Free Web Address

From LoveToKnow Web-Design

Why would anyone want a free web address? Why wouldn't they - especially in the cutthroat world of the web, it can be very useful to test your site idea with a free location before investing in a fully designed website.

Other Reasons for a Free Web Address

The word "address" can mean different things. Maybe you don't need an entire website, maybe you only need an email address. There can be several reasons for this:

Use the alternative email address to capture spam from websites that ask for email addresses
Avoid using your work email for personal business
Avoid using your personal email for on-line business such as auctions.
Maintain anonymity for various reasons, from the romantic to the political

While there are many small websites that will give you little-used domain names, by far the easiest and most secure way to get a free web address to use for email is to go to one of the big trusted names like Google or Yahoo.

What's in a Name?

While Google and Yahoo will be happy to come up with a name for you, it would be a good idea to spend some time finding something better than "JohnSmith16543." The reason for this is memory. This is because when you tell someone your email address, it's much easier for them to remember "MotorcycleJohnny@gmail.com," rather than some random bunch of numbers. One of the rules of branding is to make sure your product or business name is something that easily gets stuck in the mind of the potential client, so try and follow the following guidelines:

Use easy-to-spell words that are one or two syllables. No one misspells "moo.com."
Avoid homonyms, or words with alternate spellings like "too" or "grey."
Avoid word combinations that have the same letter at the end and beginning – for example, "www.canssmash.com" would be very confusing because of the two S's in the middle.
Resist the urge to use hyphens or underscores in the name – they are easily misplaced and can result in emails getting sent that don't ever reach you.

All those rules apply to choosing actual domain names, as well. But where can you get a domain name for free?

Sources for Free Web Address URLs

There are a few different ways to acquire an actual web address with your own personal name (or business name) involved. One thing needs to be clear from the start: it is not possible, at this time, to get absolutely free domain names ending in popular domains like .com, .net, .biz, and the like.

However, you can get your name as part of a larger domain. For example, you can open a blog at Wordpress, Livejournal, or Blogger, and have an address that reads "YourName.Blogger.com" pretty easily. However, these are actual blogs, and while you can do a lot with them using widgets, you may not want to have that kind of constant demand for content on your site.

Building a Homestead

A very popular and easy way to build your own web address for free is to try out HomeStead. This site is the successor to seminal websites like Tripod.com that populated the early world wide web, and setting up your site is as easy as the following three steps:

Choose a design from their professionally designed template library.
Customize the design with your own content, such as with images, text, and also your own domain name (or use the one they can give you for free).
Publish it with one click, with all the content hosted by HomeStead.

Of course, step 2 is actually several steps in and of itself, but the fact remains that setting up a free HomeStead site is one of the easiest ways to get on the web.

Just the Address, Please

If you don't need the hosting space, but only need an address, there are sites such as FreeDomain. If you are willing to put a small link image back to their site on your site, you are welcome to create any domain you like with the format of "YourDomain.co.nr." While that is not as easy to remember as ".com," it is not too confusing, and may be the fastest route to getting your own free web address online.

Whatever the method, there is nothing stopping you from getting your free web address right now. So what are you waiting for?

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