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My name is Santosh but I can't register a santosh.com because it is already taken. Most extensions for Santosh are already taken. I was trying to register a domain with .sh extension but santo.sh would cost me very high and I can't afford ~$100 for just a personal domain and that's only for one year only.

Now I am thinking that I should register a sntsh.com. But there is a problem, will sntsh.com over my name Santosh don't create a SEO problem?

One more thing, that totally different from above topic. If I register a santosh.name domain which is not registered, won't it create copyright and any legal problems with other santosh domains?

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3 Answers 3

up vote 5 down vote accepted

It shouldn't create an SEO problem for you it's the content that creates the ranking, not the domain name.

So far as copyright and legal problems go, so long as you don't steal content from other similarly named sites there won't be a problem - you name is santosh and you have as much right to use that domain as anyone else.

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Well in some cases it's the content, in other cases it's the incoming links that create the rankings. It goes both ways, and depends on so many factors. A site talking about some random imaginary island that doesn't exist would rank based on the content if google had no other page in their document server with that word. Then in many cases it's been shown you can rank for a word that doesn't even exist on your site. I wouldn't worry so much about having a keyword in the domain name, as I would with getting backlinks and having good relevant content. –  Anagio Mar 13 '12 at 15:50
@Anagio it's also the content that convinces people to link in the first place... –  toomanyairmiles Mar 13 '12 at 16:39

as said by @toomanyairmiles I think its mainly content that drives SEO, however if you look at most top SEO sites, they have SEO in the name somewhere. I believe keywords in domains are becoming less and less important though.

One thing you may wish to consider is if your telling someone about your website... sntsh.com is a touch clunky when trying to describe/ remember it. Had you thought of giving it an abstract name or adding something obvious to it e.g. santoshdesign.com

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Your SEO will not be affected, as content and on-page optimization is much more important than the URL.

That being said, NEVER use an abbreviation in a domain name, unless it is an extremely common abbreviation. Personal abbreviations are too complicated for others to remember and will be easily forgotten.

This may be overly simplified, but why not register your full name instead of just one name?

Regarding the legal question, and I'm not a lawyer, but in the US, if Santosh is your legal name, you can use as you wish for business/personal without repercussion from another business.

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