Domain Name Research
When doing domain name research prior to starting an SEO campaign, and it should always be done Prior to starting and SEO campaign, you will either already have a domain name to work with or you will be looking for one to start with.
Age of a Domain
Here in lies the first problem! If you are starting out with a fresh domain name you are at an advantage and a disadvantage. Youu are at an advantage because you can chose the best domain to fit your SEO campaign but you are at a disdvantage because of the domains age. You will almost certainly face the Google Sandbox. The age of the domain is an important factor in modern search engines which puts you at a distinct disadvantage with a new domain name.
Keyword in Domain Name
Using your keywords in your domain name is a good idea. It stands to reason that if you were selling widgets (sorry!) you would register www.widgets.com, or something to that extent. If you have two keywords you may wish to register www.left-widgets.com or www.leftwidgets.com. Be careful not to be too over zealous with this though. I would recomend using no more than one hyphen in a domain name. Recent tests have shown that seperating keywords is not as important anymore.
Checking out the Domain Name
Let me introduce you to a fabulous tool - www.domaintools.com. This tool single handedly tells you almost all you could ever wish to knwo about a domain.
For example lets look at Google entry. We can see the alexa ranking, how many Yahoo directory listings there are. We can see the IP address and geographical location where the site is hosted. Very important is the blacklist status which shows any bad history of the domqain and if the domain has been black listed at any time. you should also check the domain history on www.archive.org, to see if the site has a dodgy history.
After these checks you can use the search engines them seleves to find information. The first step is typing the domain name www.domainname.com into the search engines to see if it is even indexed. If not, there is your first problem. If the site is indexed, type the full title of the index page and put it in quotes, if it doesn't come in the top ten for this (unless it is a short title in a very competetive area) you will have your work cut out. Check how many links the search engines has listed for the site, check up on these back links too! See how many pages are indexed and when the last cache was. All these things tell you how much work you have to do.
Legal Issues
Lastly, make sure that any domain name you are using does not infringe any copyright or breach a trademark. Brand name domain names can be in breach of certain laws and agreements. This is beyond the scope of this site and you should always seek legal council before making any firm decisions on a domain name.
Foor Note
It pays to take time and caution here as once you have a domain name towork with, you are stuck with it! Think carefully about all aspects of the site, business and domain name before you make a decision.