Selecting a Good Domain Name

How a site rank in search engines depends a lot on the domain name. Selecting a good domain name is very much important in the world of SEO.
Lets say your site is about funny jokes, it would make sense to name it funnyjokes.com, but if the domain name is not available try for funnyjokes.net or funnyjokes.org

Don't stick to just .com domain name.

Choosing a domain name like myname.com makes no sense to me unless the site is related to the person's life.

Order of keywords should also be considered, funnyjokes.com and jokesfunny.com will not rank same for the keyword "funny jokes" assuming both sites are same in other aspects.

Now time for the controversy.
Its a SEO myth that if there are hyphens in domain name, the website does not rank well in serps.
Domain name with lot of hyphens appear spammy.

For eg www.this-domain-name-appear-spammy.com

My suggestion would be to avoid using hyphens in domain name.