DOMAIN NAME

• How To choose An Appropriate Name

• What Does The TLD Extension (.com,net, and org) mean?

• Why You Should Buy A Name Grouping

• Checking For Name Availability

• Determining Trademark/Service Mark Conflict

• Domain Tips & Suggestions

• Domain Costs

• What Are Subdomains

• Maintaining Your Domains

A domain name is your identity on the Internet and selecting the right domain name or grouping of names is very important. There are many factors involved with selecting your domain name and since many good names have already been taken, you may have to be creative or make some compromises in order to come up with a name that fits your needs and is still available.

Your name does not have to be related to what you do, for instance the word "Yahoo" has nothing to do with searching, yet it was chosen as being easy for people to remember. If you are a business that deals with the public, then a short easy to remember name is recommended like (go.com, bop.com etc.). Another common technique is to create a name that is memorable and describes what you do such as winninglawyers.com or HostingWithService.com etc.

On the other hand, if you have an established company, then your company name may be the best and most unique name to use like Xerox.com, IBM.com etc.

It's important to keep your domain name as short as you can and as easy to spell as possible.

Each domain has an extension called a TLD (Top Level Domain) of (.com/.net/.org/.gov/.mil etc.) These TLD's are commonly used to delineate a particular category of business i.e.:

.com is short for commercial for profit enterprise.

.net is short for network and is generally used for Internet and telecommunications network providers.

.org is short for organization and is generally used for industry groups or non profit organizations.

.biz is short for business and is another general purpose domain.

.info is short for information and is used for websites that educate and inform.

.gov and .mil are reserved exclusively for government.

The most popular TLD is .com and represents 74% of the total world market. There are other TLD extensions for different foreign countries and new TLDs like .name or .pro are expected to be available shortly. Although most businesses are commercial, there is nothing preventing you from purchasing all TLD's that are available for your domain.

Each additional TLD must be registered.  So, www.mysite.com is one registration and www.mysite.net is another registration and so on.

Most businesses purchase at least one .com domain name and should strongly consider purchasing the .net and .org. extensions as well. This will ensure that your competitors don't purchase them and try to set up sites that will leverage off of your existing name or popularity.

Another reason for purchasing a grouping of TLD's is if you ever decide to sell your names, a complete grouping has much higher value.

Lastly, you will want to create various "doorway pages" for your website each requiring a different TLD. Each doorway page is a variation of your website that is optimized to "rank" well for a particular search engine using a different "key search word or phrase" and often redirects to your primary web page. For example:

realestate.com - code optimized for search phrase "real estate" for Lycos search engine
realestate.net - code optimized for search phrase "mortgage rate" for Excite search engine
realestate.org - code optimized for search phrase "buy new home" for AOL search engine

If you don't grab up a full grouping of names while they are available, you may find someone trying to sell you a name for many thousands of dollars down the road.

A domain name can be up to 67 characters in length and include dashes "-" but not spaces. Using dashes can make it easier to separate the words within your domain and some search engines actually crawl the domain more efficiently.
Generally it is not advisable to use long domain names since they are harder to remember and users are more likely to make a typing error. The main use of long domain names is to make a special "doorway page" that incorporates commonly used search "key" words in the domain. For example a real estate company might use (realestate-sales-newhome-mortgage-equityloan-real-estate-agent.com) and refer respondents to their main page www.equitypartners.com

Tip 1: If your desired name is not available, you may wish to add an "i" or "e" to the beginning of the name i.e.: (If officesupply.com is taken, try eofficesupply or iofficesupply etc.). Although you can use dashes in a domain name, they make it much harder for people to remember and more likely to mess up when entering it into a browser so try to stay away from "bobs-big-house.com or gen-x.com" etc.

Tip 2: People search based upon three things: Category, Company Name, or Product Name. If your company is best known by a particular "branded product", you should develop a domain for both your product and your main company ie: www.chrysler.com and www.jeep.com to make it easier for people to find you.

Tip 3: If you have a long company name ie: international gasket manufacturing corporation, use a shorter version intergasman.com or just an abbreviation like igmc.com

Tip 4: Select a domain name that has an obvious spelling. Hearing the name "expedia" a customer might try: xpidia, xpedia, exspeedia or xpedea only to get frustrated and give up before ever reaching your site.

You should also confirm that another company does not have a trade or service mark on the name you are selecting. You can check trademarks registered in the United States by going to the US Patent and Trade Mark site by clicking here. (opens in new window)
 

Once you have made a list of your desired name(s), you can start the Hosting Service Account Creation process which will tell you if any of your domains are available and allow you to order your hosting service immediately.  Or, if you are quite ready to begin with Hosting,  you can visit our Domain Management site and start by setting up an account there so when you find an available domain you can immediately register it before anyone else beats you to it.  Then, later on when you are ready to begin building your website, your domain name will be ready and waiting for you.

Hosting With Service is an authorized representative for an ICANN approved domain registrar.  We offer domain registrations to you at the wholesale price of only $12.99/year.  Unlike my other registrations services, we allow you to purchase a single year registration for your first time.  Most other registration services force you to purchase 2 years on your initial registration.

After registering the domain in your name, we will supply you with a separate and secure "domain control panel" so you can access and update your domain record information at any time.  You are in full control and ownership of your domain.  We never hold domain names "hostage" for hosting account payments.

To find available domains and register them, go to our "Domain Management" website now.

To find available domains and register them as well as start your hosting service, select the hosting package of your choice from our home page.

Many people are very irresponsible when it comes to maintaining their domains and this can lead to BIG TROUBLE.

Your domain is an exclusive right to a specific name that is maintained by paying the annual registration fees. If you don't follow the proper rules, that right can be revoked and you can lose the rights to control the domain or you can incur severe penalties to regain the rights back to a domain or you can lose the rights altogether allowing it to be resold to someone else and lost forever

1. Maintain Your Domain Information: You must maintain your domain information to be accurate and especially make sure that the administrative email address used is one that is working and that you can send and receive from.

If you change email addresses make sure to update your domain or you may lose the right to transfer it or to access your domain control keys. REMEMBER your domain email address is the way that the registrar or hosting company reaches you for renewal notices and also how they authenticate you as the domain owner.

2. You Are Responsible For Making Sure Your Domain Is Current: When you buy a domain it can be from one year to as much as 10 years. There are no hard rules for the amount of time to prepay for your domain. Some people like to go year to year...this way they can dispose of a domain if it does not work out for their needs without major loss. Conversely some people buy a domain for 2 or 3 years at a time...enough so that they need not worry about it for a while yet not so long as to over invest and some people with domains of high value prepay for 5 or 10 years.

What ever you decide it is YOUR responsibility to make sure that your domain is renewed before it expires so write it down on a calendar and treat it like a very important birthday.

Even though the registrar or agent who sold it to you will generally send renewal notices they can not guarantee that the mail is deliverable or you will receive the renewals so make it YOUR RESPONSIBILITY to stay on top of this very important asset. If you don't receive an invoice within one or two weeks of expiration contact the party you purchased it from immediately.

3. What Happens If You Don't Pay Your Domain Renewal: When your domain expires the whois record will show the domain status as "Registrar Lock" and many registrars turn off your domain DNS so your website becomes inactive. The domain system allows a small grace period of 7 - 20 days for the original owner to renew the domain after it expires and is under "Registrar Lock". During this initial grace period only the former owner is give the option of renewing the domain and it is protected from others buying or renewing it. If you pay the renewal during the "Registrar Lock" the domain will be renewed and reset back to "Active" status and the registrar will reset your DNS and your site will come back online.

If you don't renew your domain during the "Registrar Lock" then the domain goes into the "Redemption Period". Redemption generally lasts for 30 days and is your last chance to renew the domain after it has expired. Once the domain goes into redemption, a penalty release fee must be paid to the central registry of the domain by the registrar in order to recapture it. Once a domain is in Redemption only the former owner is give the option of recapture the domain however the penalty fee charged by the registrar to get the domain out of redemption is generally $100-$200 plus the registrar or agents normal renewal costs.

If you don't pay the redemption penalty fee, then the domain goes into the "Deletion Period". Once the domain is in deletion the former owner loses exclusive rights to renew or recapture the domain and the domain will be made available for anyone to purchase as a new domain. To make sure that the domain system is fair, the registry will also notify all the other domain registrars throughout the world that your former domain will be back on the open market and if your former domain was popular, it may well get purchased by a competitor or domain speculator before you have time to blink.

4. Avoid Domain Slammers: Many people fall victim to domain slammers who send out ambiguously written emails or letters in an attempt to make it seem that they are your domain supplier and unknowingly get you to change to their services (See this example by Domain Registry of America). The offers are technically a sales solicitation and not illegal however they are generally more expensive and can add to billing confusion and cost down the road when your original domain supplier attempts to re-bill you.

Summary: Treat your domain like any other financial asset and proactively keep an eye on your domains expiration, passwords and billing and you will not have anything to worry about.

Q:  Who owns the new domains that I register?

A: All new domain(s) are owned by you and registered in your name. You are free to choose to host them with us or not and will be provided with your own control panel to modify or update your administrative information at any time.

Q: Do I have to host my new domain?

A: No, you can leave the domain name unhosted.  You can even host them with some other service and still use our domain management website to maintain your domain registrations.

Q: Can I register and manage multiple domains?

A: Certainly.  Our domain management website gives you full control over all your domains.  If you have registered domains with some other registration service you can easily transfer those domains to our domain management website so all your domain registrations are located in one easy to use management utility.

Q: Can I have my domain registrations automatically renew so I don't accidently lose the rights to my registered domains?

A: Absolutely!  And we recommend that you do so for just that reason.  Our domain management website allows you to securely store your credit card information so when your domain registration comes up for renewal it will be automatically renewed.  Of course, you will get notified via email well ahead of it's renewal date and you will be notified when your domain is automatically renewed so you will know that your credit card has been charged.

Copyright ©2005 designingresults.com

Home        About Us        Support        Services        Contacts        Learning Center

Sponsored Advertisements Below