Looking after your domain names part 1

People often get in very sticky situations when it comes to domain names and their registration and renewal.

It can be confusing for people to understand the relationship between their domain name, their email address, their website and how it all fits together in the big world wide web.

So, I'm going to try and explain how it works, bear with me.

Choosing your domain
First of all, you need a name. Let's say you start a mobile disco company and your name is Dave. You decide that you want to call your new company 'Dave's Mobile Disco'. Very good. But I suspect there may be a few other Daves out there working the decks. The first step is to see if your domain, or web name, is available. Almost any domain name registration company will have a domain search facility on their website. So you search. www.davesmobiledisco.co.uk and www.davesmobliedisco.com have already been registered by another Dave (probably in California!). So, Dave starts putting in hyphens or looking at other types of domains, and ends up with; www.daves-mobile-disco-online.org.uk. Dave, listen, nobody will ever remember that.

Lets explain the different types of domain;
.co.uk this is for UK companies and a good solution
.com is the 'global' version and all the big boys aim for it
.net is the poor cousin and doesn't really hit the mark
.org, or .org.uk should be used if you are a government body or a charity

There are lots of other domains types out there, like .me or .mob, but these tend to be specialist and back up your 'main domains'.

It is increasingly difficult to find a free domain these days. Which is why you end up with companies like www.ubeemobo.com or whatever.

Think laterally, think clever.

Registering your domain
You can register your domain yourself, and you should. But when you set up the account with the domain registration company, MAKE SURE you keep a record of your username and password. Not just on your computer, but print it out and keep it in a safe place. You then have ownership yourself, it's yours. This also means, when you put in your old Hotmail address as a contact, when the domain comes up for renewal, you will be sent an email saying 'renew your domain' and if you miss that email, because you stop using that account or can't be arsed to check it very often, you run the risk of losing that domain and some sneaky fellow will snap it up. Then they own it, and it's very, very hard to do anything about it.

It is OK to let an agency register the domain for you, they will make sure (if they are nice people) that you are listed as the owner and they are listed as the technical or administrative contacts.

You an opt in, or opt out of this thing called the 'Whois look up'. It's a list of the domains registered and tells anyone who cares to look, who owns the domain, and their details. It's not a bad thing in itself.

If look after you own domains, remember, your email and website will disappear if you do not renew them, this happens a lot. If I had a penny for every time a client rings me screeching, my email has gone down and my website has disappeared, only to find they have not responded to the reminder email...

So now you own your domain. Essentially, it's like a patch, or a forwarding service, it is nothing in itself except a name. You don't even have to use it, it can just sit there.

Most domain registration services offer two services; hosting and email. You don't have to use them and most of the time, it's not always the most appropriate. Let's see if I can explain how the next bit works... in Part 2