Domain Name Information

Your domain name is your online identity. It is the name people come to know your web site by and the name they type into their browser's address bar to bring up your pages.

In reality your page is only known by a number, an IP address that might look similar to this: 69.20.21.110 but you can imagine if people had to try to remember hundreds of numbers to find your web site. Thanks to special computers and software in those computers and routers, you can use a plain text name instead. DNS or name servers contain databases of domain names linked with their associated IP address. When you type in a domain name your browser first contacts a name server to have it look up the true (IP) address of the intended web site, then routs your browser to that IP address.  Once connected to the destination web server, a local DNS looks up the specific web page you requested and delivers that to your screen, typically in a few blinks of the eye. To conserve a shrinking supply of IP addresses many servers use name-based hosting where many domains may share a single IP address. That is where the servers own local DNS takes over.  We use a mix of shared and exclusive IP's depending on specific needs of a web site such as a digital security certificate (SSL) which needs it's own IP address.

If you know the actual IP address of the site you wish to visit you can just type that into your browser and bypass the DNS between your computer and the destination web server. This can also provide you with a simple test to troubleshoot an occasional problem with your ISP if you can't view web sites.  If you can view a page via the IP address but not by the domain name, chances are your ISP is having problems with their name servers used to do the name lookups.

Choosing a domain name is tricky these days. When we started there was little competition for domain names and finding a name to match your company name was rather easy. With so many domains registered it is getting pretty hard to find that ideal name, especially in the most popular .com top level domain. (TLD) Other TLDs include .org, .net, .biz, .us, .name and of course each nation on the planet has it's own national TLD. Ours is the .us extension. Popular foreign domain extensions are .tv and .cc with some others catching on. What you decide on is not as important as it once was because people today are very used to multiple domain extensions.  The .com is still preferred but don't let it break your heart of you can't find a name to your liking there.

What should your name be?  Some like having their company name as their .com. Others like a name that describes their product or service. Some want a combination. Some just go for wild as did Google, Yahoo and some other well known sites. Having your business name as part of your domain name can make it easier for your customers and return visitors to remember your location. It does little in a search engine when those looking for your type of business have no clue as to your name. It can be useful and affordable given today's relatively low cost of registering a domain name, to have more than one. You may find your company name is available and also want a domain name that reflects your business type. You may want a third, shorter version just to make emails easier to remember.  They can all deliver your viewers to your one main web site.

Consider registering your name for multiple years, at least after the first year when you are comfortable your site is providing you with new business. It is suggested that search engines check your domain's expiration date and give higher rank to domains who's owners believed in their own future enough to register for 5 or even 10 years in advance. There is little if any cost savings but it does fix your price for the long haul and eliminates pesky annual renewals.

We have a master account where we manage most of our customer's domain names. If you choose to register and manage your own domain elsewhere please remember to keep your email and other contact information updated at all times. Failure to do so could mean missing that renewal notice and having your domain name ( hence your web site ) suddenly expire. Worse, someone else could register it and take your name as well.

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