Domain name registration

I remember when I registered my first Internet domain name back in June 1996. I eagerly paid the $60.00 fee for a one year registration so I could get my presence on the world wide web. Back then I did not have a clue how this stuff worked. I had a free hosted site on GeoCities and a free e-mail address at Hotmail. I thought that when visitors typed my domain name they would be directed to my free site and if they e-mailed me the e-mail could be directed to my Hotmail inbox.

What they failed to tell me was that after registering my name, I would need to buy several other things to make this a reality. I was told I would need some sort of a DNS name server, web server and e-mail server which would come up to a monthly total of $39.95 at the time. So in addition to my $60.00 registration fee I was going to have to plunk down $479.40 a year extra to make the whole thing work. I thought to myself, there has to be a cheaper and easier way to use my existing e-mail and web site with my new domain name.

After some searching I realized that something like this would have to be built from scratch and various tools would have to be put together to make this work. Today there is finally a solution. It is called "domain name forwarding with e-mail forwarding". We asked our registration service provider to integrate these tools into our site and make them available to our visitors. So once a domain name is registered using our site these features will be available to you for free.

Sounds good but what about all those ads on free hosted sites similar to GeoCities. That hardly looks professional does it? Most Internet service providers already offer their customers free web page hosting and e-mail without advertisements. Since most Internet service providers provide both a web page and e-mail, all you have to do is register your domain name with us. Once registered, use the included domain and e-mail forwarding to redirect your new domain name to your web page and e-mail. You now have a full fledged website and e-mail at your own domain name with no monthly fees. Nice!

Here is an example of domain name forwarding. Open an new page in your browser and go to the web address "dns-demo.com" you will see that it points back to this page. You probably noticed that the name changed after you typed it and pressed enter. Now try it again with the www added to the name. "www.dns-demo.com". You will notice that the name did not change this time. This feature is called masking and is included free in an easy to use web browser based control panel. All you have to do is enable or disable this feature per your liking. Currently it is disabled on dns-demo.com but enabled when someone types www.dns-demo.com. How you set this up is your choice. Feel free to contact us by e-mail if you would like a demo set up for an existing site.

You may be asking yourself, so what if I change my Internet service provider? Well all you would need to do is log in to the simple web based control panel and change the address to your new Internet service provider which would look something like:

• WWW.MY-INTERNET-NAME.COM --> WWW.OLD-ISP.NET/SITES/~MYSITE


This would be changed to look like: 

• WWW.MY-INTERNET-NAME.COM --> WWW.NEW-ISP.NET/SITES/~MYSITE

What I find extremely convenient is that in addition to domain name forwarding you can also set up a complete DNS zone if you are using paid hosting. As your needs grow we scale with you at no additional cost. If you already use paid hosting I am sure you are aware that users tend to switch hosting providers very often for various reasons. If you have done this before you are well aware of the frustration and down time involved. With managed DNS, URL forwarding and e-mail forwarding this process becomes painless and you will continue to receive your e-mail at the same place. There is no need to go through the lengthy process of transferring your domain name to your new provider then having your site down for days while the process completes. All you have to do is enter the information for your new provider in the simple web based control panel and that's it.

Domain name selection

The Internet is being revolutionized with the advent of personal domain names. More and more people are registering their personal name and future business names. Some even speculate on the future resale value of domain names and purchase them as inventory items for future sale. Domain names are the equivalent of Internet real estate. Domain registrations are increasingly becoming like that of the rush to own real estate in the last great migration to the wild west.

Everyone wants to have a domain name and they should have an Internet identity. A word of caution however, don't get too greedy. Remember those fees must be paid annually and can rack up fast in a big domain portfolio. Because a catchy name is available does not mean you need to register it. First stop and ask yourself what you are going to use it for. If it's an investment then go ahead and speculate but be aware it may take a couple years to find a buyer depending on your resale price. If you are on a limited budget and just want to create a web site with it's own identity, then just get one and make it the highest quality possible. Quite a few people have recently been registering personal domain names for use with social networking sites such as Facebook, Myspace, Hi5 and Twitter. I registered my own personal name BenjaminBurn.com for my Facebook page so my friends could find me easily.

If this is your first time registering a domain name the most popular and easy to remember is .com. Everyone associates a domain name with .com, however it is getting increasingly hard to find .com names. A name ending in .de is inexpensive at $9.95 per year but somewhat hard to remember. There is also .biz, since it is catchy it is somewhat limited in availability. The new .bz although a bit expensive sound like biz and has a lot more names available. Since .bz is relatively new, investment speculators have not started bulk registering these names yet.

Happy domain hunting and all the best in your endeavors!