How To Buy A Domain Name
Before you actually take out your card and make that purchase, you should understand why you need to register your domain. Your domain is your little piece of real estate online, and as such, its registration needs to go through the centralized authority: the ICANN .
In order for this to happen, you need to acquire your domain through an accredited registrar, which is accredited to deal, on your behalf, with the ICANN. Your registrar will thus ensure that your domain name is registered correctly and therefore protected. On top of this, it will be responsible for managing your domain and keeping track of monthly or yearly renewals.
Because the registrar you select will be the one dealing with your domain, we cant recommend enough to check its reputability. Many registrars are active on the market, but not all of them offer the same conditions, and some even practice hidden fees that make your domain acquisition much more expensive than it should be. Make sure you go for a reliable registrar, one that is fully transparent about fees and other terms and conditions.
Our suggestion is to pick a registrar that is also a web host, to make sure that your website and your domain are all dealt with under the same umbrella. That way, your entire website process is centralized in one, easy to access place. Considering Wix has over 150 million users, we would say its the preferred choice of many businesses worldwide.
How Do I Permanently Buy A Domain Name
You cannot buy a domain name forever. Rather than owning the domain name permanently, you are renting the license from the domain registry. This means that you have the rights to use the website name, with an option to renew registration after a certain period of time. When you register your domain name with Wix, you can purchase a one, two or three year subscription. As long as you continue to renew your subscription, it will belong to you.
Why A Domain Name Is A Must
A website must have a domain name and a web hosting server. You can find more about the difference between domain and hosting plan on our blog.
Without a domain name, visitors will only be able to access a site using its IP address, which consists of a series of numbers, making it difficult to remember. Therefore, by using a domain name, visitors will be able to remember how to access your website much more easily.
Other benefits of a domain name include:
- Branding. A domain name will be the first thing visitors will see. Therefore, its considered as a part of the websites identity and branding. A domain name can also add credibility to your site, ensuring others that you own a trustworthy business.
- SEO . If a domain name consists of a keyword in your industry, for example, hotels.com it can drive high organic traffic since its easy to remember and find.
- Investment. Its possible to buy a popular domain name and sell it once you have no more need of it. There is a large marketplace that is continuously growing for domain names.
Recommended Reading: Transfer Shopify Domain To Another Host
What To Do If You Cant Get The Domain Name You Want
Its not always possible to get the domain name you want. What should you do then?
- It might be unavailable or parked. You can contact the owner and make them an offer. Alternatively, you can modify your domain name by adding a word to it. For example, if you are using your product name, consider adding the word get to it, as Drip did with www.getdrip.com.
- It might be outside your budget. You can significantly reduce the cost of your domain name by choosing a less popular domain extension. Just dont go overboard with this. A whacky extension that no one has ever seen before might hurt your brand.
- It might be trademarked, like WordPress. When thats the case its best to just drop the idea and go back to the drawing board. Dont play with fire if you dont want to get burned.
Yes, its really annoying when you cant get a domain name that you want, but your only option is to get creative. And who knows, maybe youll come up with something even better?
Registrar Of Your Choice
Domain registration costs will depend on the services that a registrar offers. Some domain registrars will provide simple registrations, while some will offer packages that include web hosting services.
Select a registrar that suits your needs and budget best. If a domain registrar is too expensive, try looking at other registrars that might have a better offer. Whichever registrar you choose, its crucial to make sure that its an ICANN accredited registrar.
Recommended Reading: How To Find Out Who Owns Domain
Renew Before The Deadline
Waiting until the deadline has expired increases your chances of paying much more for your existing domain name. Sometimes, a person will pick up a bunch of random expired domains and sell them back to their owners for high fees.
If you know youre going to renew your domain name, then do yourself a favor and renew your domain as early as possible.
Typically, your domain name registrar will send out reminder emails for any domains you have expiring.
Where To Buy A Domain Name
Buying a new domain, rather than one thats already owned, will be the best option for most people. The domain registration and purchase processes vary a little based on what registrar you use but should be straightforward.
Domain registrars are companies that manage and sell domain names. There are standalone registrars, but most hosting providers also sell domain names.
For example, registering a domain here at DreamHost can be an easy and practical way to go. Since were both a domain registrar and a hosting provider, you can make your purchases together as a package.
Related: Didnt Buy Your Domain With DreamHost? The Domain Transfer Process, Explained
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How Much Does It Cost To Buy A Domain Name
Generally, you can expect to pay in the region of £7-£12 for a new domain registration.
As a business, its likely that youll want to buy a new domain name. However, its possible to purchase existing domain names, such as those that are expired or pre-existing, highly sought-after domain names. As well as this, you can negotiate to buy a domain name that isnt listed for sale.
While you might consider these options if theres a particular domain name that you intend to use but isnt available, the cost of a domain name thats already in existence is likely to be considerably more expensive than registering a new one.
Domain name prices can vary significantly, with very cheap options possible . And at the other end of the scale, the skys the limit for the most in-demand names, which can sell for millions of pounds!
Keep Your Domain Name And Website Up And Running
Domain names play a crucial on the virtual marketplace. Choosing a creative domain name is a time-consuming and important aspect of giving your business the tools to thrive. Such an investment is essential for success, which is why a domain name expiration can be a demoralizing and business-crippling issue, that is only made worse if a competitor manages to snatch up your domain name. All the time and effort spent on building that brand and linking it to the domain name might be all for naught.
The best way to prevent this issue is to do everything in your power to prevent such a disaster from occurring in the first place. This includes regularly checking your email and spam folders for renewal notices, setting personal alerts of expiration, always ensuring that your domains billing info is up to date, and setting your account to auto-renew. If you take the right steps, you can save yourself a serious headache, so, do not be anything less than proactive when it comes to one of your domain names possibly expiring. With the right infrastructure in place, this should never be an issue!
Domain.com has the tools you need to continue building your business into a success.
Kristin Crabb
Content Marketing Strategist working in the digital marketing industry. Skilled in SEO-focused content creation, keyword research and competitive analysis, interactive content, web content optimization, and landing page creation.
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How To Find Out Who Owns A Domain Name
When you register a domain name, the ICANN requires you to provide personal contact information that will be stored in the WHOIS database.
Basically, as soon as the domain name is in the database, the record is publicly available to anyone who uses the WHOIS search tool.
There are loads of WHOIS tools available on the Internet, but you can try out, for example, the ICANN Lookup tool.
How Are Domain Names And Search Engine Optimization Related
Its important to start thinking of ways to make your site search engine-ready from the outset. Since keywords are used by search engines for ranking your content, you might want to consider including a relevant keyword in your domain name.
Keep in mind that Googles algorithm is resistant to keyword-stuffing: the practice of cramming your domain name with keywords so as to rank higher than other websites. So dont try to include multiple keywords in your domain as this can have a detrimental effect.
The good news is . The search engines algorithm treats new TLDs and legacy TLDs equally.
Related: The Top 11 SEO Best Practices for Domains
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What Is A Domain
The easiest way to understand what is a domain is to imagine your website as a building. If your website was a home, your domain name would be its address. More precisely, every website in the world is attributed a specific IP address. But since this one comes in the shape of a series of numbers and dots, it makes it extremely hard for human visitors to remember and type. This is why domain names were created – which is basically the legible label connected to the specific IP of a site. All domains live on the domain name system , which is a universal system that assigns addresses to servers and web pages.
Example: Want to access our website builder? You can use our domain: Wix.com or our IP address: 185.230.63.164. Either way, you will arrive on the same page.
What Can I Do After Buying A New Domain Name
Lets talk about what you can do after buying a new domain to get started online successfully in 2021 and beyond. 1. Buy hosting from a reliable web host 2. Point your domain name to your web host and install WordPress 3. Get a premium WordPress theme 4. Create a custom email address using your own domain
Read Also: Transfer From Wix To Shopify
Why Are Domain Prices Different
Domain name costs vary based on the extensions. A couple of factors that determine its pricing include the registrar through which you purchase the domain as well as the domains availability and popularity. Some people even charge premium domains for more than $1,000/year due to their high market value.
Susan Curtis
Susan is a WordPress expert with a passion for marketing and SEO. She is passionate about helping people grow their online success. In her free time, Susan loves bouldering.
Can I Remove The Www From My Domain
Yes. You can remove the “www” from your domain.
You can only remove the “www” from a Squarespace domain you already registered, and it must be set as your primary domain.
Unless you’re absolutely sure that you want to only display your naked domain, this isn’t always necessary. Without changing any settings, visitors can find your site with or without typing “www” before it. If they type “yourdomain.com,” they’ll be taken to your domain, and the “www.yourdomain.com” will appear. This is a fairly standard practice across the internet.
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What Happens When A Domain Expires
There are a variety of steps that will occur during a domain name expiration:
Step 1:
Domain expiration alerts: Prior to domain name registration expiration, Domain.com will begin sending reminders to you via email. At least two alerts will be sent before expiration, and one within five days of expiration.
Step 2:
Domain name registration expires: If the domain has not been renewed by the owner prior to the expiry date, the domains status will be changed to what is called a Renewal Grace Period. Under this status, you can still renew the domain name without incurring additional fees for a grace period of thirty days. As early as one day after expiration, your domain name will be deactivated and replaced with a parking page indicating the domain name has expired, and other services you have associated with the domain name may no longer function.
Step 3:
Renewal grace period ends: Once this period ends, the expired domain names status is changed to Registrar Hold. During this thirty-day period, the original domain owner may pay a redemption fee as well as the renewal fee.
Step 4:
Step 4b:
Step 5:
Step 6:
End of registry grace period: If this grace period ends without the domain name being renewed, it will then be put under the status of pending delete. If no actions of restoration occur on the part of the original owner, registry or registrar, the domain will eventually be deleted. This deletion will then release that domain name back for general registration.
Will I Have To Continue To Pay A Fee To Keep My Domain Name After I Buy It
One of my visitors wrote to ask me, “what happens after the year for which I paid to own the domain name?Who would I be paying in order to have the right to keep the domain for a second year or more? If my site issuccessful, am I likely to find the registrar demanding an inflated price for me to keep that name?” This article attempts toclarify the issues pertaining to registeringor “buying” a domain name.
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Can I Connect My Squarespace Domain To Another Provider
Yes, this is possible. However, if you’re moving your site to a different provider, we recommend transferring your domain to them instead.
If you want to keep your domain registered with Squarespace and direct it to a third-party site, you can forward it or point it. We recommend reviewing the two options before setting up your records.
Why Should I Pay For An Ssl Certificate
I paid for an SSL certificate from Namecheap, I think it was certified by ComodoSSL. It cost me 7$, it took them a week to activate and I had to do it myself from SSH while editing my site’s configuration files.
Then a friend made me aware of Let’s Encrypt who not only give out free SSL certificates, but they can be installed by running a single command.
I’m sure I’m missing something here, but why would I want to pay for an SSL certificate when I can get one installed easily, for free, with automatic renewal set up?
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