Why Should Registrants Still Utilize Whois Privacy Services
The WHOIS database lists information about each domain registration online and is open to the public. In regards to Registrant information, the amount that is displayed publicly may differ based on a number of factors, including:
- The specific domain extension
- The type of Registrant used for the registration
This means that malicious entities are still able to quickly access this public directory and survey for potential pieces of information to exploits. By replacing your information through a privacy service, your information is effectively blocked from public access.
Risks Of Changing Your Domain Name
Risk is inherent to the nature of business. However, theres never an excuse for exposing your business to more risk than necessary.
Changing your domain name can be a great boon for your business, but it comes with its fair share of risks. Lets explore what those risks are and address what you can do to change your domain name with as little risk as possible.
- Wasting time and money.
- Losing traffic or search rankings that have previously built up.
- Loss of your brand awareness.
- Losing backlink traffic and rankings.
Connecting Your Domain Name To Mailchimp
Whether youve bought your domain through Mailchimp or a third party, you can transfer your domain name and connect it to your Mailchimp account. Once connected, you can use that domain with a custom landing page or Mailchimp-hosted website. If you dont already have a website, Mailchimp offers a free website builder that you can use to make your brand stand out with no coding skills required.
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Avoid Numbers And Hyphens
Imagine asking your 10 friends to spell or pronounce a domain name filled with numbers and dashes. It wont work.
If you choose a domain name with these elements, youre likely going to lose traffic to people who cant remember your domain or effectively tell someone else how to find it. We probably wouldnt have Facebook today if you had to go to Face-Book.com to reach the site.
Check Your Billing Records
Checking your billing records is probably the easiest, and therefore, the first method you should use. Typically, your domain name registrar is who you bought your domain name from. If you dont remember who that registrar is, try searching your email archives for records regarding your domain name registration . The domain registrar should be listed on your invoice.
Its imperative that you keep your domain registrar up to date regarding changes to your email address and/or contact information. Registrars send renewal notifications to the email address they have listed.
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Set Up The Blank / Naked Version Of Your Domain
When we think of the web, we tend to assume all websites start with the www prefix. However, the chances are you probably visit websites on a regular basis without using www at all.
For example, you can visit LCN by either using www.lcn.com or simply lcn.com the latter address without the www is often called a naked domain.
What is actually happening here is lcn.com is merely redirecting to our proper www.lcn.com address. However, without setting this up, users will just get an error page when visiting your sites naked domain variant and this isnt a good experience for anyone.
lcn.com naked domain redirecting to www.lcn.com
You should be able to do this easily enough at most domain providers. Naturally, here at LCN its super straight-forward.
Simply find your domain name from the Domains section of your account, look for DNS settings, and from here selectAdd an A record.
When adding your new A record, ensure you leave the hostname field blank, and add the IP address for your server .
As with everything at LCN, if you get stuck, just give us a call or get us on LiveChat and well have the problem fixed in minutes.
What Is The Difference Between A Workgroup And A Domain
The main difference between workgroups and domains is how resources on the network are managed. Computers on home networks are usually part of a workgroup, and computers on workplace networks are usually part of a domain. To use any computer in the workgroup, you must have an account on that computer.
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How To Find Out Where You Bought Your Domain Name From
The first method is the simplest.
Check your emails.
When you register your domain name the domain registrar will usually send an email to your inbox with the details of the purchase & if you run a search for your domain in your email client, you might just find it.
Lost the email? No problem we have a fallback.
The fallback is to use something called a WHOIS search. The WHOIS search will pull up all of the details of your domain name, including where it was registered and thankfully the search is free to do.
There are various WHOIS tools that you can use, but one of my favourites is this one provided by DomainTools.
So open that site in a new window, then firstly enter your domain as shown below:
Hit search, then the next page will bring up all of the details of your domain.
Itll look something like this:
You can ignore most of the data though as the only bit you need to be interested in is the Registrar section.
Going off the above example we can see that the domain registrar is 123-Reg Limited as shown below:
Hopefully, the name in that section will make it obvious as to who the registrar is. For example, it might be Godaddy, or NameCheap, etc.
Some registrars though trade under different names from their company names.
Its no big deal though, it just means an extra step.
Simply copy the name listed in the registrar section, & run a search for it.
Find Your Domain Host
Your domain host is typically who you bought your domain name from. If you dont remember who your domain host is, search your email archives for billing records about registration or transfer of your domain name.
Your domain host is listed on your invoice.
If you cant find your billing records, you can search for your domain host online. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers is a non-profit organization that collects domain information. Use the ICANN Lookup tool to find your domain host.
Domain resellers
Some domains are hosted by resellers through a separate registrar. If you cant sign in with your listed registrar or the registrar field is blank, your domain host may be a reseller.
If there is no reseller listed, contact the listed registrars support team for help.
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Identify Your Domain Host
A domain host is an internet service that manages your domain name, such as, example.com. Domain hosts use Domain Name System records to connect your domain name with email, websites, and other web services. Popular domain hosts include GoDaddy, enom, DreamHost, and 1& 1 IONOS, to name a few.
Google Cloud uses DNS records to set up online services. For example, to use your domain with Google Workspace, add DNS records with your domain host.
How Is Whois Changing
In light of the General Data Protection Regulation, or GDPR, coming into force within the European Union in May 2018, many Registries and Registrars that operate within that region, or globally, are required to gain Registrant’s consent before disclosing Personally Identifiable Information to any third parties or the public. As a result of the implementation of the GDRP, much of the data historically found within WHOIS will no longer be included or be redacted. The absence of this information has a trickle-down effect throughout the domain industry, affecting WHOIS data output for domain names and Registrants that do not have an immediate or obvious nexus to the European Union
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How To Check The History Of A Domain Name
The first computers started connecting to one another through Wide Area Networks in the 1960s. However, it took several years before the Internet exploded in 1990. The World Wide Web was created a year later, which also gave way to commercial service providers to begin operating. The registration of domain names became an official part of the process.
Initially, owning a domain name was free but the exponential increase of Internet use needed to be controlled. Registration services were offered, and the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers was created. ICANN is a nonprofit corporation that manages the domain name system of the Internet, as well as its other elements, including IP address allocation and protocol parameter designation.
Fast forward to today, it is estimated that there are more than 19 million registered domain names. Approximately 40,000 are registered each day, proving that there is nothing that can stop the Internet from growing. Buying a domain name from a domain registrar is now a simple process which takes less than 2 minutes.
Purchase Your Domain Name And Complete Its Registration
Once you settle on a domain name, its time to purchase it. When you buy through Mailchimp, well let you know the annual cost of the domain name as well as any available discounts.
During the checkout process, youll be required to enter your contact information, including an email address, to register the domain.
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Check Your Credit Card And Paypal Statements
Usually, domain names are renewed automatically every year. So if you scour your credit card statements, you should be able to find a charge for about $10 to $25. Hopefully, on that line item, youll see some information on the company you bought your domain name from. Look them up on Google and call them to ask about the charge and if they are the registrar of your domain name.
You can also call your credit card company and ask them about any line items that you think might be charged from your domain name registrar. They can give you more information about who the merchant is and their contact information.
PRO TIP: Some registrars charge every two years, five years, or ten years. Thats a common little trick they employ to get more money up front faster. Sometimes theyll even pre-check 10-year billing cycles just to sneak in a nice fat one-time payment. This can make it a lot harder to figure out who your domain name registrar is since you might have to look through ten years of credit card statements to figure out who the company is.
Theres also a chance you bought your domain name using PayPal. Log in to your PayPal account and look through your transactions to see if there are any charges from a domain name registrar.
Secure Your Social Media Accounts
Before you get too involved with one particular social media network it makes sense to secure all the relevant social media accounts for your website/business.
In the short term you may only plan to use Twitter or Facebook, but whos to say later down the line you might not look to use other platforms such as LinkedIn and Instagram as you expand your social media footprint?
For branding purposes its wise to ensure your social media accounts all have the same username/handle. Theres nothing more frustrating than going to sign up to a social network only to find someone else has beaten you to the punch.
When you find out all the best usernames are taken
For instance, at LCN.com we use the handle lcndotcom for all our social networks
- com/lcndotcom
- com/user/lcndotcom
- you get the idea
While this sounds like a terribly laborious task, its actually pretty easy to check the availability of your preferred name without signing up to each network individually.
Check out a tool called namechk , then just pop in your desired username/handle and hit enter. All of the social networks that are available will show in green.
This kind of preparation at the beginning of a website and/or business launch is vital for your long-term branding prospects. Get it right from the get-go.
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Use Some Apple Terminal / Linux Tools
Heres the geeky way using the Terminal app on a Mac or it works in Linux. Most IT people live in Windows land and dont have access to great tools like this. I dont know how many emails Ive received from supposed IT People asking me to tell them the IP address of a website. Its public info you just need to look it up but they dont know how. Heres now
Do a dig. Type in dig and then the domain name :
TonyMacbookPro:~ tony$ dig tonyherman.com < < > > DiG 9.8.3-P1 < < > > tonyherman.com global options: +cmd Got answer: -> > HEADER< < - opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 7602 flags: qr rd ra QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0 QUESTION SECTION: tonyherman.com. IN A ANSWER SECTION:tonyherman.com. 86400 IN A 67.192.51.67 Query time: 71 msec SERVER: 10.0.1.1#53 WHEN: Mon May 2 20:50:17 2016 MSG SIZE rcvd: 48
And then take that result and do a dig -x on it to find out more
TonyMacbookPro:~ tony$ dig -x 67.192.51.67 < < > > DiG 9.8.3-P1 < < > > -x 67.192.51.67 global options: +cmd Got answer: -> > HEADER< < - opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 24104 flags: qr rd ra QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0 QUESTION SECTION: 67.51.192.67.in-addr.arpa. IN PTR ANSWER SECTION:67.51.192.67.in-addr.arpa. 3600 IN PTR web2.webstix.com. Query time: 37 msec SERVER: 10.0.1.1#53 WHEN: Mon May 2 20:50:23 2016 MSG SIZE rcvd: 73
Tools To Use For Checking A Domain Names History
At this point, you should already understand that it is important to be aware of your domains history before you actually purchase and use it. The Internet leaves a trail that can easily be traced and you cannot hide anything online. The domain you may be interested in buying could have a history of its own, which may include sensitive content and malicious code. It may even have different owners before you.
Thankfully, it is possible for you to figure out the history of the domain you are using or any domain name that you may wish to buy. You can investigate whether it is worth your investment or not. Here are the best tools that will let you check the history of a domain:
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