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Maybe you've heard that:
you "buy domain" or do a "domain name search" or "domain search" or "domain lookup" or "register domain name" or "domain registration" or check "domain availability" or "domain finder". Or maybe do a "WHOIS Domain" lookup.
Here's where you'll learn all about a DOMAIN, aka DOMAIN NAME. Probably more than you need to know, but it's all here!
What is a domain name
It's a custom, personalized business or personal email address - You@YourDomainName.
It's the address of your website on the internet - www.YourDomainName.
A domain name can be up to 63 characters long, and can consist of letters, numbers and hyphens/dashes. There can't be any spaces or special characters in a domain name.
A domain name is unique... once it is registered, no one else can register the same name as long as the owner continues to keep it registered. When you want to register a domain name, the registration system first checks to see if the name is available. If no one else has already registered it, you can.
You own all domain names you register or transfer to us, not us. As the owner (the Registrant) this means you control all aspects of the domain name including contact information, forwarding, name servers, etc. You can sell it, transfer it, renew it, let it expire... whatever you want. FYI: the company which registers your domain name (that's us) is known as the Registrar.
Your new domain name will be "parked" with us on a "coming soon" web page until such time as you link it to a website.
A domain name is an internet address by which people reach your website. When someone types your domain name into a web browser, your website's pages will be shown. Behind the scenes, the domain name is actually pointing to a physical location - a computer server- that holds your website files. It knows where to find your website by using special DNS computers called "name servers".
You can use your domain name to direct visitors to any existing website, even a free one. You can use it to replace the long, complicated, hard to remember web address that your ISP, AOL, GeoCities, and others give you for free. Its done by using our Domain Forwarding Service, and best of all, its FREE. Domain Forwarding lets you use a domain name, even several domain names, to direct visitors to one website... even to specific pages within your website. When you register a domain name with us, we provide you the option of forwarding it to any existing website address - for free. Go here for more information on Domain Forwarding.
As it relates to an email address, the domain name is what comes after the @ sign in the email address. You do not have to have a website in order to have your own personalized email address like you@YourDomainName.
There's more detailed information on domain names below - including hints on creating your domain name - but if you're ready to see if the domain name you want is available - or to register and buy domain name, enter the domain name you want in the Domain Registration Search form below.
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Domain Registration Search
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Hints on Creating Your Domain Name
- You can register domain names that are a word, a name, a phrase... virtually any combination of characters
- Your domain name can be as short as 3 characters or as long as 63 characters - plus the ending extension like: .com, .net, .org, .info, .biz, .us, .ws
- Your domain name can not include any spaces and must only use letters, numbers and hyphens ( dashes "-" )
- Your domain name cannot begin or end with a hyphen (dash)
- Domain names are not case sensitive, so there is no reason to use capital letters when registering them. If in the registration process you see the domain name given in all capital letters, that is OK. The actual registration is made in all lower case letters. However, when you tell people your domain name, it's OK to use capital letters to make it easier to read-- for example: you can use BeyondBeautifulWeddingGowns.com instead of beyondbeautifulweddinggowns.com
- Your domain name must be unique. There can't be more than one website with the same address. We provide you a search tool to find out if a domain name is available.
- If the name you want is already in use, you may want to check for variations. For example, if you wanted "www.myname.com", variations of the spelling or word order may help you choose a new domain name. Check availability of "my-name.com" or "mynameonline.com" or "shopmyname.com". And don't forget to check the name with the other extensions like: "myname.NET", "myname.ORG, myname.INFO", "myname.BIZ", "myname.US or "myname.WS"
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Here's another thought: most businesses want their domain name to be the name of their company, which is perfectly understandable. However, if you can have your domain name include keywords that people might be searching for when looking for the products or services you provide, you'll give your site an edge with the search engines.
For example, if the name of your company is Beyond Beautiful; and you purchase the domain name beyondbeautiful.com, you're not using any keywords in the domain name. Someone seeing it won't have any idea what your site is about. So why not use beyond-beautiful-wedding-gowns.com, which will give the search engines (and your visitors) a keyword phrase that describes your site: wedding gowns.
The best of all worlds, is to register more than one domain name -- one as your company name, and others which have key words or phrases that describe your product(s) and/or service(s).
- Here are a few other ideas to use for creating domain names:
Prefixes
Add in front of
desired name:
- MYdomainname
- OURdomainname
- YOURdomainname
- GOdomainname
- GOTOdomainname
- SHOPdomainname
- ONLINEdomainname
- FORdomainname
- WEBdomainname
- NETdomainname
- Idomainname
- I-domainname
- Edomainname
- E-domainname
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Suffixes
Add at end of
desired name:
- domainnameCENTRAL
- domainnameONLINE
- domainnamePORTAL
- domainnameFAMILY
- domainnameSTORE
- domainnameMALL
- domainnameCENTER
- domainnameZONE
- domainnameSOURCE
- domainnameWORLD
- domainnameHUB
- domainnameLINK
- domainnameCOMPANY
- domainnameCORP
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Use with Family Name
If your family name
is Smith:
- Smith.com
- TheSmiths.com
- SmithFamily.com
- Smith-Family.com
- TheSmithFamily.com
- SmithFamilyOnline.com
- MySmithFamily.com
- OurSmithFamily.com
- SmithFamilyCircle.com
- SmithFamilyTree.com
- SmithFamilyCorner.com
- SmithFamilyReunion
- SmithFamilyVacation.com
- SmithGenealogy.com
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Two more suggestions: try adding hyphens (dashes "-") between words (my-domain-name.com). And don't forget to check availabilty of the name with the ".net", ".org", ".info", ".biz",".us" or ".ws" extensions (domainname.us or domain-name.us, etc).
- One last naming suggestion: consider registering common misspellings of your domain name in case people make an error when entering it. Then using our free domain forwarding service, you can still bring visitors directly to your website. For example, if your domain name is gold-jewelry.com, also register gold-jewelery.com and gold-jewellery.com because the word "jewelry" is frequently misspelled. Same for names which include the word "restaurant" -- it is often misspelled as resturant, resterant or restorant. Think of how someone might misspell your name, register that domain name, and use our free domain forwarding service to bring visitors directly to your website.
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There's more information below, but if you're ready to see if the domain name you want is available, enter it in the Domain Registration Search form below.
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Domain Registration Search
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After setting up your own domain name, be sure to use it in your email address, such as:
judy@beyond-beautiful-wedding-gowns.com
This adds a level of professionalism to your business. In most cases, you will have been provided an email address through the ISP by which you log onto the internet -- it's probably something like judy4783@aol.com or judyd@earthlink.com. Rather than use that email address for your business, it is better to use an email address that's connected to your domain name and online business, such as the one shown above. You don't even have to have a website to setup an email account that uses your domain name. Here's information about setting up a personal or businness Personalize Email Address. Use this link for additional information on our ad free, full featured email plans.
We offer a code-free Website Builder so you can easily build your customized website. No technical skill required!
It includes hosting, SSL security certificate, simple design wizard with 100s of templates, and a mobile website as well as a standard site. All for less than $5 per month!
We also have a Shopping Cart builders to build your online store. You can also build your website using ourWordPress hosting plans.
Additionally, we offer a varitey of website hosting services, starting at $1.49 per month.
Easily administer your domains at any time
You're in complete control 24/7. We provide you with a password protected, online account control panel that you can use to setup email addresses, setup domain name forwarding to an existing web page, modify your contact information, change nameservers, renew domains, setup your etc.
You can avoid high renewal fees of your domain names that are registered with another company.
Just transfer your existing domain to us now. You keep your website on the server where it is currently hosted; and you won't lose any fees already paid because we add a full year to the existing expiration date of all transferred domains. Because your existing registrar must approve the transfer, you MUST initiate the transfer at least 10 days before the expiration date. Use the following link for more information on transferring a domain name.
You can have more than one domain name for the same website
It's called "URL forwarding", "domain forwarding" or simply "name forwarding". It lets you use a domain name, even several domain names, to direct visitors to one website. When you register a domain name with us, we provide you the option of forwarding it to an existing website address. You can also use domain forwarding to direct visitors to your free website that has a long, complicated, hard to remember web address -- you know, like the ones that your ISP, AOL, GeoCities, and others give you for free. Here's more information on Domain Forwarding. Also, if you'd like to do so, you can forward a domain name to a specific interior page on an existing website.
It may take up to 48 hours for your newly registered domain name to become accessible on the internet
The normal internet propagation time is about 48 hours; and therefore newly registered domain names will take up to 48 hours before they are accessible everywhere on the internet. This is the same regardless of who you register your domain name with.
It is impossible for someone else to register your domain name after you registered it with us.
We, and other bona fide domain name registrars, verify domain name availability through shared registration systems. Basically, these is a universal database of unavailable domain names. These systems prevent a domain name that has been successfully registered through us from being registered through another domain name registration service-- even if someone tries virtually immediately after you've completed registering it.
Your recently registered domain name may still appear to be available when you go to another domain name registration site and perform a WhoIs search
If you check your domain name availability on our web site after you have completed our registration process, your WhoIs, domain name and contact information is typically generated and available online immediately. However, your recently registered domain name may still appear to be available when you go to another domain name registration site and perform a WhoIs search. This usually is an indication that either you are checking prior to the normal 48 hour internet propagation time, or that the registration web site you are visiting is not displaying the WhoIs information of competing registrars. It does not mean that your domain name is still available for registration.
If you actually attempt to register your new domain name through a competing registrar's site, you will receive a message stating, "this domain is not available" or "this name is reserved". This is because the shared registration systems have an entry on file for your newly registered domain name; thereby indicating that the domain name is already registered and preventing duplication.
Here's how to change the email address and/or contact information for your domain name
We provide you with an online Account Control Panel by which you can administrate virtually all aspects of your domain name at any time after the registration or transfer is completed. Just click on the Manage My Account button/link to access it. You'll have to login using the User Name and Password that you established when you first registered or transferred your domain name. With your Control Panel, you can edit your contact information, e-mail addresses, domain name servers (DNS Servers) and much more.
Be sure that the e-mail address for your account with us is valid and up to date.
Certain changes and/or verification of changes to your account typically involve sending an e-mail message to you. Go to The Customer Information section of Manage My Account and click on the Account Security Information link. Also keep your email address up to date in the Contacts section for each domain name you have registered with us.
Changes you make to your domain name will not appear instantly on the internet.
If you use Manage My Account to make changes to your domain name information, they will not show up instantly. It typically requires the standard internet propagation time. Changes to IP addresses and domain forwarding typically take 24-48 hours to take effect. Domain Name Server (DNS) changes may take up to 72 hours.
To see if the domain name you want is available, use the Domain Registration Search form below.
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Domain Registration Search
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All About Domain Names
