How vital can an affordable domain name be?

One of the most important requirements for setting up a successful Internet presence is the domain name. It is what people will perceive first when they discover your web site and what they will link you with. The domain should be easy to remember, but should also be something that tells your site's visitors what the site is about.

Generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs)

A domain name typically consists of two components - a Top-Level Domain Name (TLD) and a Second-Level Domain Name (SLD). If you have domain.com, for instance, ".com" is the TLD and "domain" is the Second-Level Domain. There are a few groups of Top-Level Domains that you should contemplate before you select the domain name you want. Your decision should depend on the goal of your web page and on its target viewers. Let's have a glance at the gTLDs, or generic Top-Level Domains - these are the most widespread Top-Level Domains meant to show a specific intention - .com (business enterprises), .net (networks), .biz (firms), .info (informational sites), .org (organizations of a non-commercial character), .mobi (handheld devices), .asia (the Asia-Pacific), .name (persons or families), .pro (given professions), etc. As you can see, these Top-Level Domain Names cover most realms of life, so you should choose the one that would denote the aim of your web page best. There is no restriction as to who can register such Top-Level Domain Names, but some of them contain extra procedures to show that you are eligible to own such a domain name (.mobi and .pro, for instance).

Country-code Top-Level Domain Names (ccTLDs)

The ccTLDs, or country-code Top-Level Domains, are country-specific domain names. Each country has its own ccTLD. Picking such a domain name is good if your target group of visitors is from a certain country. Many guys would rather purchase commodities or services from a local web site, and if your target is Canada, for instance, picking a .ca domain name could boost the visits to your web site.

URL Forwarding

You can register different domains, which can forward your web page's visitors to a certain website such as domain.com, for instance. This would raise the traffic and lower the likelihood of somebody swiping your web page visitors by registering the same SLD with a different Top-Level Domain - if you are not using a trademark.

Name Servers (NSs)

Each Top-Level Domain has domain name records. The name server records (NS records, a.k.a. DNS records) reveal where the domain is hosted, i.e. they point to the web hosting company whose name servers (NSs, a.k.a. DNSs) it is utilizing at present. You can switch the DNSs of your domain name whenever you like. You can have your domain name registered with one provider and get the website hosting service itself from another. In this way, if you register your domain name and discover good website hosting services someplace else afterwards, you can point your domain to the present provider's DNSs straight off.

Name Server Records (NS Records)

On the whole, as long as your domain name uses a given pair of DNSs, all its DNS records will direct to the same web page hosting provider. Some hosting distributors, however, enable you to edit certain domain records, among them the A records and the MX records of your domain. The A record is an Internet Protocol address, which demonstrates on which server your site is situated, whereas the MX records reveal which server handles the email box accounts related to your domain name. For example, if you engage a new site designer and he devises an .ASP web site that will be hosted on his personal Windows web hosting server, you may want to edit only the IP address (the A record) but not the MX records of your domain name. So, www.domain.com will direct to the Windows web server, but your emails or any sub-domain names like forum.domain.com or shop.domain.com will still be in your present Linux web site hosting account. The .ASP environment is invented by Microsoft and requires a Windows web server, even though a Linux web hosting server would be way more secure.

Cut-Rate Domain Names Distributed by 'Free Hostia'

Just a few web hosting distributors allow you to edit particular records and quite frequently this an additional paid service. With Free Hostia , you get a large number of Top-Level Domains to choose from and you can edit all name server records or forward the domains via a redirection tool at no additional charge. For that reason, 'Free Hostia' would be your finest pick when it comes to administering your domain and to creating a successful presence on the Internet.