The complete guide to search and register the perfect Domain Name!
The first step in building any online business, or a website, or a Blog is to register a domain name. The domain name is your identity on the Internet or Cyber Space. So, it is all the more necessary to give it the importance it deserves.
You will learn:
- Some interesting Domain Name Stories
- Structure of a Domain Name
- Why is it important to register a Good Domain Name
- How to go about registration of a domain name
- How to make the best use of your Domain Name
Some interesting Domain Name Stories
ARMani.com
Anand Ramnath Mani – shortened simply to A. R. Mani, is a Vancouver based artist. In the year 1995, he registered a domain name ‘ARMani.com‘. Nothing wrong here. He woke up early, the domain armani.com was available, and he registered it.
G. A. Modefine S.A., the company that owns the world famous fashion brand ‘Armani‘, argued that Mr A R Mani did not have a legitimate right to the domain name and that he had intentionally registered the domain with their trade mark.
WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organisation) refused to transfer the domain name armani.com to the fashion conglomerate, and ordered that the domain name remains in the ownership of Mr A R Mani.
MikeRowSoft.com
Mike Rowe was a Canadian student who registered a domain name ‘MikeRoweSoft.com‘ in August 2003. He wanted to do web designing as a side hustle, and chose this name out of fun.
The software giant Microsoft took umbrage of this fact, and because the name MikeRoweSoft sounded like Microsoft, considered it a trademark infringement.
Mike Row went to the media to highlight this as a suppression of his rights, and collect donations to legally fight the David vs Goliath battle.
Microsoft made an out of court settlement with Mike Rowe. Mike Rowe registered a new domain ‘MikeRoweForums’.
Under this settlement Microsoft was handed the control of the domain and in return Microsoft agreed to pay all of the expenses that Rowe had incurred including setting up a new site at and redirecting traffic to MikeRoweforums.com
Additionally Microsoft provided Rowe with
- a subscription to the Microsoft Developer Network,
- an all expenses paid trip for him and his family to the Microsoft Research Tech Fest at their headquarters in Redmond, Washington,
- training for Microsoft certification, and
- an Xbox with a selection of games.
The two incidents you read above are ample proof that a relevant domain name is important for a business. Do you want one more?
Nissan.com
Uzi Nissan started a company Nissan Computers in 1980 and when the Internet age began, he registered the name Nissan.com in 1994. The rest you can guess.
In 1980, the automobile company was known as Datsun. It was only in 1984, that Datsun was branded as Nissan. And Nissan Motor’s interest in the domain name nissan.com roused only in 1999. Following the outcome of the case, Nissan Motors was asked to use the name nissanusa.com for its U.S. website.
This battle Nissan Motors vs Nissan Computers, too was a long drawn one and pretty legendary.
Structure of a Domain Name
Before we proceed further, you should know the structure of domain names, and the common nomenclature associated with them.
In a full URL like http://www.raunharman.net,
- .net is the gTLD (generic Top Level Domain)
- raunharman is the Second Level Domain
- www is the Sub Domain
- www.raunharman.net is the Fully Qualified Domain Name (FQDN)
Top Level Domain is the part of a domain that comes after the dot, for example, com, org or net. Top Level Domains are broadly classified into 2 types:
- gTLD – generic Top Level Domain
- ccTLD – country code Top Level Domain
All domains that are not associated with a country are listed under gTLD. Examples include com, net, org.
Similarly, domains identified by a geographic location or country come under ccTLD. Domains like example.co.uk, example.de, example.cn, example.in come under ccTLDs
- .com is used for commercial organizations,
- .net is used for network related companies / websites
- .org is used by non-profit organizations
- .edu is used for educational institutions
Why is it important to register a good Domain Name?
There are a few good reasons why you should register a good domain name:
It is your Brand in the Cyber Space: The 2 domain name stories you have read above (armani.com and mikerowsoft.com) are all about brands. In the physical world, Armani sells its stuff – watches, clothing etc with the label ARMANI. How can its website be something different from Armani.com? They could have taken Armani.net or Armani.org, but the most common TLD is .com, and since Armani is a business enterprize, the domain name Armani.com is most suited for them.
Adds relevance and trust to your website: A good domain name makes your website look relevant and trustworthy. Imagine you come across a website which sells industrial goods, and their website domain name is abctutorials.com. Isn’t that a complete mismatch.
Helps to boost search traffic: If you see a new car by Toyota on the road, the most obvious step for you to get information about the car is to go to their website toyota.com. These days people register domain names that are useful from a SEO (Search Engine Optimization) point of view. So, a business that sells hand tools could register a domain name DurableHandTools.com because when people search for hand tools on Google, they would simply type durable hand tools, or cheap hand tools, or best hand tools. And from SEO point of view, the domains DurableHandTools.com or CheapHandTools.com or BestHandTools.com will be most appropriate.
Boosts Customer Recall: If your domain name is easily memorizable, people who hear it, or see it in print are more likely to type it into the Browser’s address bar or search for it on Google.
How to go about with Registration of a Domain Name.
To register a domain name, you have to visit the website of one of the Domain Name Registrars. Domain Name registrars are companies entrusted by ICANN to register Domain Names.
Domain names are registered on a first-come-first-served basis. Which means that you can lay your hands on any domain name as long as it is available. Similar to the ones in the stories above.
You can register a domain name for a minimum of 1 year and a maximum of 10 years. Also, you have to be careful when your domain name registration is expiring, because if you do not renew the registration within a specific time frame, it will become available for the first quick buyer who wants it. This practice of registering domain names when the owner either abandons a domain name or forgets to renew it, is called Drop Catching.
Register a domain from Domain.com
Domain.com is one of the easiest names to remember. And when the company is a domain name Registrar, it becomes the default choice for searching and registering domain names.
Domain.com offers very competent pricing, and you can start searching for the domain you want from their home page itself. The .com domain is priced at US$9.99 and a .net domain for US$12.99. All these prices are per year.
Enter the domain name you want in the text box, and click “Search” (The magnifying glass icon on the right).
I searched for anothercompany.com, and it has already been taken. So, domain.com is offering me different options in the Top Level Domain, like anothercompany.tech, anothercompany.space and more. Some domain names with not so common TLDs like .space and .site are much cheaper.
So, you can make your choice from these domains or start afresh by typing a new name in the search box at the top of the page.
You can click on “Add to Cart” for the domains you want to register. You can also “add Domain Privacy + Protection” to the domains you register. The system automatically does this, but it still is optional. You may de-select it from the cart. Domain Privacy + Protection actually hides the domain registrant’s (your) information from public view. It does not really matter right now. So, you may as well save a few dollars by removing this option.
Finally, you select the time period in years, RE-CHECK THE SPELLING and click on Continue.
You will be prompted to include some add-ons like
- Professional Email address
- Website Builder
- Powerful Web Hosting
- SSL Certificates
- Sitelock to protect your website from viruses, malware and hackers.
Finally, you can provide the billing & payment information and checkout. You can pay using PayPal or with a Credit Card.
Congratulations! you now have a domain name registered.
How to make the best use of your Domain Name.
A fancy email address with your domain name
Your newly registered domain name could get you a fancy email address. So, instead of using xyz@gmail.com, if you use xyz@yourdomain.com, it looks more professional and adds another level of authenticity to your communication.
The recipient of your email knows that you work with COMPANY and can also get relevant information from www.company.com. It is advisable to use the email address with your domain name for business enquiries, sales communication, advertisements, posts, recruitment etc.
You will be surprised to know that domain names like
- .apple,
- .samsung,
- .bentley,
- .americanexpress
also exist. You can see the updated list of such TLDs at https://data.iana.org/TLD/tlds-alpha-by-domain.txt.
Before I end, a few words of caution.
Be careful about the renewal date of your domain name.
The domain name registrar will send you reminder emails around the time of renewal. Do not ignore them. Because, if you miss out on renewing your domain name, it will expire. And when the domain name expires
- Your website or blog becomes inaccessible
- The domain name will be put up for sale again, to the first person who gets to do it. You cannot claim any right to its ownership just because you have held it for some time.
Do not be tempted by “Free Domain Name for 1 year” offers.
Either you will be asked to buy some other product from that company (like web hosting) or you will not have complete control over your domain name.
Some companies may offer you the domain name for free, or at a highly discounted rate. But if you look carefully, the free offer or the reduced price is for the first year only. The renewal prices are extremely high. And usually, they make you register the domain name for multiple years. So, the low cost advertised is just an eye wash, and you end up paying a lot of extra money.
Ideally, you should register your domain independently and keep your username and password, secure with you. I personally recommend going with Domain.com. Their systems are extremely user friendly. This way, you can control where to host your website. Whenever you decide to change your web host, you simply have to change the name servers and your domain name will start pointing to your new web space.
You can also transfer your domain name from one registrar to another, depending upon the current prices or features they are offering at the time of renewal.
Do you still have a question about registering a domain name? Please feel free to write to me. I will include it in my next update of this article. Who knows how many readers could benefit from your query.