I am in the process of registering more and more domain names so it seems natural to look for the best pricing deal.

Does GoDaddy really suck?

Registering multiple domain names can add up quickly, especially if you register both the NoDashVersion.com and Dashed-Version.com names.

Each domain name represents a new site concept which will in most cases involve the selection of a web hosting plan.

It also makes sense to pay a little less for web hosting right? After all, all these new projects add up.

How much do you really save?

The answer to this question depends o­n how much value we place o­n our time, and our ability to determine what other software tools are required to run the type of website we have in mind.

In other words, if we think that our time is valuable, we will not mind investing an extra $50-$400 per project per year, especially if there is a lot of value added services and software tools included in the price.

What’s the point in saving 50 bucks a year o­n some bare-bones web hosting if our time gets wasted with support issues or we need to buy additional products and services in order to run our site effectively?

Example of Web Hosting Hell:

http://www.godaddysux.com/web_hosting_hell.html

I do not know about you, but after I read o­ne of these bad web hosting reviews, I start to become very cautious about that company. In this case, it is GoDaddy.

Research your new Web Host or Domain Name registrar

I remembered that GoDaddy has been mentioned a number of times in some of the Internet Marketing courses and SEO books that I own, so I decided to check GoDaddy out. By check them out, I do not mean just visit their web site, swallow their sales pitch and click through to the checkout patting myself o­n the back for a job well done.

I did a search at Google.com for the term godaddy review, and discovered some interesting results.

After reading a few of the results, I decided to search for the term “do not use godaddy” (this string was searched enclosed with “inverted commas”), and discovered even more negative feedback not o­nly about their web hosting services but also their domain name registration and associated services.

Is it all about Price?

No way. Do we *really* save? o­n o­ne hand it looks like a saving but o­n the other hand the saving can be offset by extra costs elsewhere.

As a result of this little study, I have no desire at this time to change my domain name registrar or my two web hosting companies that I use just to save a few bucks.

At the moment, I enjoy the following benefits from my web hosts and domain name registrar:

Everything works to my satisfaction 99.99% of the time
Very little support needed in the first place
Support queries attended to quickly
Support queries always solved to my satisfaction
I never suffer from emotional disturbance as a result of dealing with rude support staff
I am never accused of being the problem
Example of excellent support

I created a new directory and installed a PHP script o­n o­ne of my sites. All the file permissions were set correctly and the files were uploaded in the correct format.

So I edited the HTML user interfaces and tried to upload them to this new directory. For some reason I was denied access to this new directory. Permission Denied!

I emailed my web host with a description of the problem and within a few hours my web host sent me an email saying that the problem has been fixed and that I can now proceed to upload into that directory. Wow!

A good Web Hosting and Domain Name service is worth it’s weight in Gold

Who really wants unnecessary dramas with web hosting and domain name registrars? Nobody does! (except those that cannot survive o­ne day without chaos)

The peace of mind for a few extra bucks a year buys is priceless.

Besides, even if I select some of the platinum (no extras to buy) web hosting deals out there, it still o­nly costs about 10-30 bucks a week to run a business o­n the Internet.

Imagine that, for a few extra bucks, I need not worry about: Content Management Software, web design, domain name registrations, expensive keyword research and SEO tools, search engine rankings, and the list goes o­n and adds up *real* quick.

Compare this to a regular bricks and mortar business where you pay thousands a month in rental fees just for a bit of floor space.

Sometimes it pays to do the sums. It might *appear* to cost more money at first, but does it really cost more after you calculate the out-going dollars over the whole year?

When I was in the process of building my first web site, I would not have had the capacity to answer that question because I had no experience. But you know that old saying:

“When someone with experience meets someone with money, the o­ne with the experience ends up with the money and the o­ne who had the money, ends up with an experience”

As a result, I have ended up spending thousands of dollars o­n eBooks, software, scripts, courses, private memberships, DVDs, VCDs, MP3s in an attempt to complete the o­nline Marketing mystery. This is all now part of my experience.

Conclusion

When we go looking to buy a car or a house, we do not base our decision o­n price alone. Otherwise we would all be driving around in smokey old $200 bombs. We look for features which we then translate in some way to benefits.

So why waste time looking for cheap-as-chips deals for the very important job of setting up an o­nline Business? We would do much better to look beyond price when buying services o­n the Internet.

Copyright 2004 Ed Zivkovic

Are you getting the service that you require from your domain registrar? Actually, thinking about it for a minute, it might be a better question to ask, do you even know what services are available? Are you aware that you can shop around and get better prices, more features and far better customer service?

Guess what? All domain registrars are not the same.

Okay, let’s back up a minute. Way back when the internet was young (maybe 5 years ago) all domain names were handled by Network Solutions, Inc. In those dark, evil days you had no choice. It didn’t matter what you thought of the process, it was unimportant that you were not getting service and the price, well, was a standard high fee.

A few years ago the government decided that Network Solutions would no longer be a monopoly. The government wanted to do this to deregulate the industry and encourage competition, and also perhaps to spur a little bit of growth into this thing called the internet.

Okay, so now you do have a choice. In fact, there are well over a hundred different domain registrars at last count. They seem to be springing up all over the place, and the level of support and service, as well as the price, seems to vary greatly.

You may not know it, but you can change domain registrars at any time. It’s actually not very complicated at all.

Here are some of the questions that you may have regarding domain transfers.

How much does it cost?

It depends upon the domain registrar. I have found that many will transfer your domain for no cost to get your business. Others will charge a few dollars ($5 to $20 or more), but will drop the fee if you extend your domain for a couple of years. Shop around and find a good deal.

What are the advantages of transferring?

You may not like the domain registrar you are currently using – perhaps they have poor support or cost too much. You can shop around and find the best solution for your needs.

Remember, though, that if you are like most people, domain registration is something you will not do very often, so perhaps customer support is not all that important.

What are the disadvantages?

Transferring a domain can be confusing. Also, there is no guarantee that the new registrar will be any better than the old o­ne. Again, remember that domain registration is not something that you should need to deal with very often (if you are like most people) so it may not be worth the effort to change.

Can any domain be transferred?

Yes, any domain registered with any registrar may be transferred to any other registrar.

What does a registrar do?

The registrar manages your domain name. They maintain security and the structures that make the domain work.

Does changing registrars have any effect o­n ownership?

No. When you change registrars you are o­nly changing managers. You still retain ownership.

Are there reasons why a domain may not be transferred?

Yes. Some of these are listed below.

- The domain name is in a legal dispute of some kind.
- The identity of the domain name holder is in dispute or unknown.
- The domain name holder is in bankruptcy.
- The domain has o­nly been with the registrar for 60 days.
- The registrar refuses to transfer for other reasons.

How is a domain transferred?

This varies from registrar to registrar. Some require a notarized form to be delivered to them, others can do it using a web site form. How long does the process take?

The registrar will usually take five to ten days to review and validate the request. o­nce it has been validated and put into action, it will take a couple of days for the change to filter through the internet.

Will the web site associated with the domain be accessible during the change?

Yes. This normally does not effect access to your web site. The registrar is changed, not the web site address and other information.

The museum-domain is an exclusive domain. It is open for registration by museums, organization of museums and friends of museums. The notion of museum is understood very generously, e.g. a zoological or botanical garden belongs to it. A proof to be a museum is necessary for registering museum-domains.

ENS ID and Key
You will get your eligibility to register .museum-domains not anymore o­nly at MUSEDOMA, but you can order the ENS ID and Confidential Key at Secura’s
museum-website while you are registering your first museum-domain (https://www.domainregistry.de/museum.html).

New Policy
The museum domains have a new naming policy. In former times the museum-domains had to have a third-level-structure in the form specific.generic.museum. It was e.g. not possible to register moma.museum. The three-level-domains are persisting, but you can also register second level domains like guggenheim.museum. It is important, that the second level domain is derived directly from the official name of the museum.

Digital Museum.
Digital museums are eligible to register museum-domains. It is o­nly logic, that the digital museum get the digital address of museums – the museum-domain. The managers of digital museums can register at .museum or at virtual.museum, digital.museum, o­nline.museum or cyber.museum – even at all second levels.

IDN: museum-domains with special characters
You can order now museum-domains in many different languages. You can use the special characters of your own language. o­ne example for a domain with special characters: http://österreich.icom.museum

Improve your ranking at Google by museum-domains
Search engines like Google rank your listing higher if a keyword from a search is in your domain name. You can get these names with .museum, when they are not available in .com.

Listen to what the Internet “gurus” have to say about what names to buy:
“As we’ve frequently reported in our SE Book & Newsletter, placing keywords right in your domain name can give your site a major boost o­n search engines. We’ve also reported that some engines are no longer accepting sub-directory pages. This is o­ne of the reasons the smart marketing pros have been buying keyword-phrase domain names. They use them as doorway pages to boost traffic to their sites.” says Stephen Mahaney, author of The Unfair Advantage Book o­n Winning the Search Engine Wars.

Michael Campbell points out, in Nothing But ‘Net, “The reason we want keywords in the domain name is that search engines often get ‘tuned’ to find, and give better positioning to, domains with keywords in them.” Declan Dunn, author of Winning the Affiliate Game, sent out a memo to his affiliates advising “To get o­n top of the search engines, o­ne of the critical keys is a good domain name LOADED with keywords.” Declan goes o­n to say “This news is spreading among WebMasters, SearchEngine Meisters, Internet marketers, and big corporations. Don’t wait.”

The following are some of the important organisations in the domain name industry.

ARIN
American Registry for Internet Numbers is a a not for profit organisation established to handle the administration and registration of Internet Protocol (IP) addresses in North America, some of the Caribbean, and sub-Saharan Africa.

CORE Internet Council of Registrars is a not for profit organisation set up under Swiss law. Core is made up of domain name registrars handling domain name registration o­n behalf of customers.

IANA
Internet Assigned Numbers Authority is the authority given the initial responsibility for the oversight of IP address allocation, the coordination of the assignment of protocol parameters provided for in Internet technical standards, and the management of the DNS.

ICAAN
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers is an internationally organized, non-profit corporation that has responsibility for Internet Protocol (IP) address space allocation, protocol identifier assignment, generic (gTLD) and country code (ccTLD) Top-Level Domain name system management, and root server system management functions.

IETF
Internet Engineering Task Force is an open international community of network designers, operators, resellers, and researchers concerned with the evolution of the Internet architecture and the operation of the Internet. Membership is open to any interested individual or corporation.

Nominet Nominet is the UK TLD registrar responsible for the management and development of the .uk domain range.

W3C
World Wide Web Consortium is an international industry consortium set up to develop common protocols to promote the evolution of the World Wide Web and ensure its smooth operation. Services include; a repository of information about the World Wide Web for developers and users; reference code implementations to promote standards; and various prototype and sample applications to demonstrate use of new technology.