How to Buy Web Hosting and Domain Name

Learn how to buy a web hosting and domain name properly today. When buying a domain or web hosting, you can use credit card, debit card or online payment processors like PayPal or a digital currency like BitCoin. Before we go ahead to the guide, let us first get some basic information about each items. (Firs domain name, second is web hosting).

I do know you want to build your own website or blog. I really liked your decision. Having your own website or blog is a great idea especially when you really want to make money online.

There is no such thing as “free investment”. If you want to make money, you need to spend money. And the money you spend today will be for your website or blog. There are many blogger and e-commerce owners who knows the advantage of having a reliable web hosting. If you are one of them, let’s continue because you are on the right page to know the basic stuff when buying a domain name and web hosting.

Web Hosting and Domain Name Difference

You domain name is the URL of your website or blog. Example, in this blog, the domain name is www.InvestmentTotal.com

Web Hosting is the service wherein your blog or website will become live online. There are companies offering web hosting for free. However, experts don’t recommend free web hosting because of its limited ability. Your files are located in your web hosting company. When you buy a web hosting, you are allow to login to a CPanel or access your FTP.

Domain Name Registration Basics

What you should know about registering a domain name? First you have to specify your domain name whether you want to have a short and unique domain name or “keyword based” domain name. What do I mean unique and keyword-based domain name?

A. Uniquely Branded Domains

Make your domain name unique, short and easy to remember. It can be useful if you want to make a “branding” online. Can I ask you something? What is your favorite website? What have you noticed? Are they long, short or unique? Are they difficult to remember?

Easy to remember domain names like Facebook.com, Twitter.com, Google.Com, Yahoo.Com. As you have noticed, these domain names has two-syllables word. (e.g. Google.com : Gu-Gel)

Example of this branded names are Apple.com, Amazon.Com, Chase.com, Bloomberg.Com, etc. This domain names are aligned to the name of the company or corporation.

WARNING: Do not use “registered business names and trademark” when registering a domain name to avoid legal issues. Trademark such as Wells Fargo Online, don’t register a domain something like WellsFargoOnline.com.

Image Credit: Aesop CC 2.0 on Flickr — Computer Desktop

You can learn good branding tips when Insure.Com became the most expensive domain name in the world. If you are skillful and talented in brainstorming great brands, you will also have a great fortune like the owner of Insure.Com. FYI: Insure.com is worth million dollars because of its brand, keywords related terms “insurance”.

B. Keyword-Based Domain Name

Keyword-based domain names are SEO friendly. What do I mean by that? SEO means search engine optimization. When you have a keyword-based domain name, you can rank your website or blog higher in search engine results page in a specific keywords.

Example: If your blog or website is about Stock Market Made Easy, you can buy a domain name like stockmarketmadeeasy.com or stockmarketinvesting.com

Other Example: If the keyword you want to rank in SERPs is Money Management for Couples, you can buy a domain name like moneymanagementforcouples.com or moneymanagingforcouples.

C. .Com, .Net or .Org?

This is a good question asked by my reader last night when they read my post about the migration ways of blogger blog to WordPress. Hey, this blog was previously hosted in blogger. But I decided to buy my web hosting because  I really love this blog. It’s just a tool to track my finances online. That’s why I named it “investmenttotal.com”.

Just a Side Note: If you want to create a blog with WordPress or migrate your old blogger to WordPress just let me know, leave a comment and I will guide you or always visit WordPress Customization Help

Going back to the topic, would you choose .com or .net? The answer is you should prefer.com. However, sometimes .com aren’t available, you can use .net if that’s the case. You can also use .org if your website or blog represents your organization or club.

How to Buy Web Hosting and Domain Name?

You can go to any reliable domain name registrants and search for your desired domain name. If your desired domain name is available, buy it using credit card or debit card. Once you registered a domain name, login to your domain registrants and set your domain DNS from your registrants to preferred web hosting company.

When buying web hosting, you can use your previously registered domain name or use a new domain name. The domain name registrants and web hosting used in this blog are from different companies. Some web hosting company are cheap costing you around $3 per month. Investigate their services, feedback and customer support from their previous clients.

You can buy web hosting by paying it annually or monthly. Sometimes paying your 3 year web hosting plan can help you save a lot of money than paying it annually or monthly.

Buy web hosting plan based on your needs. If you plan to build a website or blog for personal hobby only, you can choose the lowest plan. But, if you plan to create a bigger website or blogs, then chose the “advanced” not the basic web hosting plan. You can start with lowest plan and when your blog traffic increases, you can upgrade later.

Tips and Warnings

• When buying domains, do not use trademarks, slogan and business and corporate names.
• Make your domain name short or SEO friendly. Make it easy to remember.
• Before buying a web host, plan and think carefully.
• Buy a web hosting plans only to the reliable company with great customer support, good feed backs and reviews from their previous clients.
• Save a lot of money if you pay for 3 or more years of web hosting plans compare to monthly and annually.
• Look for discounted price of web hosting. Have time to search for coupon codes and discounts.

What can you say about this guide? Please let me know if there are important things to consider when buying web hosting and domain names that are not written in this article. Did you already buy a web hosting for your blogging career or for your business website? Which companies do you recommend and which companies you think we will avoid?

Thought of the Day:

There’s no such thing as free investment. If you want to make a lot of money, sometimes you need to spend money. – Grace, InvestmentTotal.com Admin