The Power of Owning Your Own Domain
Posted June 28, 2011 in Social Media
A website is one of the most basic and essential marketing tools for the modern freelancer. Fortunately for us, it’s now easier and cheaper than ever to create a website.
That said, the temptation of free websites and domains is strong. You can get started without taking out your credit card or even having a PayPal account. In fact, you can create a website at Blogger.com or WordPress.org for zero investment and in under 10 minutes. How cool is that?
Yet I always advise freelancers, and anyone else interested in creating a business website, to make the small investment to register their own domain name and pay for their website’s hosting. You can get web hosting for under $10 a month. Domain name registration is even less expensive, at less than a dollar a month.
Why You Should Own Your Domain Name
There are at least three compelling reasons for you to own your domain name:
- Control. The number one reason to register your domain name is so you have control over it. You can use that domain name and set up a website on any web hosting service or web creation tool. More importantly, you get to choose the type of content that will be in that website. Whether you’ll use that domain name for a website about your business, or your personal musings, or even no content at all–it’s all up to you.
- Branding. It’s inevitable, people will search for your name and/or your company name in one of the online search engines (the biggest being Google). If you haven’t registered either one as a domain name, then you don’t know what they’ll find. Especially if you have a common business or personal name, it’s imperative that you be The One to register it as a domain.
- Ownership. Finally, a domain name is a piece of property. Whoever registers it owns it. This means you can sell domain names. You may want to do this if you outgrow your company name. Depending on the demand for a particular domain name, this can mean big bucks.
How to Register a Domain Name
Have I convinced you to register your own domain name? Then the following tips will be helpful:
- Which domains to register. Even if you plan to have only one website, I suggest you register both your personal name and your company name. This is because prospective clients won’t only be Googling your company name. They’ll search for your personal name too. If you do have a company name, you can create a business card-like website around your personal name. Or you could simply redirect that to your company website. This means if people type yourname.com in their web browser, they’ll automatically land on yourcompanyname.com. If you’re targeting a particular keyword phrase, you can register that as well. An example could be texaswebdesign.com or buildfacebookpages.com.
- Domain name availability. Before you get all excited, make a list of the different domain names you’d like to register. Rank them by priority. That is, identify which ones are your first choices, second choices, and so on. This way, you’re not left (overly) frustrated and empty-handed when you discover the domain name you wanted has already been registered by somebody else. By the way, you can use a free tool like checkdomain.com to find out.
- Choose wisely. Make sure you pick domain names that are easy to remember, spell, and type. This means don’t use numbers–unless the numbers are part of your company name. Don’t use special characters, and don’t experiment with funky, unusual spellings. Oh and don’t use hyphens in between words, either. That just makes your domain name a pain to type. And most people will probably forget to type the hyphens anyway.
Another thing. Unless you’re targeting prospective clients in a specific country only, use the .com extension. This is the most common extension for domain names, and therefore, the one most people will remember easily. However, if you work with local businesses only and the domain name you want has been registered as a .com, then you could register yourname.ca, or whatever the extension is for your country.
Do You Rule Your Domain?
What’s your domain name situation? Have you registered your own, or are you using one of the free web hosting sites that give you a sub-domain on their site?
Do you have questions about choosing and registering a domain name? Let us know in the comments below.
Image by rodriago
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- If You Could Have A Freelancing Super Power, What Would You Choose?
About the author: Lexi Rodrigo is the creator of The Savvy Freelancer, a blog that's all about achieving creative and financial freedom through freelancing. Check out Lexi's free guide, 31 Days to Start Your Freelancing Business (or Make Yours A Better One).
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26 Comments
J-Mag Guthrie
June 28th, 2011 at 8:59 amMost domain hosting companies offer website construction tools so you can build your own. If that doesn’t satisfy you, then there are people who will do basic websites inexpensively. By that I mean at about the same cost as good-quality business cards. You’re not setting up an online store so you don’t need flash or java (some of which doesn’t work on all browsers anyway).
Like anything else, though, read the fine print. A properly set up website is easy to update and you should be able to use your hosting company’s tools to do your own updates.
Rachel Small
June 28th, 2011 at 10:40 amWhen I first built my website I used the free sub-domain but quickly realized it would be worth my while to spend the $10 and own my own – it’s been well worth it!
Richard Arblaster
June 28th, 2011 at 11:45 amI have a golden rule, never buy hosting from the same company you purchased your domain name from.
Less scrupulous hosts could hold your site to ransom if your relationship sours.
Some Design Blog
June 28th, 2011 at 11:52 amI would add another big reason to have your own domain: It legitimizes you in the eyes of potential clients. A free website has the subtext “I’m not committed enough to my business to get a real website”. This especially bad for freelancers because we already have to fight the stigma of not having a “brick-and-mortar” office.
Christina
June 28th, 2011 at 12:41 pmWhen I first went to buy my company name in the 90s I checked it on Register.com and it was available. So I got lunch, told my husband and we decided to buy it. I went back about an hour later and someone from Canada purchased it. That’s odd I thought. So I registered the .net version and started using it right away.
I checked back periodically to see if the .com became available because no one was using it. So about 4 years go by and I get this email from someone who isn’t Canadian who is offering to sell me the .com. So I go back to Register.com and see that it’s available and I register it.
Once I know for sure registration goes through, I email the person back and let them know I already own it.
Anyways, that was my first experience in owning a domain name. Now I own about 100 total and use about 15 of them actively.
As for the free websites….I use them as well and I mask the headers and URLs. So I only pay money to host my .net name since it was the first. I’ve been slowly switching over to using my .com without confusing my clients.
BTW….I’m not sure how much it happens now but Register.com, unscrupulous companies planting bots and many others see what you’re looking for and will sometimes grab the domain name you’ve input. GoDaddy has a reputation for protecting searches. But you may want to research to see if this has changed.
Jason Matthews
June 28th, 2011 at 1:59 pmI dunno. I have about 8 websites without a custom domain name that are entirely free and make money. Just saying it’s not that taboo anymore.
TLC
June 28th, 2011 at 9:22 pmChristina: excellent point. I did a search and found out that the name I wanted was available. But I sent it to the Secretary of State’s office on Friday morning to make sure there wouldn’t be a copyright violation. The SOS responded Monday morning, but by the time I got back to the name of my design firm, someone in Gibraltar had bought it — supposedly to start an online poker site! Three years alter, the poker site never materialized. I think they saw my search and bought the name so I would buy it from them.
Brad Griffith
June 29th, 2011 at 8:21 amNice article. WordPress.COM provides free hosting. WordPress.ORG provides a free download to use with your own hosting. That’s a very Important distinction, as WordPress.org is a great choice!
Hasan
June 29th, 2011 at 8:27 amGreat Article,
Absolutely right, I think the owning your own domain name is very important, and it doesn’t cost as much anyway!
Tamal Anwar
June 30th, 2011 at 11:03 amYep I own my domain name, now days if I want to start a new website I would always have my own domain + hosting. When I started online, I spent my first dollars on buying my 1st domain name.
Arun Rathi
July 1st, 2011 at 1:02 amInternet users are increasing day by day and every group want to target there client online as well. So domain name not only help them in branding but also in increasing there revenue.
Domain name also gives you an opportunity to get self employed.
Search a good domain name -> Register it -> Sell it on domain name selling sites.
Believe me, if your domain name any potential it will give you 10 – 1000 times of you investment.
Luckily if you find a good brandable domain name then you can directly contact to the farm for a deal.
Business.com Sold for $360000000
Jim Connor
July 1st, 2011 at 1:04 amI Agree, One should have a domain name of his. It also build your social repo. and .com domain name hardly cost $7.50
Ian
July 1st, 2011 at 3:19 amI completely agree. It might be snobbish but the fact remains that it’s still a business and that your business will be judged by the impression you project. I’ve seen a lot of businesses that are well established here in the Philippines but are still using multiply sites!
I personally believe that if you are serious about your business, you should be able to make proper and important investments on them. If you don’t want to have your own domain, at least have a company email address.
I recently wrote about this on our blog: http://businessonline.ph/news/using-free-email-for-your-business-think-again/
Usman Shahid
July 1st, 2011 at 7:30 amIt is god to have domain name and I like it because I can have more control over my domain. Free hosting like WordPress.com is suitable only if you are a random blogger, if you are a professional then I think you must have your own custom domain and website.
Christina
July 1st, 2011 at 2:01 pm@Arun…. You are correct about being able to buy domain names and sell them at inflated costs. But when you do this, you have to be very careful about squatting illegally.
This happens when you, I or someone else buys a brand that is well-known and we hold it for ransom. This is illegal to do now. You need to really know your rights on when you can and can’t own a domain name.
It’s a very scary business to be in.
@Usman…. websites like Blogger and WordPress are actually becoming very mainstream and acceptable to use as regular websites for clients. They’re affordable and easy for designers to build with without the hassles of getting a programmer involved. These blog builders also allow you to mask or forward domain names with now problems.
Nicole
July 1st, 2011 at 8:17 pmI totally agree with choosing your domain name wisely so that it’s easy to remember, spell, and type. I’m a web programmer, and I believe my first registered domain was candi-coded.com. Well that got hard to tell people, and then I switched business names, so I registered inthedesigns.net. Even that’s hard to tell people! So now I have nicolesmithweb.com which is much simpler.
Also, about inthedesigns.net. I dreamed for so long about owning .com, and a week before I had the money to register, someone else registered it and wanted $500 to sell. It’s now almost 3 years later I believe, and it’s still not active. I’m hoping it expires so I can grab it once and for all.
Ian
July 2nd, 2011 at 11:48 pmCompletely agree with Cristina. Blogger and WordPress are ideal for bloggers who would just like to write but not for a business. Personally, I find it a huge turn off for any client who would like to go into business with me and their website is something like mybiz.blogspot.com or mybiz.multiply.com.
Duncan
July 3rd, 2011 at 7:48 amI’ve got my own name and my business name registered and both run off of the WordPress platform, but for my professional blog, I run it off Tumblr but as a sub-directory from my main website. It helps with my social media presence, apparently.
It feels like I own my web property, as opposed to just renting it…
Lucas Wagner
July 8th, 2011 at 10:51 amI have registered my own domain and must say that this really improved the search rankings for my name on Google. So everyone who’s searching for me will find my portfolio. So it doesn’t cost that much and is very effective.
Jason Matthews
July 8th, 2011 at 11:00 amI have entirely free websites that come up on Google’s first page of search results for competitive search terms.
I agree with people who feel they need to have a custom domain name for their own personal reasons, but the fact is you can do fine and even make money with nothing invested but time.
Diana Maxwell
July 28th, 2011 at 4:47 amIf you register your domain name with google does Google own your domain name? If you choose not to host on google do they the keep your domain name when you leave. I have heard this is the case with GoDaddy. Google domain names are powered by Go Daddy. Let me know what you think. Is it better to register with Network Solutions?
Thank you I am confused about all this.
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