Domain and Hosting
 

About Domain Name

Choose a domain name such as www.yoursite.com or www.yoursite.com.au

An Australian domain name requires an Australian business or company registration. A .com domain name can be registered under your name.

The following example illustrates the difference between a URL (Uniform Resource Locator) and a domain name:

URL: http://www.example.net/index.html
Domain name: www.example.net
Registered domain name: example.net

Domain names are used in URLs to identify particular Web pages. For example, in the URL http://www.pcwebopedia.com/index.html, the domain name is pcwebopedia.com.

Importance of a Domain Name

There are a number of good reasons for having a domain name:

• If you ever change your web host, your domain name goes with you. Your regular visitors or customers who knew your site name as www.thesitewizard.com (for example) would not have to be informed about a change of URL. They would simply type your domain name and they'd be brought to your new site.
• If you are a business, a domain name gives you credibility. Few people would be willing to do business with a company with a dubious URL like http://www.geocities.com/whatever/12345.
• If you get a domain name that describes your company's business or name, people can remember the name easily and can return to your site without having to consult their documents. In fact, if you get a good name that describes your product or service, you might even get people who were trying their luck by typing "www.yourproductname.com" in their browser.
• If you want good sponsors (advertisers) for your website, a domain name is usually helpful. It tends to give your website an aura of respectability.

For more information on domain go to thesitewizard.com.

Hosting

You need to choose a company to host your website for it to be made available to the world wide web.

If your web developer is hosting sites on their own server, make sure you are allowed to have your website hosted by a different company.

Also make sure there is enough space allocated for your website.

A web hosting service is a type of Internet hosting service that allows individuals and organizations to provide their own website accessible via the World Wide Web. Web hosts are companies that provide space on a server they own for use by their clients as well as providing Internet connectivity, typically in a data centre.

For more information on web hosting go to thesitewizard.com.