The best way to prevent frustrations and disappointments associated with buying an inferior existing domain name is to research the subject thoroughly. Alternatively, you can also avoid these issues by hiring the services of a reputed firm as such as Tradebooster. You need to establish that the determined existing domain name is valuable and has the potential to fetch you good returns in the long term.

There are a number of things you should check for in a good existing domain name.

• Top level domains such as .com, .biz and .info are the best ones to look for when you are looking for a profitable domain name. They have a lot of commercial value, are easy to remember and are amongst the most preferred of domains. The inherent commercial value of a domain that has a high page rank (the value assigned by Google to your website or webpage) will raise its value among prospective buyers, so the page rank is the most important factor you should look for.
• Research the domain you are going to buy. You can get a lot of information on this from Google. Try the Google search engine. To quickly determine whether your site is still in our index, just perform a Google site search for its entire URL eg. site:preferreddomainname.com.You can also learn about the ranking of the existing domain from this tool. Find out about its ranking as well whether it still exists in the Google index.
• One of the most important aspects of domain name relate to the quality of the incoming links. Organic links are better for this purpose, compared to those that do not come to the domain directly. If you are wondering what an organic link is, it is a link that comes in from another website that has a good page rank on the search engine.
• Another factor you should consider is the age of the existing domain. Find out who created the domain and when. The commercial value of the domain will increase with the life span of the domain, so make this a key ingredient in your searches. You can use the WHOIS service at Tradebooster Domains to look for information on this factor.

An existing domain that has all the qualities above is a great deal, so make sure you invest the time required to check these out.

In the last article, I had mentioned a very important tip that you should ALWAYS provide valid registration details while registering your domain name. So let’s take a look at the Domain Record (the registration contact details for your domain name as maintained by the registry) and understand the significance of its various components.

Take a look at the image below. I did a WHOIS search for “tradebooster.com” at www.drwhois.com (hmm… you should know what WHOIS is by now ). The image shows the domain record for tradebooster.com as maintained by the registry.

Now lets understand the meaning and significance of each of the components of the domain record.

Item nos. 1 and 2 give information about where your domain is registered. Item no. 1 indicates the registrar where your domain is registered and Item no. 2 indicates, most likely, the local contact / company that helped you with the domain registration. In most cases this an authorised reseller of the services of the registrar who is your local contact / company. In case you got this registered directly with the registrar, this would show the registrar information.

Item No.3 is the registrant company / person of the domain. The registrant is the legal owner of the domain. You must make sure that the registrant details is the accurate contact information for your company.

Item No.4 shows the date when the domain record was created. In simpler terms it shows the date when you first registered the domain name.

Item No.5 shows the next date of expiry of the domain name. In case you do not renew your domain before its next expiry date, the domain would expire. A detailed explanation on the process of expiry is provided in another article later in the series.

Item No. 6 is technically known as the “Name Server Information“. To put it simply, it tells the registry about the server / computer in the world actually hosts your domain. Hmmmm…’host‘, another technical term. Don’t worry, I will explain in detail in the next article what hosting is all about. As for now, let this be the explanation and a bit of grey area.

Item No.7 is the contact details for the Administrative Contact (Admin Contact) for the domain. The admin contact for the domain is the most important part of the domain record as all correspondence from the registrar / registry pertaining to the domain name is ALWAYS sent to the admin contact. You must therefore make sure that these details correctly represent the contact details of the person who would be in-charge of your domain. You should always avoid using person specific email address if the admin contact is one of your staff members. Preferably specify an email address that you are sure would exist over the next 1 year.

You must also ensure that you update the contact details of the admin contact if there is any change in the same.

Item No.8 is the billing contact of the domain. Issues pertaining to invoicing / payments regarding the domain are sent to the billing contact. These would also be sent to the Admin Contact.

Item no. 9 is the technical contact of the domain. Techinical issues regarding the domain are notified to the technical contact. As above, the admin contact would also be notified about the same.

In almost all of the cases we have seen, the admin, technical and billing contacts are usually the same. However, this is not a thumb rule and you can always specify three different contact details for these items of the domain record.

Item No.10 is status of the domain in the registry. This should always be active. If this set to anything other than active then you should consult your local contact / registry on how to set the status to active.

Now two important tips, specially when you have got your domain name registered through a local contact.

1. ALWAYS, ALWAYS and ALWAYS ask the local contact to put YOUR contact details while registering the domain name. A lot of intermediaries DO NOT do so because they think that they would lose you as a customer if they are transparent. However, what they do not realise is that transparency in business transactions is the foundation of a long term relationship.
2. ALWAYS ask your local contact to give you the username and password for your domain control panel. Well, in simpler terms, the domain control panel is nothing but a facility wherein you can manage the domain record i.e update the details of your domain record as and when required. Once again the intermediaries are very hesitant to reveal this information for the reason mentioned above.

You should always keep the above two tips in mind and act accordingly since they are required if you wish to change your service provider / intermediary / local contact. Remember, YOU are the customer and you hold the exclusive right of choosing your preferred web partner.

The last 4 articles have covered a lot of ground on domain names. Now that we’ve understood some bits about domain names, the next article would give you some insight on the mystic world of web hosting .

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What is a domain name?

If you search for definitions of “domain name” on Google, the results would be fairly complex and most likely you would give up pretty soon. However, the purpose of this Customer Education Series is to make you understand the Internet as a layman and not as a technician. So lets start by understanding what a domain name actually is.

Lets assume I am a professor in a University and taking a class on this subject. I have my students seated in front of me in a 10 x 6 matrix i.e. 10 rows with 6 students in each row. Now during the course of the session I need to ask a particular student a question. I can refer to him as the student seated in row 5, 3rd seat from the left or I can refer to him as “James” which is his name. In both scenarios I am referring to the same person. His name however, is a more convenient way of referring to him rather than the first method. Specially so, because I need to remember the names of 60 students in my class.

This is exactly how the Internet or for that matter any network works. The real location of a server / machine on the network is identified by something called the “IP Address” (IP = Internet Protocol). A typical IP address looks like 122.160.156.225. Now imagine 60 students in my class, each having a specific IP address (his seat location). How difficult or almost impossible would it be for me to remember that. Isnt remembering names much much easier?

So the name of the student is like the domain name and the seat location of the student is his IP address. Now imagine day 2 of the same class. James, the student in question, is now seated in row 7, 2nd seat from the right. Today, if I need to refer James by his location I would call him as the student on row 7, 2nd from the right. However, if I need to refer him by his name, I would still call him as James. And this is exactly why names are better than IP addresses.

A domain name is practically an easier way to refer to your Internet Business, though the actual location is always the IP address.

A domain name looks like:

www.example.com

Now, let’s break this up:

example – this is the domain name

.com – this is the domain extension

For those of you who have used the Internet for years now, you would recollect that the domain names began with 3 possible extensions viz. .com, .net and .org.

However, for those who were late in catching up with the Internet, their preferred domains were gone by that time. Hence, today you would see multiple domain extenions like .biz, .info and country specific extensions like .in, .us, .uk. This has given an opportunity to the late entrants to get a domain name of their choice to establish their presence in the World of Internet.

To summarise, a domain name is just a name for referring to your Internet identity. The actual process however works on IP addresses. Just like James could shift from 1 seat to another class after class, you can also choose to shift from one provider to another, but the name still remains the same and hence easier for all to remember.

The next article would cover more details on domain extensions and registries. Stay tuned!!

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Each new domain name has something called an extension like .com, .net, .org, .in, .us, .co.uk, .biz, .info and the like. The database for each domain extension is maintained by a company called Registry. Now different registries handle information about domain names differently. There are certain registries like the .com and .net registry which maintain only limited data about the domain name in its database eg. the domain name, the registration and expiry dates, the name server information. Other information about the registrant is maintained by the registrar who registered your domain name. We refer to such registries as thin registries. Other registries like .org, .biz and .info maintain complete information about the domain name in its database. Such registries are referred to as thick registries.

Typically from the time the information about your new domain is added to the registry’s database, it takes about 12-24 hours for your domain to become active and start receiving emails / web traffic. However, most providers try to play safe and still commit time frames of 24-72 hours for a complete propagation over the Internet. Our practical experience however shows that domain names for thick registries start resolving faster as compared to domain names for thin registries. This time frame of how soon the domain becomes active actually depends on the DNS policies of the ISP which is sending traffic to your domain name. ISPs in the remote locations usually cache DNS entries for longer periods to speed up Internet access for their customers. However, decent ISPs usually either do not cache DNS entries at all or refresh their DNS server once every 1-2 hours. So you can actually start receiving traffic on your new domain name practically within 1-2 hours from the time the registration is completed. However, please allow around 24-48 hours for a full propagation.

And by the way, we forgot to mention. All the discussion above is valid only when the hosting account for your domain is setup at the same time when your domain name is registered.