LINCOLN WHITMAN GROUP

Domain Name Registration

Lincoln Whitman Group will be happy to help you through the process of choosing a name (URL) for your web site and registering it on-line.

Registering your URL may be the most important thing you do. Your name www.yourname.com (if it's still available) will be what people use to get to your site. Domain names are going fast, it would be wise to register yours immediately. URL registrations usually cost between $10.00 and $30.00 per year depending on which registrar you use.

A descriptive name is usually better than an abbreviation. Even though it's more typing, a URL like www.TheVillageBikeShop.com is easier to remember than www.TVBS.com and more likely to be available. Be prepared with more than one name when you go to register your domain as there is a possibility that your first choice is already being used by someone else.

Another good idea when registering your company URL is to register many similar URL's that would redirect to your web site. For example www.VillageBikeShop.com points to the same site as www.TheVillageBikeShop.com . You may also consider registering URL's that are common misspelling's of your primary URL. In this way people will still get to your site, even if they misspell the URL.

When you go to register your domain name you can either park the URL - (if you don't need to set up the hosting and e-mail immediately) - or you can usually set up a hosting account right then. See our section on Web Hosting Providers for where to register your site.

NOTE: Domain names are going fast, it would be wise to register yours immediately.
NOTE: Make sure that you are the owner of your URL, some sites will register the URL for you but retain ownership of it. This could cause a problem when it is time to renew.