How crucial is to discover the best domain name?

One of the most important prerequisites for creating a successful web presence is the domain name. It is what people will notice first when they stumble upon your site and what they will relate you with. The domain should be easy to memorize, but should also be something that informs your website's visitors what the web site is about.

Generic Top-Level Domain Names (gTLDs)

A domain traditionally has two fragments - a Top-Level Domain (TLD) and a Second-Level Domain Name (SLD). If you have domain.com, for example, ".com" is the Top-Level Domain Name and "domain" is the Second-Level Domain Name. There are a couple of sets of Top-Level Domains that you should contemplate before you pick the domain name you want. Your pick should be built upon the intention of your web site and on its target visitors. Let's have a gaze at the gTLDs, or generic Top-Level Domain Names - these are the most common TLDs aimed to show a given purpose - .com (business enterprises), .net (networks), .biz (companies), .info (informative resources), .org (organizations of a non-commercial character), .mobi (handheld devices), .asia (the Asia Pacific), .name (persons or relatives), .pro (certain professions), and so on. As you can perceive, these Top-Level Domains cover most realms of life, so you should go for the one that would express the intention of your web page best. There is no limitation as to who can register such domains, but some of them involve additional requirements to ascertain that you qualify to have such a Top-Level Domain Name (.mobi and .pro, for example).

Country-code Top-Level Domains (ccTLDs)

The ccTLDs, or country-code TLDs, are country-specific domain names. Each country has its own ccTLD. Getting such a domain is good if your target group of web site visitors is from a particular country. Many visitors would sooner purchase commodities or services from a local website, and if your aim is Canada, for example, registering a .ca domain name could boost the visits to your website.

URL Forwarding

You can register different Top-Level Domains, which can forward your site's visitors to a particular site such as domain.com, for example. This would boost the traffic and reduce the risk of someone pilfering your web site visitors by registering the same Second-Level Domain with another Top-Level Domain Name - if you are not utilizing a trademark.

Name Servers (NSs)

Every TLD has domain name records. The name server records (NS records, also known as DNS records) show where the domain is hosted, in other words they point to the web hosting vendor whose name servers (NSs, a.k.a. DNSs) it is utilizing at present. You can modify the DNSs of your domain at all times. You can have your domain name registered with one provider and get the web space hosting service itself from another. So, if you register your domain name and discover decent website hosting plans someplace else later, you can point your domain name to the new provider's DNSs instantaneously.

Name Server Records (DNS Records)

In general, as long as your domain name utilizes a particular set of name servers, all its name server records will point to the same web space hosting company. Some web space hosting distributors, however, permit you to modify certain domain records, among them the A records and the MX records of your domain name. The A record is an Internet Protocol address, which reveals on which web hosting server your site is hosted, whereas the MX records indicate which web hosting server handles the mail aliases related to your domain name. For example, if you appoint a new web site designer and he creates an .ASP website that will be hosted on his personal Windows hosting server, you may desire to modify only the IP address (the A record) but not the MX records of your domain. Thus, www.domain.com will direct to the Windows web hosting server, but your email boxes or any sub-domain names like forum.domain.com or shop.domain.com will still be in your present Linux web site hosting account. The .ASP environment is developed by Microsoft and requires a Windows hosting server, although a Linux web server would be far more reliable.

Low-cost Top-Level Domains Courtesy of 'AfterHost'

Just a small number of web hosting distributors permit you to modify specific domain name server records and quite often this an extra paid service. With AfterHost , you have a vast assortment of Top-Level Domain Names to select from and you can modify all domain name server records or redirect the domain names using a redirection tool at no additional charge. Therefore, 'AfterHost' would be your finest choice when it comes to handling your domain name and to establishing a successful presence on the web.