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Digital Pacific Company Blog
Useful tips on web design, hosting, marketing and more…
Posts Tagged ‘domain’
How To Get Your Business Online
Tuesday, January 3rd, 2012
While making money on the Internet is certainly not as easy as it used to be, there are still plenty of opportunities out there. With a realistic approach and plenty of patience, many people are perfectly capable of making an income online. While there are freelancing opportunities to accommodate a wide variety of skills such as writing, web design and much more, starting your own business from scratch is somewhat more challenging. One of the greatest attractions to starting an online business is that the costs are minimal. Keeping your goals realistic is also essential. It’s wise to completely ignore the outlandish promises made by companies and individuals selling get-rich-quick schemes and instead start out with a plausible plan with goals that you can actually reach if you work hard enough. Consider the following steps for building a money-making website.
1. Be Inspired
Consider your skills and your level of knowledge in certain areas. You’ll want to think of a niche which you know plenty about as well as something which interests you. Since you’re going to need to provide quality content and something of value to your visitors, you need to be knowledgeable in your field. Of secondary importance is coming up with an idea that is ideal for making money.
2. Register a Domain Name and Hosting Package
The only costs involved in starting an online business are registering a domain name (web address) and getting a web hosting package. The costs only run into a few dollars per month and the costs will only ever increase if you have an enormous number of visitors and you need to start paying for more bandwidth.
Choose your domain name carefully. It’s good practice for search engine optimization (SEO) to include a relevant keyword or phrase in your web address. You should also keep it short and memorable. It’s also a good idea to register multiple domain names which all direct to your main website. Ideally, you should register your domain name for a longer time, such as five years. The search engines favour long-term registrations.
You’ll also want to decide whether to use a local domain name ending in the country code for your location or a .com address. As a general rule, you should only use a localised domain name such as “.com.au” if the content of your site is primarily relevant to an audience in that country. For the most part, all other sites are better off using a .com address. There are plenty of other options, however.
Domain Renewal Scam – Warning
Wednesday, December 9th, 2009
Knowing how important the domain name is to individuals and businesses online, some sneaky scam artists are tricking people into renewing the domain name early, and transferring domain registrars in the process. There is one company in particular that we have received various letters on ourselves that we would like to point out to unsuspecting domain owners. We have also decided to label it as a scam even though it is technically a legit, yet shady, business practice.
Since domain owner information and domain expiration dates are listed in the public WHOIS directory, this company is taking advantage of this knowledge and sending out domain renewal notice advertisements (that look like bills) in advance. The whole point of the advertisement / bill is to make it appear as though you must pay in order to maintain domain ownership. However, even though the advertisement / bill makes the company seem to be the current registrar at face value, the fine print actually states that this is a form to TRANSFER domain registration from your actual registrar to this new company.
For this one particular company that plagues Australian domain owners, the problems are as follows:
- Most domain names are only registered on a yearly basis, so by the time the domain finally rolls around for renewal, the owner may have forgotten the exact name of the company initially used. The individuals too busy to tend to the fine details could possibly respond to the advertisment / bill with payment without understanding the true meaning.
- The wording on the front of the document, which looks like a bill, does actually state it would call for a domain transfer, but those that don’t read the document thoroughly could easily overlook this fact because of the way the document is designed.
- The fine print on the back is extremely lengthy and small. Most people will not take the time to read this information and simply overlook it as technical drivel. Come on, you know you do it, too.
- The payment sent to this company is non-refundable should issues arise and the domain transfer is denied. The company then states that it will try to register the domain name from the date of expiry and onward, but even if the company is unable to register it, the fee is still non-refundable.
- The fee for the domain renewal can be quite high. So, when a person might be spending $19.90 for a one year .com domain name renewal with Digital Pacific, the company in question is charging more than twice that amount.
- The company is technically American based, but they have acquired an Australian billing address that they paste all over the letter. This adds to the confusion of the Australian domain name holder.
The best way to avoid domain renewal scams, such as this, is to just be aware. Know when your domain is set to expire, and best of all, know the name of your current domain name provider.
The best thing to do if you get one of these letters is to put it straight in to the paper recycle bin. Don’t even give it any thought.
Have you ever received a sneaky letter like this pertaining to your domain name? If so, we’d love to hear about it so we can keep our customers informed.
Added 31/03/10
As an addition to this post we have just been made aware of another domain renewal scam that may be doing the rounds. Please be aware of the following email.
Added 17/09/10
Yet another domain name scam. Please be aware of the following email.
How do I transfer my domain?
Saturday, July 25th, 2009
Sometimes a domain name provider may charge a lot more than another for domain names. Because of this, a very popular support call to Digital Pacific involves the question, as seen in the title, “How do I transfer my domain name?” Normally, this question is asked in the sense that a customer has already purchased a domain name from another provider and would like to transfer it to Digital Pacific, perhaps to take advantage of a decreased registration fee. Since this is such a popular topic, we have decided to focus on the process in this article.
Why would I transfer a domain name?
Domain name transfers change the entity responsible for the domain records. Perhaps you would like to take advantage of cheaper registration fees, or just because you would like to keep all domain names and hosting in one place with the goal of making management easier. It is important to note that a domain name is the same no matter where the domain name is held.
Important Note
Before completing and submitting any transfer forms, we suggest that you update the nameservers of your domain to point to Digital Pacific at NS1.DIGITALPACIFIC.COM.AU and NS2.DIGITALPACIFIC.COM.AU. Completing this process will help to ensure your website stays active after the domain finishes the transfer and gets put into a locked mode for a few days.
Basic Process
Usually, the process to transfer a domain name will be laid out on the domain provider’s website, you can perform a domain name transfer without any intervention from the current registrar, as long as you have your domain transfer password you can move your domain name to any registrar of your choice. Below we are going to let you know the steps to keep in mind if you are transferring a domain name to Digital Pacific.
To transfer a .au domain name to Digital Pacific, you must first do two things:
1) Make sure your email address associated with the domain is valid so you can receive the domain transfer initiation email. To do this simply log in to the members section where your domain name is currently registered and update your email address.
2) Get your domain password, which you can do by using the domain password retrieval tool on the auDA website.
When you have these two items sorted, fill out the domain name transfer form after which time Digital Pacific will send the initiation email. You MUST click on the link in this email for the transfer to begin, if you don’t click this confirmation link the transfer is void. After you have confirmed the transfer it should take in the area of 2 to 5 days to complete which will be confirmed by an email from Digital Pacific.
The cost of transfer is free if the domain name is not set to expire in the next 90 days.
To transfer a global domain name (.com, .net, etc.) to Digital Pacific, you must do three things first:
1) Make sure your email address associated with the domain is valid so you can receive the domain transfer initiation email. To do this simply log in to the members section where your domain name is currently registered and update your email address.
2) Get your EPP code, which you can do by contacting your current provider. In most cases you will be able to see your EPP code or transfer password from within your current registrars management section. They usually hide it somewhere tricky just to make life a little harder for you when you are taking your domain name management from them.
3) Whilst you are in the management console make sure domain transfer lock is OFF at your current provider. This is a mechanism that stops people from stealing domains via some sneaky methods.
When you have these three items sorted, fill out the domain name transfer form after which time Digital Pacific will send you the initiation email. You MUST click on the link in this email for the transfer to begin. After you have confirmed the transfer it may take up to 7 days to complete which will be noted by an email from Digital Pacific.
The cost of transfer is the same as the cost of a new domain registration, however the transfer process also adds another 12 months on to the current expiry date, so essentially you are not really paying for a transfer but also another 12 month extension. It is important to note that a global domain must be renewed at the current provider, before transfer, if it is set to expire in the next 7 days. We have had customers attempt to transfer domain names one or two days prior to the due date that, in most cases render the domain inaccessible.
So, if you feel the need to move your previously purchased domain names to Digital Pacific, we hope this gives you a bit of guidance for the process. By doing so, you can better manage your domain names and hosting, or just get a great rate for future renewals.
If everything you have read above is too confusing, please give us a call and we can help with the process.
Choosing the Right Domain Name
Thursday, July 16th, 2009
Andrew Koloadin.
Most people starting business online are so concerned with the products or services they want to promote that they neglect the importance of choosing the right domain name for their web site. Choosing the right domain name should be your first priority in the quest for online success. Many entrepreneurs are oblivious of the role a domain name plays in their online businesses and register domains which have little or no relevance to their business. The following tips will help you proceed along the right track.
Keep it Short
Although you can register a name with up to 63 characters, you have to keep in mind that people need to be able to remember it, and easily type it into their browser. Good domain names are short, all of the worlds three and four letter .com domains have been registered and the five letter domains are not far behind. Since the .au domain registration process is more stringent there are still plenty of short domains available. There is no definite number of characters that you should aim for but for guidance try to go below 12 letters and never exceed 20. Avoid using hyphens in your domain name, many users are used to typing things like petsupplies.com.au but not pet-supplies.com.au. Although they make your domain name easier to read they create confusion and people will tend to leave them out when typing them and end up at your competitor’s site.
Use Keywords in Domain Name
Your keywords have an important role to play here a domain name with keywords embedded will do wonders, not only in achieving higher positioning on the search engines, but also in becoming more effective at informing a potential customer what the Web site sells. You should try to embed least one of the most relevant keywords or a keyword phrase into your domain name, whilst this is not the only method that will elevate your site in a search engine it certainly does help. While buying a domain name for branding purposes reigns search power, if you have an opportunity to snatch a keyword rich domain name, do not hesitate to register it and use it to push the agenda of your primary domain. Also if you plan on getting visitors from another country make sure you use spelling that is recognised in that country, for example the word “color” is U.S where as the word “colour” is Australian. Also register all variations of a word such as “auslighting.com.au” and “ozlighting.com.au” to avoid competitors getting a hold of it for their advantage and to capture all mistakes that can be made by users.
Dot What?
Most countries have their own domain extension so if you’re marketing your products and services primarily to users in a single country then consider using that country’s top-level domain other wise known as domain extension.
Generally if you have an Australian business you would register a .com.au domain name since people in Australia tend to have a sense of trust from a domain with the .au extension which may result in more sales. Another advantage of having an .au domain extension is that Australian search engines will give preference to these domains over the traditional .com extension. If you don’t plan on doing most of your business in Australia then having a .com domain will do as it’s the original and most common extension. In many cases it’s also a good idea to register a few domain names and have them pointed to the same web site. It’s very important to find a balance between building your brand and making it user and search engine friendly.
Avoid Trademarked Names
Domain names mostly represent a company’s intellectual property in the form of trademarks, either registered or common law, or words and phrases associated with the company. Domain names can incorporate trademarks in a number of ways. The most common is a company name followed by a domain extension such as sony.com. A person who is not the trademark owner and registers the trademark as a domain name engages in trademark infringement. Even a domain name as innocent as sonytvsales.com would be in violation. There would be nothing worse than to spend marketing dollars on promoting your website than to lose it to another company that has protection over a particular name. There has been a long running domain trademark dispute for the domain www.nissan.com that has been going on for 15 years where Nissan Motors Is Suing Nissan Computer For Trademark Infringement and Trademark Dilution, Nissan Motors has been unsuccessful since Nissan Computer was established prior to Nissan Motors, trademark disputes like this can end up costing a lot of money. So when choosing domain make sure you understand legal issues surrounding the name, it may be a good idea to speak with intellectual property lawyer if in doubt.
Already Registered?
The chances are that when you start your search for the perfect domain name it may have already been registered by another party and in many cases it may never be used and was only registered someone liked the sound of it at the time. Don’t give up, there are a number of things you can do. There are tools available all over the internet called “whois lookups” which allow you to search across multiple domain registrar databases to give you registration information on domain names, including owners email addresses and expiry dates. Once you have those details you can either send an email to the owner asking them to kindly pass it on or wait for the domain to expire so you can register it.
If you still don’t have any luck why not try a slogan, brand name, acronym or even a phone number. Creative names can be very effective and memorable. Some domain registrars also have a domain suggestion tool where you simply type in the key word or words that you want to be in your domain and it comes back to you with a variety of combinations of available domains using that combination of words. A simple search in Google for “domain suggestion tool” will give you a few free tools that you can use.
Register your domain name now. . .
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