How valuable can an top domain name be?

One of the most essential preconditions for setting up a successful web presence is the domain. It is what people will notice first when they come across your website and what they will associate you with. The domain name should be easy to remember, but should also be something that informs your visitors what the web page is about.

Generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs)

A domain name usually has two fragments - a Top-Level Domain Name (TLD) and a Second-Level Domain Name (SLD). If you have domain.com, for instance, ".com" is the Top-Level Domain Name and "domain" is the Second-Level Domain Name. There are a couple of groups of Top-Level Domains that you should examine prior to picking the domain you want. Your pick should be based on the purpose of your web site and on its target audience. Let's analyze the gTLDs, or generic Top-Level Domains - these are the most widespread Top-Level Domains meant to signify a particular purpose - .com (business enterprises), .net (network infrastructures), .biz (corporations), .info (informative web pages), .org (organizations of a non-commercial character), .mobi (handheld devices), .asia (the Asia Pacific region), .name (persons or families), .pro (particular walks of life), etc. As you can see, these Top-Level Domains encompass most spheres of life, so you should settle on the one that would describe the objective of your web site best. There is no restriction as to who can register such TLDs, but some of them contain extra procedures to confirm that you are eligible to register such a TLD (.mobi and .pro, for instance).

Country-code Top-Level Domains (ccTLDs)

The ccTLDs, or country-code Top-Level Domain Names, 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 persons would like to purchase goods or services from a local web site, and if your target is Canada, for example, settling on a .ca TLD could increase the visits to your website.

Domain Forwarding

You can register several domains, which can redirect your visitors to a particular site such as domain.com, for instance. This would increase the traffic and decrease the probability of someone snatching your visitors by registering the same Second-Level Domain with another Top-Level Domain Name - if you are not using a trademark.

Name Servers (NSs)

Every domain name has domain name records. The name server records (NS records, a.k.a. DNS records) demonstrate where the domain is hosted, i.e. they point to the web hosting distributor whose name servers (NSs, also known as DNSs) it is utilizing now. You can substitute the NSs of your domain whenever you wish. You can have your domain registered with one provider and get the webspace hosting service itself from another. So, if you register your domain and discover good website hosting plans someplace else at a later time, you can point your domain name to the current company's name servers instantly.

Name Server Records (DNS Records)

On the whole, as long as your domain name utilizes a certain pair of NSs, all its name server records will lead to the same web space hosting supplier. Some webspace hosting vendors, though, allow you to modify certain domain name records, among them the A records and the MX records of your domain. The A record is an IP address, which exhibits on which server your web page is located, while the MX records disclose which hosting server tackles the electronic mail accounts related to your domain name. For example, if you engage a new site designer and he constructs an .ASP site that will be situated on his personal Windows web server, you may want to change just the Internet Protocol address (the A record) but not the MX records of your domain name. In this way, www.domain.com will point to the Windows hosting server, but your emails or any sub-domains such as forum.domain.com or shop.domain.com will still be in your current Linux website hosting account. The .ASP environment is designed by Microsoft and requires a Windows server, even though a Linux hosting server would be way more secure.

Budget Domain Names Distributed by 'Exclusive Hosting'

Only a few web hosting providers permit you to modify certain name server records and quite often this an extra paid service. With Exclusive Hosting , you get an extensive assortment of TLDs to choose from and you can edit all NS records or forward the domain names using a forwarding tool at no additional cost. For that reason, 'Exclusive Hosting' would be your best pick when it comes to handling your domain name and to creating a successful presence on the Internet.