Own Your Web Address

When first considering a website, small businesses get their thinking caps on to choose a domain name ie your website address: www.yoursmallbusiness.com.au. Sometimes, this is easier said than done!

With the internet getting more and more crowded with new business websites, it can be a difficult process to find that ideal domain that truly reflects our current business name or service.

Often times, small businesses leave this job to their website developer who registers the domain as part of the process of building your small business website.  It all seems easy to leave it to them…. and it is…. until you decide to upgrade your website with a new developer, move your website hosting, have a falling out with your current website developer or worse still, your current developer chooses to change career paths and disappears into the abyss.

Since you left it all to your developer, they are the only ones with access to your domain name.  Often, you are not assigned any administration rights to your own domain name, and going forward, you no longer have the domain you spent all that time choosing and all that money branding countless business cards, letterheads, social media pages, and vehicle signage.  Not to mention, once your domain expires, so too does your email address @yoursmallbusiness.com.au

I often see this scenario with small businesses.

Community groups, committees or not for profit organisations where many of the management team are made up of volunteers also fall victim as the person who purchased the domain is often long gone by the time the domain is due for renewal within 2 years or when changes are required to the domain.

If a web developer cannot access your domain, they cannot point your domain name to your new website location.

It’s not all doom and gloom:
If simply asked, many web developers will give you administration rights to your domain or transfer to a new domain registry for you or your new developer to gain access.
You can develop your website under a new domain name and add a back order to your old domain name so that when it expires (with the old domain registry) you will be given first option to re-purchase the domain.

In a nutshell, there are ways around it, but do yourself a favour and either purchase your domain prior to hiring a web developer or let them know at the start that you want complete access to your purchased domain…. if they won’t give it to you… that’s a hint!