Who owns domain name – A complete Guide
Recently, we came across an issue where some of the small business owners wanted to get started with our Free Website Development and Online Marketing program but they couldn’t get started quickly due to the domain name ownership issues. Do you know who owns domain name?
They were pretty frustrated with the website design and online marketing agencies that they were dealing with since few months and guess what it became even worse, when they wanted to have access to their domain control panel those web design agencies simply refused to give them the access to change the DNS (Domain name System) settings because they didn’t want the customers to stop paying for the services.
Considering the above situation we thought about writing an entire post for small business owners like you so, that next time you don’t have to face any such issue about domain name ownership and you already know who own domain name.
Now, you must be thinking what a Domain name is and why is it so important?
So let’s get started with this tutorial that will explain to you everything about the domain name ownership, website design, hosting and online marketing and how your domain name is linked to all of these.
In simple terms without getting into technical details a domain name is your website’s name that you register with a domain registrar such as godaddy
or domain.com. It is a friendly naming system for assigning memorable address to the computers on the internet. It is difficult for human beings to remember ip address which is a string of numbers so a domain name hides an ip address but technically every domain has an ip address which is its real address.
e.g. zoho.com is a domain name and it has ip address assigned to it > 172.19.251.70
There are many services that help you find out any domain’s ip address
A domain name can be a combination of letters or numbers and you must always remember that it is like your business identity on the internet and that’s why it is important that your domain name should always contain your business name.
e.g. your business or company’s name is ‘A1 cleaning systems’ so, you must register your domain name as ‘aonecleaningsystems.com’ or ‘a1cleaningsystems.com’
For more clarity on how to book perfect domain name you can find out in our detailed post here.
Why domain name is so important?
Domain name is like your business identity on the internet, your digital asset and that’s the importance of domain names. It helps people find your website or web pages on the internet. You would never want that someone else is running a website on the internet under your business name and so it is equally important to register a domain name as soon as you register your business or company.
Now lt’s time to come back to the issue that we want to discuss in this post that ‘who owns domain name’?
As a business owner or an individual you should always remember that the legal owner of the any domain is its registrant. Registrant means someone who registers a domain under his/her name and his/her contact details. Typically, domains have four contacts registrant/owner, admin, technical and billing.
e.g. As a business owner you search for a domain on godaddy or domain.com or any other registrar’s website and for the booking you provide your details as the owner such as your name, address and phone number so, you become the legal owner of the domain.
You should never confuse with the people whose names appear in admin, technical or billing details of the domain when you do a WHOIS Lookup as the owner of the domain.
WHOIS Lookup service helps users to find out the information related to the domain ownership, registrant of the domain and other related information such as technical contact or admin.
e.g. sometimes small business owners do not have idea about how to book domain names and website development so, they hire a freelancer or an agency for carrying out the task. In such cases the freelancer or the web design agency inputs their details as the owner while registering a domain name which is a bad practice.
As a small business owner you should always check with your web design agency or the freelancer for the domain registrant details and change the username & passwords for the domain control panel.
With all the above information you can figure out the importance of domain names. Domain names are as important as your other physical and financial assets. It’s just a matter of being aware when you are outsourcing the task of registering a domain name for your business or personal purpose to an agency or a freelancer and then checking with them about the ownership details being used during domain registration and finally taking the domain control panel under your custody.
Read the complete guide above – ‘who owns domain name’ to claim your domain name today.
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