What period of time did you choose to purchase your domain name from Godaddy.com? Thay have 1,3,5 and 10 year options. I'm just wondering if there is a benefit to purchase for more than one year. Thanks.

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Sandy
www.eliteadminforyou.com

Sandy,

A friend of mine who is a computer "geek" just helped me purchase my domain name through GoDaddy.com. He suggested purchasing one year to start with. You can always renew the option for additional years, but since you are just starting, one year might make more sense now. That's what I did.

Sylvia
The Alliances

Hi Sandy,

I agree with Sylvia but one thing to consider - if you are sure of your domain name and in this for the "long haul" you might want to consider investing in 5 or 10 years. Strange as it sounds Google does look at this so it helps your SEO.

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Professional VA By Design
Your Work, Your Business, Your Life

Sandy,

I purchased mine for 5 years when I started. I looked at it this way, I was in it for the long haul and it was my incentive to devise a 5 year business plan. Going into my third year, looks like I made the right decision.

However, if you are working on a shoestring budget then do what fits into that amount. You can always renew at different levels as the time arises.

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Lee Drozak
My Office Assistant

There is a benefit, ranking-wise, to having a multi-year registration. And it's a relatively small investment, so if you love your domain name, there's no harm at all in taking a longer plan.

However--I know you didn't ask this, but after the experience I had, I'm going to tell you anyway--I would advise you to only pay for ONE year now, then start shopping for a new registrar so you'll be ready to switch long before that year is up. I found it nothing less than TORTURE to be stuck with GoDaddy for a long period of time. And (again, I know you didn't ask, but...) I advise against ever hosting with GoDaddy at all.

People say the registrar doesn't matter much, but I found GD annoyed me as registrar just as much as it did as host. So I give them my money for neither now, and I'm much, much happier.

/unsolicited rant

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AnnaLisa Michalski, Sunny Words Writing Services

Thanks everyone. I accept any and all advice

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Sandy
www.eliteadminforyou.com

Originally Posted by AnnaLisa Michalski

There is a benefit, ranking-wise, to having a multi-year registration. And it's a relatively small investment, so if you love your domain name, there's no harm at all in taking a longer plan. However--I know you didn't ask this, but after the experience I had, I'm going to tell you anyway--I would advise you to only pay for ONE year now, then start shopping for a new registrar so you'll be ready to switch long before that year is up. I found it nothing less than TORTURE to be stuck with GoDaddy for a long period of time. And (again, I know you didn't ask, but...) I advise against ever hosting with GoDaddy at all. People say the registrar doesn't matter much, but I found GD annoyed me as registrar just as much as it did as host. So I give them my money for neither now, and I'm much, much happier. /unsolicited rant

I appreciate your honesty AnnaLisa. Now I have to ask, why do you suggest I dont' use GoDaddy to register?

Is registering and hosting the same thing? And, of course then I assume that it's ok to purchase the domain name from one provider and register or host it with another carrier correct?

Thank you.

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Sandy
www.eliteadminforyou.com

Hi Sandy,

Once you get a GoDaddy account, they'll send you offers galore. Get what you can afford now & keep your eyes peeled - maybe you can use one of their offers to extend your registration at a lesser amount.

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Lezly Harrison
Laserdog Productions - Code that Doesn't Bite

Sandy,

No, registering and hosting are not the same. Registration is just reserving the domain for yourself and making a public record of who its administrator is. Here's the thing: you can register as many domains as you want, but you can't really do anything with them (i.e., you can't actually upload a "site" the world can see) until you order hosting also.

Paying for hosting is sort of like leasing an apartment. You pay rent (hosting fees) for the right to occupy a certain unit (domain and server space) of his building. Usually, your landlord (host company) also provides some level of maintenance, security, and/or utility services (tech support, spam guards, etc.) as part of your lease package. That may be a weak analogy--does it make sense?

I agree it's simplest to use the same company for both registration and hosting, but you don't have to. As for why I switched, I'd feel kind of funny giving any of the "dirty details" of my bad experience publicly. I'll PM you.

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AnnaLisa Michalski, Sunny Words Writing Services

This has been sufficiently answered, but I still want to share my 2 cents:

Even for a startup business, it is advisable to register a domain for a minimum of 2 years. Search engines look at the date your domain expires, and if it is less than a year you will get a lower page score (bing) and page rank (google) right away.

Often it is cheaper to go ahead and register for 2 years than it is to register for one and renew for another couple of years 6 months into the first year. (Yep, I've done that. Once.)

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Amber Whitener
Virtual IT Assistants

Great info Amber - thanks so much for sharing your experience. I'll renew for longer than one year.

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Sandy
www.eliteadminforyou.com

After reading the information from all the posts, I might consider renewing for longer than one year myself. Didn't know that search engines look at length of time. Learn something new here all the time. Thanks.

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Sylvia Mesaros
The Alliances

Originally Posted by AnnaLisa Michalski

Sandy, No, registering and hosting are not the same. Registration is just reserving the domain for yourself and making a public record of who its administrator is. Here's the thing: you can register as many domains as you want, but you can't really do anything with them (i.e., you can't actually upload a "site" the world can see) until you order hosting also. Paying for hosting is sort of like leasing an apartment. You pay rent (hosting fees) for the right to occupy a certain unit (domain and server space) of his building. Usually, your landlord (host company) also provides some level of maintenance, security, and/or utility services (tech support, spam guards, etc.) as part of your lease package. That may be a weak analogy--does it make sense? I agree it's simplest to use the same company for both registration and hosting, but you don't have to. As for why I switched, I'd feel kind of funny giving any of the "dirty details" of my bad experience publicly. I'll PM you.

Sorry to bother you again AnnaLisa but, is registering the same as purchasing the domain name?

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Sandy
www.eliteadminforyou.com

Someone else may need to step in here and clean up my response. I'm not sure how accurate this is, but my understanding is that most people don't technically "own" a domain. We only purchase the rights to use the domain.

But in essence, yes, if you're the one who registers the domain, you've purchased those rights. For all intents and purposes, it's yours.

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AnnaLisa Michalski, Sunny Words Writing Services

I feel I'm late on this as well. But, for my two cents, I've referred my clients and friends to Doteasy through the link on my website.

With Doteasy, you pay an annual fee of $25 for your domain registration and basic hosting is $0. For 2 years, it's $45, and for more years, it's discounted again.

Doteasy also provides you with a free website creator, templates, emails, guestbook, forum, blog, etc. I found it to be the most reasonably priced and easy to use for building a basic website with text and pictures. I have actually been able to add building affordable websites to my services and make a pretty good profit for 5-10 hours max of work.

I also get a $5 referral fee if the referrer registers through my website. Not bad!!

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Shellye L. Lyons, Business/Marketing Manager ~~ The Lyons Group, LLC