Sunday, November 14, 2010

Basic ingredients for a web site

There are some main ingredients and some optional parts to getting a website up and running. In this article, we will discuss the essentials you need to at least be viewable on the internet. Main components are having a domain name and web hosting for your files, the actual physical files like HTML, that make up the design of the page and the option to secure your content against non encrypted attacks. Let's take a look.

Registering a Domain Name

When starting up your website, you need a domain name to help people remember how to get to your site. Google.com is one of the most familiar domain name that almost everyone using the web knows. Upon getting your initial site up and running, you could choose the route of a cheap domain name provider to help start your web business. These companies almost always provide similar features to the big companies and are a great alternative.

Web Hosting

You need a location to store your web site files. No matter what type of content you are displaying, including images or PDF files, they have to be accessible on a computer server that is always on. This is where an affordable web hosting solution comes into play. For a relatively inexpensive price of less than five to ten dollars a month you can get your web files hosted for others to see.

Web Site Design

Your web site will be designed with a variety of HTML files, Images, Videos, Flash and PDF files. A web developer can create this for you or you will do it yourself. The better the skills of the person doing it, the better your site will look like. Web hosting sitebuilders or Dreamweaver may be used to get your site up and running quickly. Again, quality is directly in relation to the tools used and skill level of the person doing it.

Secured Hosting Service (Optional)

Having your hosting secured is an optional practice for most sites as there is usually just static data. If your site is collecting information such as credit card data, then you will need to looking into buying ssl certificate for your website to ensure your visitors data is protected. The data is protected by a web server certificate that changes your site from http to https, indicating to the user it is secure. The transformation to an https site is what makes the site use the certificate to encrypt the transmitted data, so it is kept away from prying eyes. For these sites, you definately need it, but not for regular information web sites or blogs.

Those are four basics you need to start any web site and will get you started. You then need to decide what additional components you may need to also include in your web site package.

Friday, October 22, 2010

Shared hosting should have add on domains

For the longest time web hosting setups were made to accommodate only one web site to be hosted. As technology has improved as well as structures, there has been a shift in almost all hosts that allow you to buy web hosting. The ability to include a certain number of addon domains in their packages has been added, while some do not restrict how many add on domains you can have. It is still not advised to host to many domains within one account, but this is a huge money saver for those who may want to host a couple of small sites.

An add on domain is as the name implies added on to your existing hosting account. A main domain will always be hosted for the account, and then normally within a subfolder on that account, your addon domain will be hosted. So when you connect via ftp the first folder you see will be for maindomain.com files. You will then create a subfolder or the hosting will create the subfolder for you (normally something to do with the domain), like a folder named addondomain.com, will contain the files for your second domain. Now if you type maindomain.com, you will see it as its own site, and the same for addondomain.com. Your visitor will not know it is hosted on the same hosting as it will appear separately hosted.

Affordable low cost web hosting solutions are popping up everywhere, and normally the mid to higher based packages will offer add on domains as an option. Note, this does vary from provider. When you find the hosting provider offering the package you want, you then rinse and repeat with as many domains as the provider will allow you to add on. You do have to remember not to delete these subfolders or your site will stop working, and it may get messy with too many subfolders for addon domains.

Now that you are able to host multiple domains within one account, enjoy your savings.

Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Is a personal or corporate domain the same?

Computer Users involved in the web site industry are all familiar with the concept of a domain name. In fact, anyone who surfs the web will have used a domain name at some time. Yahoo.com being very popular domain names viewed by many on a hourly basis. Let's talk about the idea of a personal domain name versus corporate domain name registration. Those who are confused need not be. They are realistically the same thing with a different way of thinking in what the domain name will show.

Personal domain registration

As the title suggests, a personal domain name is for the person looking to set up a web site for non commercial reasons. This can be for a personal photo album, personal resume online or used to register their given name to use for email purposes. You can find many places offering cheap domain names and these are the best way to get your own domain name. After that you just need an affordable web hosting solution.

Corporate domain registration

This is for the companies like Pepsi (Pepsi.com), Dell (dell.com) and CNN (cnn.com). They are registering the domain names as a corporation to use for corporate branding. In today's world all businesses need to be on the web so you need a web domain name that matches your brand name.

What is the difference then between personal web name registration and corporate domain registration. Just the end use of the domain. The same website domain name cost the same and can be had with a number of cheap domain registration service providers.

The cost of Domains can vary based on the Top Level Domain (TLD) extension you choose. When you register corporate domains, you will likely register the .com extension, and for local branding you may register a .ca extension for a business owner living in Canada. Domains for personal use can be many domain extensions, but even for personal registrations .com is the first choice. The newly popular .Me extension is being used to register personal domains.

Whether its corporate or personal reasons you are registering your domain name, find the low cost domain name provider that offers a cheap, yet reliable solution. After all, help is needed at times and services offering 24x7 assistance is very helpful after you have registered your domain name, for personal or corporate reasons.

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Need a Web Address? There's three things you need to know

When it comes to building a business in the online world, branding questions will arise and the main method to branding online is through domain name registration. This provides you with a brandable name online that people can remember to get to your web site. The most famous one that everyone probably knows is google.com. As you look to buy your domain name, you should inform yourself about three things within the process.

Domain Name Spelling

Making sure your domain name is spelled correctly avoids frustration of paying for something you did not want. Many times people do it quickly and forget this simple fact of double checking. Then their web designer will go to set up the domain for the hosting and the web person realizes that the domain they think they own is not actually theirs. A short window does normally exist where you can actually return the domain name if this happens, so noticing this early is crucial.

Multiple TLD Registration

With domain names, there are multiple top level domains (TLD for short). The .com domain name extensions is the most common extension every average person knows about and this is what they are after. The .net or .org domains are hardly registered as well as country code specific domains such as .ca and .us. Company branding and branding all variations of your domain name is the reason you want to register multiple top level domains. If anyone forgets your website and by mistake puts a different domain name extension, it will still redirect to your site (provided you make the correct setup). Doing this will also prevent cybersquatters using your name for their gain.

Ensuring correct Contact Information

For domain name regulation, ICANN requires you to enter in valid information when you buy a domain name. If you do not, you are at risk of losing your domain name. No one wants to risk losing the domain name that identifies their company online, and their really is no reason to put invalid information here.

Follow these simple ideas when you go ahead with buying cheap domains and your start to branding your business online will have a great start.

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Three Mistakes Newbie Domainers Make When Buying Domains For Investment

When becoming a domain flipper, especially when starting out, there are a few things you need to know about domain names. That way when you do flip the domain to make money you do not run into any problems. Here are three mistakes some newbie domainers make when deciding to try the domain flipping game.

1. Not knowing the 60 day transfer period

When buying domain names, the rules for most Top Level Domains (TLD's) are that you must keep it initially for 60 days with the registrar you purchase it with. Until that sixty days is done you are not allowed to transfer it to another person. So you should keep it for two months before trying to flip it. Also, many do offer a free push into a new account, but you must tell the person buying the domain that you will be doing a free push into the registrar it is currently registered with. Also, if you do the free push, when they receive the domain they will also need to wait sixty days if they decide to switch to their registrar of choice.

2. Purchasing really long domain names

One thing you must not do when flipping domains is buy really long domains like HeyThisIsMyNewBlogAboutDogTrainingComeReadIt.com. This will not make you money if your trying to flip domains. Short domains are the best domains to flip. If you check out any 3 or 4 letter domains for sale you will see they demand high prices, even the ones that are a strange combination of letters. Also, catchy short memorable domains sell well. You might be able to sell three word domains, but they will need to normally have some kind of site content on it. In terms of just flipping straight domains with out a built on top site, you should remember "short and sweet".

3. Buying Domain Names with Hyphens

Hyphenated domain names may allow you to get the keywords you are after to be contained within the domain name, but they will sell for much less when trying to sell the domain or site being built on top of it. Everyone when they tell someone a URL for their domain will say the words to the domain. If you have to say "domain hyphen second hyphen word" just so they remember the domain, you will likely get people not finding the site or they will try out "domainsecondword.com" which may lead to a competitor site. Memory and ease of use in typing in the domain name are the main reason you should not use hyphens if you are looking into investing in a domain name.

These are three mistakes many newbies make when buying domain names. There are times when point two and three above can be financially rewarding when buying as an investment, but for anyone starting out they may find out they are putting in a lot of money without a return on investment.

If your looking to purchase some domain names that you want to invest in, please find some cheap domain namesavailable at http://www.domainsatretail.com/

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Michael_Kralj

Monday, November 16, 2009

Domain Name Registration Canada

Domain name registration over a decade ago was a more specialized business with very few offering you the ability to purchase and register your own domain name. Since then, the domain name industry has blossomed and currently their is in existence of hundreds to thousands of service providers offering the chance to pick up and register your own domain name. The most popular Top Level Domain (TLD) extension is the .com extension, and almost everyone will pick that extension up if available.

Do TLD domain name extensions exist that are specific for different countries? Yes they exist and you can purchase everything from .co.uk for United Kingdom (UK) based companies, to even .us domain names for United States companies. For those living in Canada, you also have available your own domain name extension which is the .ca domain. The .ca domain extensions is simply for all who want to register their site for a canadian domain name.

The Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) is the main controlling company overviewing canadian domain names (.ca). They control and monitor all activity with .ca domain names and when you choose to register a domain canada, an email will be sent to the administrative contact email indicating the registration process has been completed and you own the domain name.

Do you need to register the domain name through a company that is specifically located in Canada or will any cheap domain name registrar work? The answer to this is that any registrar will work provided that you find on their website that they actually offer ca domain names. Most are offering the capability to register canadian domain names, but their still are companies who do not. Before making the purchase of your domain name, just double check that the price showing on the website is in Canadian Dollars instead of US Dollars. Since the Canadian dollar at the time of this writing, is lower than the US dollar you will be paying more than the posted cost if they are showing it in US dollars.

Monday, November 9, 2009

Beginner Guide to Web Hosting

Web hosting is an idea that is very foreign for new web site owners, especially when they are venturing into developing a web site. They will hear of terms like web domains, web site hosting, web design and graphic design. Shared web site hosting when you understand the concept is pretty easy to understand. To summarize, shared web site hosting is a storage container to hold your ASP files and images.

Those looking to purchase an affordable web hosting service will want to learn the different offerings included with shared web hosting, such as hosting disk space, bandwidth, number of databases provided and types of languages you can use.

Disk Space

Hosting disk space is exactly as the title states, and is similar to the disk space you have on your own PC. This feature indicates the size in GB available to the webmaster to host your JSP files and images you have for your website. Multimedia, such as images will use more of your hosting space, while your text based coded files will take up less disk space. The amount of disk space you are wise to look into purchasing depends ultimately on the file types you will be hosting, and the overall file size of your web site.

Hosting Bandwidth

Transfer amount for web hosting is much like the bandwidth you use for your internet. Each time a file is downloaded from your site, it is added to your total for bandwidth used for your site. Bandwidth will be different depending on the plan, and you will need to select the bandwidth amount you will use based on how much traffic your site receives and the total disk space your site uses.. You will normally find lower offerings of bandwidth all the way up to web hosting service providers giving unlimited hosting plans.

Types of Hosting Servers

The last topic to cover here is the different hosting servers available. The server type will limit the file types, like ASP, that you will be able to host. All hosting servers will run HTML, CSS and JavaScript, since they are handled by web browsers, like Internet Explorer. The main thing to note is Linux hosting is usually cheaper and Linux server hosting with Apache supports the PHP programming language. Windows server hosting runs with IIS and is generally used for Active Server Pages (ASP) files. open source CMS like Drupal run off PHP~Windows is on average more pricier due to the cost associated with purchasing the windows license for the server}.

For your next or first web hosting purchase, ensure to look at all these factors to make a decision.