What Is Domain Name, Purpose, and Extensions?

What Is Domain Name?

An internet domain name can be referred as the address of Domain Name Server (DNS) or a hosting computer server of a web page. Domain names help the visitors to easily memorize company or brand. They are unique in fact.

Different sectors like e-commerce and services use domain names. Most of all, they are even used for blogging, personal branding.

An Example Of a Domain Name

Domain name is a part of a website URL (uniform resource locator) used to access websites, for example:

URL address: http://www.infoseekout.com/index.html
Top-level domain: com
Second-level domain: infoseekout
Hostname: www

What’s The Purpose Of Having a Domain Name?

Furthermore, domain name is an identity on the Web. For the reason that having a domain lets viewers’ access information from all over the world anytime. An organization or a business without a domain name is hard to find and looks less professional. Domain names are therefore to help visitors in EASILY FINDING OUT the details of a company or an organization.

Types Of Domain Extensions

Domain extensions are categorized into two level:

1^st Level

Generic top-level domains (gTLDs) – These are noticeable domains such as .com, .info, .net, .biz, .mobi, .edu, .asia and .org. As a matter of fact, availability of domains with these extensions is difficult.

Country code top-level domains (ccTLDs) – As the name itself states, these are used to represent country code such as .au, .ca, .fr, .in, .nl, .ru, .uk, .us.

2^nd Level and 3^rd Level:

Second-level and third-level domain names are the next level domains in the Domain Name System (DNS) hierarchy. The individuals who wish to maintain publicly accessible resources by running a website will buy these domain extensions. Some of the examples are .me, .my, .to, etc.

Domain name registrars will manage domain names and some of them are godaddy.com, uniregistry.com, namecheap.com, one.com, etc. The registrar who provides registration service to the end-user becomes the designated registrar for the chosen domain. In any case, only the designated registrar can modify or delete domain names information in a central registry database.

An end user can change their designated registrar by invoking a domain transfer process. The transfer process has to be executed between involved registrars and it is governed by domain name transfer policies.

How To Select a Domain Name?

To say choosing a domain name is never easy and a crucial thing. As you cannot change or do not want to change it after getting branding. It requires a lot of creativity and attention. Don’t worry, if you are not that creative. There are few best sites available on the web. They can provide you with the suggestions and domain name availability. These sites can even generate the good domain names. All you have to do is provide them with your favorite keywords, suited to your business and/or personal needs. Just use them and get the job done. In addition, please read Things To Keep In Mind While Picking Domain Name For Registration.

If you’re having difficulty in finding a domain name that is available and suitable to your need, there are sites that can help you pick a right domain name. Further, check Best Domain Name Suggestion Tools.

How and Where To Buy a Domain Name?

In my opinion, GoDaddy, Namecheap are few among the popular domain registrars. You can consider buying a domain name from them. In order to buy, you need to have an account with the registrar with valid email id. It’s better to provide your main email id while registering.

Expired and Deleted Domain names:

On the other hand, you can buy an expired domain. Do you know almost thousands of Domain names expire every day? The reasons for expiry can be numerous. Some owners may forget to renew, some just don’t want them anymore or because they might have moved on to other projects.

ExpiredDomains is the great website where you can find the expired and deleted domains. Just pick the one if you like, available and especially relevant. These expired domains have their own advantages and disadvantages. Rather than advantages, they have many disadvantages. Hence, we suggest not to buy expired domains. Besides, check drop catcher services if you are still interested in expired domains.

Drop Catcher Services:

Speaking about drop catcher services, these websites provide the service of quickly attempting to register an available domain name if that name becomes available. That is, to “catch” a “dropped” name when the domain name’s registration expires. The expiry can be either because the registrant does not want the domain or did not renew the registration on time. There are many websites who offer drop catcher services. Some of them are DropCatch and DesktopCatcher.

What is Domain Name Transfer/Domain Forwarding?

Domain name transfer is the process of changing designated registrar from one to other. The Policy on Transfer of Registrations between two Registrars is maintained by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, in short ICANN.

What is DNS Hosting?

Storing of a website or other data on a server or other computer is called hosting. So that it can be accessed from all over the world. Registration of a domain name creates a set of name server records in the DNS servers of the parent domain. This indicates the IP addresses of DNS servers. You have to replace them with your hosting service provider DNS servers IP address. This is only if you are choosing different hosting service provider other than domain registrar.