How to register a domain name

If you are interested in creating a web site, there are several options to have your site in the Internet. The simplest way of having a web site is going to one of the free web sites and create your own.

However, as you have more pages in the web and want to have a more professional appearence, you will want to buy a domain name. Don't worry, however: registering a domain name is easier than you imagine, as we will see in this article.

There are several domain registration web sites. This is an extremelly competitive business, since anyone can build an infrastructure and start to sell domain names. The result is that you can find great bargains in this area. Most of the companies will register your first domain for free if you sign up for an annual plan. Other companies will give you a pretty good initial price.

The most well known web registration companies include:

Yahoo domains: Yahoo has an excellent infrastructure for domain registration, and they do it at very affordable prices. The first domain is usually free with an annual account. The normal prices are around $10, which is very inexpensive.

Go daddy: This is one of the best know registration companies. They have good deals such as the first domain starting from $5.

After registration, you need to make sure that the domain is secure. Most registration companies will do that for free, but you need to check anyway, to avoid someone to changing you domain without your consent.

You have several options for renewal of the domain registration. The basic web registration service is for one year. After that you need to make sure that the name will be renewed, or you can lose your domain.

In more than one case it happened that someone forgets to renew a domain registration and finally lost the domain. One a domain is expired (generally after one year or two of the original registration) anyone can register it again and use the domain name for another web site.

If you try to register a domain name you will quickly find that all good names have already been registered. Since it is so easy and cheap to register a domain, most people register several domains that they think might be of interest. This results in a large number of domains that are used only to display advertisement.

This means that your first option will usually have been taken. This is true specially if it involves well known names. Your best bet nowadays is to find a completelly different name (that is why you see so many web companies with such strange names) or use variations on the main name you want to register.

Many registration companies will give you variations over your main name, so you can choose one of them.