Domains Defined
One of the most vital prerequisites for setting up a successful Internet presence is the domain. It is what people will discern first when they come across your site and what they will identify you with. The domain should be easy to memorize, but should also be something that tells your web page's visitors what the site is about.
Generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs)
A domain as a rule is composed of two constituents - a Top-Level Domain (TLD) and a Second-Level Domain (SLD). If you have domain.com, for example, ".com" is the Top-Level Domain Name and "domain" is the Second-Level Domain. There are a couple of groups of TLDs that you should consider prior to choosing the domain you desire. Your decision should be built upon the goal of your web site and on its target audience. Let's explore the gTLDs, or generic Top-Level Domains - these are the most common Top-Level Domain Names intended to indicate a given purpose - .com (business organizations), .net (network infrastructures), .biz (companies), .info (informative resources), .org (organizations of a non-commercial character), .mobi (handheld devices), .asia (the Asia Pacific region), .name (individuals or relatives), .pro (particular walks of life), etc. As you can see, these Top-Level Domain Names encompass most realms of life, so you should pick the one that would indicate the objective of your web site best. There is no limitation as to who can register such domains, but some of them involve additional requirements to demonstrate that you qualify to keep such a domain (.mobi and .pro, for example).
Country-code Top-Level Domains (ccTLDs)
The ccTLDs, or country-code TLDs, are country-specific Top-Level Domain Names. Each country has its own ccTLD. Getting such a domain is good if your target group of web site visitors is from a given country. Many individuals would rather buy goods or services from a local site, and if your target is Canada, for instance, registering a .ca domain could increase the visits to your site.
Domain Name Redirection
You can register different Top-Level Domains, which can forward your web site's visitors to a given website like domain.com, for example. This would boost the traffic and lower the chance of somebody pilfering your web page visitors by using the same name with another Top-Level Domain - if you are not utilizing a trademark.
Name Servers (NSs)
Each and every Top-Level Domain has domain records. The name server records (NS records, also known as DNS records) reveal where the domain is hosted, i.e. they point to the hosting supplier whose name servers (NSs, aka DNSs) it is using at the moment. You can swap the DNSs of your domain name at all times. You can have your domain name registered with one firm and get the website hosting service itself from another. Thus, if you register your domain and come across decent website hosting plans somewhere else afterwards, you can point your domain to the current company's name servers straight off.
Domain Server Records (NS Records)
On the whole, as long as your domain name utilizes a particular pair of name servers, all its name server records will lead to the same hosting vendor. Some website hosting suppliers, however, permit you to modify specific domain name records, such as the A records and the MX records of your domain. The A record is an IP address, which specifies on which server your web page is hosted, whereas the MX records demonstrate which server tackles the email mailbox accounts associated with your domain name. For instance, if you take on a new web page designer and he devises an .ASP website that will be hosted on his personal Windows web server, you may desire to change just the IP address (the A record) but not the MX records of your domain. In this way, www.domain.com will direct to the Windows web hosting server, but your e-mail accounts or any sub-domain names like forum.domain.com or shop.domain.com will still be in your current Linux website hosting account. The .ASP platform is created by Microsoft and demands a Windows hosting server, even though a Linux web hosting server would be way more reliable.
Budget Domain Names Furnished by 'Blue Grape Hosting'
Just a small number of web hosting companies allow you to modify certain domain name records and quite frequently this an additional paid service. With us, you get a large number of TLDs to pick from and you can modify all domain records or redirect the domain names using a forwarding tool at no extra cost.