Tips On Transferring Domain Names

When you initially get your brand new domain name, it gets temporarily placed on the server where you bought the domain name from, whether it be GoDaddy, Valueweb, or whoever. In some cases, you're pretty content with keeping the domain name right where it is and set up hosting for your account, in which case no transferring is needed. But if you're like most people, and if you're smart, you'll want to have your domain hosted by somebody other than the person you got the domain from. In this article, in addition to explaining how to transfer your domain name to a new hosting service, we're also going to give you some reasons why you may want to do this.

Having your domain hosted by the same company you got it from can just be plain dangerous. Take a hosting company and domain registrar like GoDaddy. GoDaddy is very strict when it comes to spam and spam complaints. It doesn't matter whether you're at fault or not. If they get enough complaints they'll suspend your hosting quicker than you can shake a stick at it. Now, if you were hosting the domain with another company, GoDaddy would have no say in the matter. But, in hosting and registering with them, not only will you get your hosting canceled on you, but you'll also lose the domain itself. With another company, all you have to worry about is losing your hosting, which you can always get from another company. This is probably the main reason why you don't want to host your domain with the same person who you bought it from.

So since we don't want to risk having out domain confiscated from us, we want to immediately transfer the domain name to the hosting company we plan on doing business with. Now, depending on who you got your domain from, this procedure will vary, as I quickly found out. One procedure is very easy and the other is, quite honestly, a royal pain in the backside.

The easier procedure is when you buy the domain from a registration service that gives you access to a domain account and control panel. Somewhere in the control panel, you will see an option for setting the DNS setting for the domain itself. After you purchase the domain this setting will be the company where you bought it from. What you need to do is simply contact the hosting company you plan to use, find out what the DNS settings will be for their server and replace the existing one with the new one. This will usually take about 24 to 48 hours to propagate. Sometimes it happens a lot faster. The last domain I got propagated in less than 4 hours. I was transferring from GoDaddy to my current web hosting account. GoDaddy does work very fast. I'll give them that much.

The not so easy procedure is when you have a registration service like Valueweb. They make you call them up with the new DNS settings. There is no control panel to access. They say it's because some people don't do it right and they want to avoid problems. Trust me, it's an easy process and the last thing you want to do is deal with these people on the phone. Register your domain with a service that allows you to change the DNS settings yourself.

For the most part, transferring a domain name is a simple procedure and you shouldn't have too much trouble unless you copy down the DNS settings incorrectly, which, according to Valueweb, seems to be a rather commonplace occurance.

To YOUR Success