Recently, I had a client who had her domain name held hostage by a former web designer. Whether it was malice on the part of the designer, or just busyness I’m not sure, but I do know it caused us a week’s work of headaches.

Unfortunately this is a fairly common occurrence. My client had the utmost trust in her designer when she hired her. She probably didn’t think twice about the details of domain registration and site hosting when she signed up, instead she trusted her designer. While a great relationship with your web designer is essential, so is control over the finished product -- including the domain name.

Many web designers have packages which include the domain name and hosting. This makes it convenient to get everything in one fell swoop. When allowing your designer to register your name, ask her to put you as the Administrative Contact on the account. There are generally three contacts on each domain: Administrative, Technical, and Billing. By registering as the Administrative Contact, you’ll have the ability to move the domain if you ever need to.

You may, instead, choose to register your own name. It’s an easy process and it takes just a few minutes to do. First you’ll need to find a registrant. The most well-known registrants are: networksolutions.com, godaddy.com and register.com. Their prices vary, so do a little homework to see which offers the best deal for you.

No matter which registrant you choose, you’ll be given the opportunity to search for a domain name. This is where you’re going to plug in your desired ‘dot com’. Generally, you’ll want to register the name you write under. (ie. Susie Author would look for susieauthor.com) Once you plug your desired name in, you’ll be taken to a screen which tells you if the domain is available or not. If it is, great, go ahead and pay for it. If not, you’ll be given some suggested names. Some are just plain silly and some may be worth considering. Generally, if my first choice domain is taken, I look for a hyphenated name (ie susie-author.com). I’m not a big fan of hyphenated domain names, but it sometimes means getting a domain close to the one I want instead of having to use something completely off-base.

Once you’ve registered your domain name it will be ‘parked’ until you move it to your host. This means you can purchase your domain name at any time and save it until you decide to build your site. Just make sure (no matter who registers your domain) you keep your contact information up to date. Doing this prevents hassle when you need to move your domain.

Keep your domain under your control…make sure you are named as a contact and be certain your contact information is up to date!