Domain registration and website hosting services are a necessary component of your website design process.
Once your new website has been launched, the bulk of the costs associated with a new website design are over.
However, there are two fees that you must continue to pay in order to keep your new website live and accessible on the internet.
They are domain registration/renewal and website/email hosting.
Before we get into the difference between the two, let’s start off with some definitions.
What is a Domain?
This is also called your url and is the name you registered that usually starts with www. and ends with .com or .ca .
Some companies have more than one domain name registered so as to have ownership over specific niches as well as their company name.
What is Domain registration?
The purchase of your domain name is also called domain registration and can be done through providers, or domain registrars like godaddy.com or webnames.ca and are generally for the period of one year.
This means each year you must renew your domain name each year in order for you to maintain ownership. This is typically a nominal fee of under $40 per year.
What is Website and email hosting?
Simply put, website and email hosting is essentially renting server space online for your website files to live.
In addition to the actual space, a host will provide band with, or data transfer services.
For example:
Your website files are stored on a server and whenever someone types in your website address, these files are sent to that user’s computer over the internet, using bandwidth.
The same goes for email associated with your domain name.
When someone emails you at yourname@yourcompany.com files are sent over the internet to that user’s computer.
The service that sends those files is your website and email hosting service.
It requires a lot of hardware and expertise to provide reliable web hosting services.
A good web host will actively update their servers to guard against spam, viruses and hacks. These are just some of the things happening behind the scenes at your website hosting provider, but they are very important ones.
You must continue your website and email hosting services for your website and emails to remain functional.
We are an authorized reseller for rackspace email and website hosting, and as such can guarantee 99% uptime.
ProTip: We recommend that your website and email hosting provider be the same as your web design provider.
3 reasons why to source your web hosting and web development services from the same company:
1. If your website goes down or breaks, it’s just one call to one company. This saves you time and headaches when you just need it fixed.
2. Your website design may require very specific server configuration in order for it to function. Not all web hosting companies offer support of all technologies which will cause delays in your web design project, and may result in additional fees.
3. You don’t know what you don’t know about website hosting.
Your website developer will have the technical expertise and experience to recommend a hosting company with a solid reputation combined with great support and an infrastructure big enough to not disappear into the night.
Most of the time you’ll rely on your web developer to communicate with the web host on your behalf, so it’s important to consider your web developer’s recommendations for a web host, as they have a vested interest in keeping your web design online, functional and virus free.
