| My favorite place to purchase domains is Godaddy. | | | | hundred years, but this is ridiculous. When you look |
| There is a lot of spam, and I have to ignore some of | | | | up the information about these websites, you will |
| their inappropriate commercials, but they are always | | | | never see them with a registration longer than ten |
| affordable, have an easy to learn interface, and their | | | | years. |
| telephone customer service is open 24/7 and | | | | Now let's talk about hosting. In order for your |
| excellent. Most of my domains are through them. I | | | | website to remain live around the clock, it needs to |
| also love that they have a component for Joomla | | | | exist on a server that has constant internet |
| ready for me to install. Most of my domains are with | | | | connectivity, and is set up for internet hosting. The |
| GoDaddy. | | | | server is similar to a hard drive that stores all the files |
| You can register your domain for as little as one | | | | that make up your website. There are some cases |
| month to as long as ten years. The advantage for | | | | where big companies will host website on their own |
| going for a shorter period of time, is because small | | | | server, and have their own IT department, however, |
| start up businesses do not have much start- up | | | | most of the time, hosting your website with a |
| capital. The advantages to registering your domain | | | | company like Godaddy will be much better. Godaddy |
| for longer periods of time are 1. Search engines give | | | | gives you access to lots of applications, databases, |
| you more credibility to a website that it thinks will be | | | | and you have a full time customer service staff at |
| around longer, and 2. You get discounted rates for | | | | your disposal to help you with any challenges. |
| longer registration periods. Some companies will temp | | | | One last point on hosting, there are typically many |
| you to register for longer than ten years, however, | | | | hosting packages available. The main difference is the |
| this cannot actually be done. What is really happening | | | | amount of storage space you get to use. With all of |
| is you pre-pay that company to renew your | | | | my websites so far, I have not needed any more |
| registration, once your first ten years expires. I have | | | | space than comes with the cheapest hosting |
| seen companies offer registration for as long as one | | | | package. |