5 Tips to Boost your Company´s Domain Name Management

Friday, October 30, 2009, 9:04:54 AM

If you are responsible for your company´s domain name management then here are 5 tips to avoid sleepless nights by handling your domain names optimally. Even if you only have time to deal with a couple of the tasks below then do them.

Tip 1: Get an overview of domains belonging to your organization.

Be in the driver´s seat and avoid unpleasant surprises. Over time domains - which should belong to your organization - could have been registered in the name of employees or other companies in the group. If your brand is well known then surely someone could have registered related domains in bad faith.

It can be quite a detective´s work, but there is a great tool available to get you started: Domain Tools. You can look for different search terms as registrant details, part of a domain name, employee names, DNS details etc.

Tip 2: Check your WHOIS data and streamline them

At the home page of the different hostmasters you can check the WHOIS details for your domains. Correctly updated owner name and contact email are essential. Address, telephone number and contact person data are secondary. Make sure that the WHOIS contact email has to outlive any person in the company, ie domains@yourcompany.com.

Tip 3: Find the gaps in your domain portfolio

When you have an overview of the domains registered by your company, it will be easier to see which domains are missing in your domain list to ensure optimal domain name management. If you have .com then you should also register .net. Have you registered domains in some countries but not in other geographical markets where you do business?

Tip 4: Test the DNS settings

Are the domains active, redirected to the correct URL and at least have a catch-all email forward? On which DNS are the domains located?

Tip 5: Reduce the number of registrars

Less registrars, less administration. For effective domain name management reduce the number of registrars to a level, which does not cost you too much work when making annual renewals, updating the domain settings, new domain registrations etc.

Good luck with your domain name management!

By Christopher Hofman Laursen - http://www.europeandomaincentre.com

Category: Articles