How To Change Name Servers For A Domain Name

Register A Domain Name Directly - Attach It To A Different Web Hosting Package

In this section I am going to show you how to directly register a domain name with a registrar, called NameCheap, so that you have complete control of its Name, Address, Phone Number and E-Mail details regardless of which web hosting provider you are with.

I will then show you how to attach that domain name to a different web hosting provider's package using their name servers. This means you can have all your extra domain names with one registrar whilst your main domain name and web hosting package (web space/website) is with another registrar (another web hosting provider). The idea being that if you do not like the web hosting provider anymore, for whatever reason(s), you can link/attach your extra domain names to another web hosting provider's package.

Normally you search the internet for one web hosting provider to host your main domain name and its website, but there are occasions when you want/need more than one domain name hosted (either as a parked domain name or as an add-on domain name) by the same web hosting provider's package but at the same time have full control of your extra domain names - A web hosting provider usually has full control of the, main, domain name you ordered with your web hosting package.

REGISTER  YOUR  OWN  DOMAIN  NAMES

The downside of this that the web hosting provider, as registered Administrators of your main domain name, have control over that domain name. Its contact details, it EPP (Transfer) Code and so on. By registering your, extra, domain names with a company like NameCheap (or GoDaddy) you can easily change your contact details and retrieve your epp codes for example. To see what I mean by all this, follow the examples below.

Fig 1.0  Click on the SIGN UP FOR A FREE ACCOUNT link (right-hand side) to begin

Before registering a domain name; Go to www.namecheap.com and click on the SIGN UP FOR A FREE ACCOUNT link (right-hand side) to open a FREE account with them. This will then give you access to their control panel in which you can then order a domain name, transfer a domain name, add funds, get epp codes and so on.

The sign up form is quite straight forward (see below). When you have filled it in click on its CREATE ACCOUNT button to continue.

Fig 1.1  Click on the CREATE ACCOUNT button to continue

With the namecheap account now setup and logged in, the next step is to register a domain name by clicking directly on the REGISTER A DOMAIN menu title (even though the menu-items are displayed when you do this). Doing so will take you to the DOMAIN SEARCH form (Fig 1.3).

Fig 1.2  Click on the REGISTER A DOMAIN menu title only




Fig 1.3  Enter the domain name you want to register - Tick its TLD (i.e. .com) - Click on SEARCH

When you reach the DOMAIN SEARCH form (above) simply enter the domain name you would like to register, which has a default TLD (Top Level Domain - www Extension) of .com, and then click on the SEARCH button to check if that domain name is available.

If you would like to register any other domain names of the same name (i.e. co.uk, .biz etc) put a tick next to each respective TLD (www Extension). The search will then check if those domain names are also available and list them in the search results accordingly.

Fig 1.4  Click on the ADD TO CART button to continue

In the above example I am only registering one domain name, www.websitecreationvideos.com, but if I had ticked .co.uk for example and it was available it would of been ticked in the above search results. As it is I can still register the .co.uk version of the domain name, because it is available, by putting a tick next to it in the above search results.

When you are happy with your selection (ticked domain names) click on the ADD TO CART button to take you to the Shopping Cart page.

Fig 1.5  Click on the STANDARD CHECKOUT button to continue

Normally at this stage you would click on the STANDARD CHECKOUT button to continue, but in this case there is an offer for a FREE, 1 Year, SSL (Security Padlock) Certificate to consider. It allows you to have the HTTPS: prefix before your www.???.com domain name, in certain web browsers, to let people know your website handles payments in a verified/certified/secure way. As I am always sceptical about offers like this I emailed namecheap to quiz them about the finer details of the offer. Basically, all is well. The offer is genuine in every sense of their promotional wordings.

However, because I did not need this offer I removed it from the shopping basket (not exampled here) by right clicking on the promotion link (which opened a separate page) and then clicked on the REMOVE option. With the shopping cart updated I then clicked on the STANDARD CHECKOUT button, which took me to the ENTER CONTACT INFORMATION page.

Fig 1.6  Fill in your contact details and then click on the CONTINUE CHECKOUT button to continue




Fig 1.7  Confirm the contact details for Registrant, Billing, Technical and Administrator purposes

The ENTER CONTACT INFORMATION details (above) are used for Registrant, Billing, Technical and Administrator purposes which you must confirm, and change if need be, at this stage of account/payment registration because these details will become permanent. Once you have entered all of your contact details, and check them to make sure they are correct, click on the appropriate buttons (Figures 1.6 and 1.7 above) to continue to the FREE WhoIs option.

FREE  WHOIS  OFFER

NameCheap offer WHOIS Protection for free on all newly registered domain names - WHOIS, explained in the Buying A Domain section, allows your Name & Address details to be hidden from the general public. You must decide if you need WHOIS for this domain name, by putting a tick next to its ENABLE option, before clicking on the CONTINUE TO OPTIONS button.

Fig 1.8  Tick ENABLE, if need be, and then click on the CONTINUE TO OPTIONS button to continue

In this example I chose to ENABLE the WHOIS option so that no one can find my Name & Address details in the WHOIS Lookup (Search) Service.

NAME  SERVERS

The next step is to choose the Name Servers for this chosen domain name - Name Servers, without being too technical, are the technologies that point (link/attach) your domain name to the two servers (website computers) where your website content is stored/copied to.

Or put another way; NameCheap needs to know which name servers (website computers) your web hosting provider is using to host (store) your website files on. Once namecheap have these details they can then point (link/attach) this domain name to those name servers. This in turn will allow you to add-on, or park, this domain name onto your web hosting package via its control panel. Put even simpler! Each web hosting package has two name servers that all of your domain names can point to (link up with/attach to).

When you ordered your web hosting package the web hosting provider (company) should of emailed you their name servers information. This information can also be found via your WHOIS records. In this case my name servers are ns15.net-hosted.com and ns16.net-hosted.com, which I have entered into the relevant boxes below after selecting the USE CUSTOM NAME SERVERS option.

Fig 1.9  Select the USE CUSTOM NAME SERVERS option and then enter your Name Servers details

With the name servers information entered in the above form scroll down the page until you see the CONTINUE CHECKOUT button and click on it. You can ignore the URL Forwarding and EMAIL Forwarding settings because these are only required if you want namecheap to host this domain name. In this example you are setting everything up so that this domain name will be hosted by your, different, web hosting provider of course.

Fig 1.10  Click on the CONTINUE CHECKOUT button to continue

After clicking on the CONTINUE CHECKOUT button you will then be asked how you would like to pay. Either via Credit Card or via a Payment Merchant Account such as PayPal. In this example I chose to pay via PayPal, by clicking on the PROCEED TO SECURE PAYMENT button.

Fig 1.11  Click on the PROCEED TO SECURE PAYMENT button after selecting your payment option

If you do not have sufficient funds in your namecheap account, if you are paying via paypal for example, you will be asked to top up your namecheap account first using paypal. This is just a simple case of specifying an amount to add (i.e. $10) and then logging into your paypal account to transfer that amount from your paypal account into your namecheap account.

Fig 1.12  Enter the amount you want to add to your namecheap account




Fig 1.13  After making payment click on the RETURN TO UNIFIEDREGISTRAR link to return to namecheap

In the above example I had to go through the SEARCH process again to select the domain name again and enable the free WHOIS option, because my namecheap account was empty and therefore the shopping cart was emptied. The other details (name, address, etc) were left intact though. So ideally you should top up your namecheap account first.

ALWAYS  TEST  THE  WATER

Saying this, I purposely went through this process (without adding any funds) to show you a normal scenario. Meaning, you should do the same when it is your first time using something new. This is where many people go wrong. They see something cheap and purchase (add funds in this case) straight away without actually going through the process.....using a bogus email address etc to start off with. Always use a bogus email address to test the water, even if you just want to know if a company will SPAM you.

At the expense of having to SEARCH for my domain name again I have played safe by going through the registration process first, without initially adding any funds, so that when I can see there are no hidden costs/tricks I can then purchase this domain name.....which I did of course.

Fig 1.14  $10 in my namecheap account - Click on the PROCEED TO SECURE PAYMENT button to continue




Fig 1.15  Domain Name registered and paid for - Click on the CONTINUE button to proceed




Fig 1.16  My namecheap account with one new domain name inside it

The namecheap control panel has a lot of features worth reading about such as Get EPP Code, Transfer Domain and so on.

USING  A  DOMAIN  NAME  WITH  A  DIFFERENT  WEB  HOSTING  PACKAGE

With a domain name purchased from namecheap, pointing to the correct name servers of my web hosting package with nethosted.com, I can now use my nethosted.com CPanel control panel in the usual way to make this domain name a parked domain or add-on domain - As exampled in the Park A Domain Name and ADD-ON A Domain Name sections respectively.

With the above you may be thinking: "Surely someone can just park their domain name on your website if they know your name servers information?". And that would be a valid thought if it wasn't for the fact that they would then have to log-in to your web hosting control panel in order to add-on or park that domain name. Without your username and password they could not do this. And even if they did, through whatever means, you would know about it by looking at your control panel parked domains and add-on domains statistics.