Do you remember the times when you didn’t have to think about sprucing your website content or how many clicks you received on your pages or how many conversions you got from your clicks? Well, I wouldn’t be surprised if you don’t remember those days because the digital world has consumed everyone in its fold. This can be summed up as saying, “If you are on the net, you need to fight to stay relevant”. This goes true for all businesses, large or small and the emerging ones have the shorter end of the rope.

Websites are an integral aspect of your brand personality and when you are looking to launch a website, one of the most integral aspects of that is looking for an appropriate domain name. Some of us might look at web developers for outsourcing our domain buying and there are some things we should consider before doing that:

You are the owner of your domain name

One of the key things to remember is that the domain name legally belongs to you and to your company. If you are handing out the activity of procuring a domain name to a web developer, make sure you don’t hand out the power of attorney along with it. In other words, the web developer should be registering the domain in your name. There could be exceptions to this if they are a part of your business entity and you have given them a stake in the form of a business name. Even in that case, it is imperative that you have someone from your company who would be the liaison for all transactions and business-related activities.

Scrutiny in agreement

One of the reasons why we outsource this activity is because we want to be saved from the technical storm that could engulf us. However, it is important to note that when the web developer is responsible for this, your agreement with the developer should clearly state the terms and conditions with respect to hosting and have included all elements that you can clearly recognize, before signing the agreement. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to get a legal voice on the agreement, someone who has expertise in this particular kind of law, to have a look at it. There have been some cases in the past, where web developers have included additions to the agreement in terms of compensation and other factors and have even held clients’ website on hold till their conditions have been met.

Backup is key

Sometimes, a developer allows a client access to the website and also allows for hosting rights, but that is highly restricted for the safety of your website and is most times, only allocated to site files and the hosting account.

However, as a business owner wanting to protect his/her interest, it is imperative that you keep a full backup of your website files, independently of your web developer’s server.

One of the last few things you should definitely consider is a written understanding between a web hosting company and yours. The agreement should be signed, only if parties are in agreement on each and every term, leaving no room for ambiguity.