I’ve been doing web design and development since 1997, and officially as a business since 2007. During this time, I’ve learned a few things that makes it easier to maintain websites.
Domain Registration
Often when a customer comes to you to do a web site, they either have a domain name or need one purchased. Either way it’s important that they have complete control over the registration and access to the registration.
DNS Records
Because of this, I’ve found that it’s easier to host the DNS (domain name service) elsewhere, so that as a designer I can control where the domain is pointed without having to log into the client’s registration portal every time, which often involved getting authentication codes and what not.
For this I use a service called DNSimple. It allows me to have control of all the record associated with the domain in a system that I control, without having the client relinquish control over their domain registration account.
Hosting
As with a lot of things associated with a website, hosting is key. I generally don’t leave this decision up to my clients. I’ve found that Flywheel (affiliate link) is the best host for their sites. Goldstein Media controls the relationship with Flywheel, because our clients have better things to do than deal with hosting issues. Also, we maintain our clients’ sites, so it makes sense to tie in hosting.
It’s never a good idea to have your domains registered where you have your hosting, because if you ever need to change hosting companies, the domain name migration process is much more arduous and time consuming a task than migrating the actual site to a different hosting provider.
Keeping Them Separated
Keeping them separated helps streamline the process in the long run. It might be more time consuming to setup, but you’ll be glad you did. If you need a bit more of a primer on what all this is, check out this great post over at Norlink.
