What is a Domain Name?

What is a Domain Name?

What is a Domain Name?

A domain name is essentially the address of your website; it helps your visitors remember your site, and find it easily. So, when you select a domain name, try to make it as descriptive as possible - for example: BestDogGrooming.com, QualityPlumbing.biz, or AdamsFamilyBlog.info.
Your domain name also becomes a part of your email address - for example: John@AdamsFamilyBlog.info. Essentially, registering a domain (or adding a domain to your hosting account) is the next step towards building a website.
When you sign up for a hosting account, you're typically given the option to register a new domain name. If you signed up without registering a domain, you can register one later. You may also point any other domain names you already own to your new hosting account. Keep reading to find out how to register, add, consolidate, manage, and renew your domains.

Using DomainCentral

DomainCentral simplifies domain management. First, it's a central location where you can see all of your domains in one table, along with their various registrars, expirations dates, renewal options, and much more.

Second, from DomainCentral, you can configure domain options (for multiple domains at a time), edit domain information, and add services.
The basic process of using DomainCentral consists of these steps:

1. Consolidate your existing domains into DomainCentral
2. Manage all your domains
3. Renew your domains

The following sections walk you through each of these steps.

Consolidate All Domains into DomainCentral

If you registered domain names in different places, they will integrate into your account in different ways. Here are the possible domain types and instructions how to merge them into your hosting account:

·         Existing and New Domains: Domains you registered when you purchased your hosting account or domains that you registered later, through iPage. Any domains you have registered through your iPage account are automatically listed in DomainCentral

Article: Register a new domain name

·         Added Domains: Domains you have registered elsewhere, which you'd like pointed to your iPage account. If you've registered domains elsewhere and want to manage them through DomainCentral, follow the instructions in this article.

Article: Add a domain that you registered elsewhere

·         Transferred Domains: Domains that are registered elsewhere that you'd like to transfer to iPage's registrar. Here are some benefits of switching to iPage's domain registrar:

• Manage your hosting account and domains together, all in one place,
• And take advantage of the Automated Domain Renewal Service (ADRS), and rest easy knowing your domain names won't expire unexpectedly.

Article: Transfer your domain to our registrar (complete process)

Manage All of Your Domains

DomainCentral makes it easy to manage the domains associated with your account. If your domains are registered through iPage, you can:

• Update the admin and contact information for each domain, as well as the registrant contact information (which is displayed in the Whois database),
• Lock and unlock domain names,
• And refresh Whois information for multiple domains at the same time.

Article: Managing Domains

You can also:

·         Secure Your Domain: Lock your domain so that it cannot be transferred to a different registrar unless you (the owner) unlock it first. Prevent name server changes, unwanted renewals and contact from spammers with Name Safe and Domain Privacy.

Article: Domain Security

·         Set a primary domain for your account:

Article: Setting a Primary Domain

·         Stay Updated by Keeping Your Contact Information Current: Your domain contact email will receive any important information relating to your registered domain, so it's important to keep it up to date.

Article: Domain Contact Information

Renew Your Domain

Renewing your domain name is a critical part of maintaining your website. If you've registered your domain with iPage, or transferred your domain registrar to iPage's registrar, you can renew your domain manually in DomainCentral, or enroll in our Automated Domain Renewal Service.

Article: Domain Renewal

Manage Your Mail

Manage Your Mail

MailCentral, located in the "Email" section of your control panel, allows you to create and manage your email mailboxes.
Your first option is to create a new mailbox, or create a mail forward. Both options allow you to create an email address with your domain name -- for example, sales@CakesByMolly.biz.
A mailbox stores your email messages. You access your mailbox using the mailbox name and password, and a client of your choice (we'll discuss clients a bit later). Once logged in, you can read your mail, reply, delete, organize into folders, and basically manage your email any way you like.
A forward does not store messages sent to it, but simply relays them to a specified address, or multiple addresses. An example of a forward is a group list - customers@MyCompanyDomain.com - which would contain a forwarding email address for every customer you wish to include. If you wish to notify your regular customers about a promotion, or a sale, you don't have to send it to individual email addresses of every customer; if you sent it to customers@MyCompanyDomain.com instead, everyone receives a copy of your email.
Here are instructions and video tutorials on how to create a mailbox or a forward.

Article: Email Basics

Access Your Mail

You (or a designated user) can access a specific mailbox by using the mailbox name and password to log in, without having to log into your control panel. It's like giving a key to your P.O. Box to someone you trust.
If you designate an email administrator, they can manage ALL email addresses associated with your hosting account, again, without having to log into your hosting account. An administrator can:

• Create new mailboxes or forwards,
• Change SPAM options,
• Reconfigure existing addresses (for example, add more addresses to a Forward),
• And perform all other tasks available in MailCentral.

To find step by step instructions for all the options described:

Article: Email Administrator/Mailbox Owner access

Use a Mail Client

When you access a specific mailbox, a mail client retrieves your mailbox contents from the server, and displays them via folders, images, etc. A mail client allows you to manage your mail - read messages, reply to messages, delete, organize into folders, etc. - and syncs with the server to make sure that everything is stored and retrieved properly. Examples of mail clients include Microsoft Outlook, MacMail, Gmail, Hotmail, and even your iPhone!

Webmail vs. Email Clients

There are two basic types of mail clients: webmail and email. A webmail client (such as AtMail, Gmail, Yahoo!, etc.) allows you to access your email from any web browser, on any computer. An email client (Microsoft Outlook, iPhone) is stored on the device (for example, only your iPhone connects to your mailbox), allows you to access messages offline, and typically offers a wider range of mail management features.
Which one should you choose? It's completely up to you! You can even have both - an email client for your iPhone, and a webmail client to use when traveling or away from home.

Article: The difference between an email client and webmail client

Configure an Email Client

To access your hosting account mailboxes with an email client like Outlook, iPhone, MacMail, or another client of your choice (either POP or IMAP), you have to configure it. You'll find the required configuration settings and step-by-step instructions here:

Article: Configure an Email Client for your iPage POP/IMAP mailbox

Access Email with a Webmail Client

A webmail client allows you to access your email via the web, from any computer and any browser. This is very useful if different users "own" different email addresses in your hosting account - each user can log in to webmail with just the mailbox address and mailbox password, without logging into your hosting control panel.
A webmail client is also useful for an email administrator, who essentially has access to MailCentral without having to log into your control panel.

Article: Check your email over the web

What You Need

Ready to start selling online? iPage provides all kinds of tools and services to help you get started, but first, there are a few key things you need to know. To sell products on your website, you need:

·         The Ability to Accept Payments: Unless you are planning to give away your products for free, your customers will need a way to pay for the products they wish to purchase. What types of payments will you accept? There are lots of options - PayPal, credit cards, phone orders, checks, gift cards, etc. Whatever method(s) you select, these should integrate seamlessly with your shopping cart. iPage offers a few complete solutions that we will explain in "Accepting Payments". Some solutions work better if you sell just a few products (typically a charge per transaction), and others work better if you have an active store (typically a monthly charge for a large number of transactions). Be sure to compare these solutions to find one that would work best for your business.

·         Shopping Cart Software: Shopping cart software allows users to place the products they choose online into a virtual shopping cart, and then pay for them once they've finished shopping. There are lots of different ways to set up and integrate a shopping cart into your website, which we'll go over in detail later (see "Creating an Online Store").

It may sound complicated, but the good news is all of these tools are available via your hosting account, and we'll show you what they are and how to use them. There are lots of options when it comes to configuring your site to sell products online, and we've designed this guide to explain how to implement the right tools for you.

Accepting Payments

What payment options do you plan to offer your customers? While it may seem out-of-step to consider accepting payments before you've configured your store, different payment options come with different requirements. You may need to set up a PayPal Business Account or another type of merchant account based on the payment method you choose to accept, and you'll need this information when you're ready to create your shopping cart.

Accept Credit Cards

In order to accept credit card payments on your site, you'll need both a merchant account and a payment gateway. A merchant account is a bank account designed to accept electronic payments for your business. When customers purchase a product from your website, the money they pay for that product is deposited into this account. A payment gateway, on the other hand, authorizes your customers' credit cards and actually processes the transactions.

iPage offers AcceptSafe as your one stop solution, which includes a merchant account and a payment gateway.

Article: Online credit card processing

Accept PayPal

PayPal is another great payment option to consider. Most online shoppers are already familiar with PayPal and recognize it as a secure way to make purchases on the web. It's also easy to use and gives you lots of flexibility.

You can fully integrate PayPayl into your website with the "Express Checkout" plan, while the "Standard" and "Pro" plans act as an all-in-one solution. Compare plans to decide which is right for you.

Article: Using PayPal solutions to accept payments

It's important to remember you don't have to choose one or the other. PayPal gives you lots of options, and you are welcome to purchase both payment options to give your customers a variety of ways to pay for your products.

Creating an Online Store

What is a Shopping Cart?

A shopping cart is a type of software that allows customers to purchase multiple products on your site, then pay for them when they've finished shopping. That said, a shopping cart can take many different forms depending on how you plan to implement it. You can use shopping cart software to:

• Add an online store as a new page on your existing site
• Add purchase buttons to products listed on your site
• Create a website with an integrated store

Shopping Cart Options

Here are some of the options available to you via your control panel:

1. Configure the Ecommerce Widget in the Drag and Drop Site Builder

Our Drag and Drop Site Builder has an ecommerce widget that allows you to build a small store. If you are just starting out, or experimenting, this is a great option for you. However, it does not offer the management capabilities and flexibility of a shopping cart.

2. Integrate the Drag and Drop Site Builder with ShopSite

ShopSite allows you to add "Add to Cart" and "Buy Now" buttons to any site, including a site you've created with Adobe Dreamweaver, WordPress, and the Drag and Drop Site Builder. Adding these buttons is as simple or as feature-rich as you wish to make it. You can harness the full power of ShopSite, including all store and order management capabilities, just by configuring these buttons. The added management features included with ShopSite make this option a better fit for those who want to sell more products on their site.

3. Create a Store with ShopSite

ShopSite also allows you to create an online store. You can link to the store from a site you've already created, or you can build your whole website via ShopSite as a stand alone store.

Article: ShopSite Basics

ShopSite offers a wide range of features to help you build and manage your store, including tax, shipment, payment, and order management options. You can also build an email list for email marketing opportunities, send automated thank you notes, and more.

4. Create an Advanced Store with osCommerce

This flexible open source shopping cart offers more customization capabilities, but it's also more difficult to use. If you're not a professional web developer, we suggest one of the options above. However, more advanced users might prefer osCommerce, available for installation via SimpleScripts.

Article: Using osCommerce

Manage Billing Information

If you scroll to the bottom of your control panel, you'll see the "Account Information" section, which includes all kinds of tools you can use to manage your account.

For example, from BillingCentral, you can:

• Change your payment method
• Generate an invoice for your next payment
• Print a receipt
• Extend your payment period, and more.

Article: Billing General

Renew Your Hosting Account

Your account is set to renew automatically, but you can adjust this setting by clicking on the "Account Renewal" icon at the bottom of your control panel.

Change Your Password

To set a new password for your account, click on the "Change Password" icon at the bottom of your control panel.

We recommend that you follow the instructions to create a strong password, to protect your account.

Article: Account password

Update Your Account Information

Your hosting account includes what we call your "account information" and an "account profile," which help us assist you should you call us for customer support. Your account information corresponds to the details you provide when you purchase your account, where as the account profile gives you an opportunity to add other users who may access your account.

Since iPage uses the email addresses you provide as the primary way to contact you about your account, it's important to keep them up-to-date with mailboxes you check regularly.

Article: Account Contact Information