For those of you with Web sites, you probably know what a “host” is. It’s a company that provides a location, or address, on the Internet where your Web site resides.

In other words, just like a physical business needs an address, so does a Web site. You can’t have a Web site and just “stick it up” on the Web. Unless you want to set up your own server, you have to go through a hosting company who gives you that address, including server space and bandwidth, that enables the search engines and visitors to find your site.

Let’s look at some common problems we often have with hosting companies:

• You can never find an actual person to talk to! They may have a 24-hour customer service line open, but you can never get through to a real person.

• Hosting companies often think that the “lowest price” will always get the sale, but they fail to realize that what people really want is excellent customer service, servers that are up almost 100% of the time, and a variety of services that come with the hosting package.

• Many hosting companies don’t provide any other functionality other than Web site hosting. They don’t provide a “control panel” full of goodies such as PGP secure e-mail, shopping carts, log analysis, database creation, etc.

• Guess what? Technical support people often don’t make the best “customer support” people. They may be technical gurus, but their main interest lies in their high tech servers and other functionality, rather than solving the simple problems of their customers.

In other words, weak customer service is a major problem with the majority of hosting companies these days. Solution:

I recently had the pleasure of being introduced to Combustion Hosting Company, and to say I was impressed is a vast understatement.

Here are some things that struck me as unbelievable. When the phone rings, whoever answers the phone is required to stand up to answer it and talk. After all, the sheer act of standing up requires that they’re alert and are listening to your problems and concerns. And, you actually speak to a “real” person!

With Combustion, if you have a problem, they don’t just “tell” you how to solve it, they solve it for you! Also, their services certainly aren’t limited to “hosting.” They can set you up with an account to where you can access the Internet through local access numbers no matter where you travel.

Their prices are extremely reasonable — much better than I had been paying previously. Plus, the “extras” I’ve received by going with Combustion are amazing.

But the one thing that makes Combustion shine over most Web hosting companies is their devotion to providing good customer service, and this is an area in which they truly excel.

So, if you’re in the market for a new Web site, or if you aren’t pleased with your current host, consider Combustion Hosting. It will be one of the smartest moves you could ever make for your Web site. http://www.combustionhosting.com/moreinfo

If you want further proof as to the benefits of using Combustion, read: this article.

About The Author

Robin Nobles is the Co-Director of Training of Search Engine Workshops with John Alexander. They teach 2-day beginner, 3-day advanced, and 5-day all-inclusive “hands on” search engine marketing workshops in locations across the globe. She also teaches online search engine marketing courses through http://www.onlinewebtraining.com, and she’s a member of Wordtracker’s official question support team. With partner John Alexander, she’s co-authored a series of e-books called, “The Totally Non-Technical Guides to Having a Successful Web Site.” And, they opened a networking community for search engine marketers called The World Resource Center for Search Engine Marketers.

robin@searchengineworkshops.com

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Registering a domain name has become a very simple, common procedure. People all over the world from all kind of different countries register domain names for different purposes. So if you are also interested in registering a domain name, there are some things you should know before starting the entire procedure.

There are many aspects regarding the procedure of registering a domain name. Some domain names are available from some resources but some others aren’t yet on the market. Consequently, if you want to use a certain domain name you have no other choice but using the services of that domain name’s registrars. If you are wondering what a domain registrar is, you should know that they are being approved by the ICANN or the International Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers. The purpose of this organisation is to help people like you in getting a domain name.

The first thing you should know is the fact that nobody can access and change the leading data base of that domain name you are using. This is possible because InterNIC is dealing with the leading data base, together with the domain name registrars. In the end, the domain name registrars are in charge of everything when it comes to registering a domain name. And if you are wondering what the leading data base might be, here is the answer. The leading database is a database which contains the entire necessary documentation on all the domain names registered until the date you register too.

Another thing you should be aware of is the fact that some domain name registrars sometimes happen to be out of the list. It is most likely that these registrars are actually taking hold for registering a domain name and they are in the end reselling the domain name for the accredited domain name registrar.

But these kinds of registrars don’t do this registering thing for free. In most cases they state their fee for registering domain names. The price is actually a fee paid every year which is usually paid by the domain name holders and consumers. These domain name registrars are also offering some discounts for those who will register for longer than a year. The longest period of domain name registration is maximum 10 years.

In conclusion, registering domain names has become a very common thing to do. You just have to pay the fee and there you are: you have registered for a domain name!

For an established site to facilitate the buying and selling of domain names, domain name ownership , domain names trading just visit us.

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As your Internet business grows, the value of your domain name
increases. The issue of a domain name trademark should move to
the top of your list. You need to guard against unscrupulous
competitors that may try to incorporate your domain name in
their meta tags to obtain search engine rankings under your
name. If you have a domain name trademark, you can go after
these individuals and compel the search engines to remove
their listings.

What Is A Trademark?

A trademark is a distinctive item that is used to identify a
logo, product, device, package or service. The trademark
identifies the item as being provided by a particular firm. To
protect these items you can obtain a mark from the patent and
trademark office that prohibits others from trying to gain
economic advantage from your mark.

Domain Name

The patent and trademark office views domain names in a unique
way. The office views the “http://www” element as a part of
the file transfer process, not your domain name. The “.com”,
“.net”, etc., designations are considered top-level domain
identifiers and are also disregarded for the purpose of a
domain name trademark. For example, our domain name is
http://www.sandiegobusinesslawfirm.com. If we submitted the
domain name for registration, only the
“sandiegobusinesslawfirm” portion would be considered for a
mark.

Locators Cannot Be Registered

A domain name is a locator for file pages. When you type in
your domain name, a server locates and displays files. If a
domain is used solely for this purpose, it will not be granted
a mark. Instead, the domain name must be incorporated into the
site. For instance, Amazon is recognized as an online
bookstore and the site actually has the word “Amazon” on every
page. Since “Amazon.com” is more than a locator, Amazon can
apply for and receive a trademark. If Amazon used the domain
name, bookstore.com, the company would be able to register
“Amazon”, but not “bookstore.”

Generic and Descriptive Terms

Domain names that are generic or descriptive in nature cannot
be registered because they fail to designate a distinctive
product or service. For example, “sandiegobusinesslawfirm” is
comprised of generic terms and describes who and where we are,
to wit, a San Diego business law firm. This domain name cannot
be trademarked. The same result would occur with bank.com,
book.com, advice.com, etc.

You may be thinking, “What about ‘Coke?’ “Coke” is a
trademarked term because it is a distinctive term for a soft
drink product. It just so happens that a brilliant marketing
plan has convinced most people to refer to soft drinks as
“cokes”, even if they actually prefer another brand!

Trademarks are an important factor in protecting your Internet
business. Armed with a trademark, you can keep competitors
from pulling traffic off the search engines when people search
for your site.

Richard Chapo is with http://www.sandiegobusinesslawfirm.com -
a law firm providing legal advice to California businesses.
This article is for general education purposes and does not
address every facet of the subject matter. Nothing in this
article creates an attorney-client relationship.

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