You've decided to register a .coop domain name. Smart! Here's a quick rundown of
other services that you might need in order to use your domain name.
If you have an IT service or in-house department or if someone maintains your
website or email already, check with them first to see if these services are
already available or included with current support packages.
If you don't have any of these options, then most of our registrars offer these
services. You can also use your favorite search engine to locate literally
thousands of options for any of these services.
Use these services so that when someone uses your new .coop domain on a browser
or part of an email address, they are immediately forwarded to your existing
Website or Email Account. This can be used with any site but is especially
useful if you are using a free email or hosting service so that you can
"personalize" your web or email identity.
Most domain forwarding services also allow you to "mask" the real site name so
you are able to maintain your brand integrity as they navigate through your
site.
Domain and Email Forwarding can be used to allow immediate use of your .coop
domain when you want to transition to .coop as your primary name or if you want
to use .coop for particular services or target audiences and want to maintain
your existing brand as well as use the .coop brand. These services typically to
not require any changes to your existing web site or email accounts.
If you want to be able to directly define the location of your website or email
hosting information then you will need to secure DNS Hosting. This is typically
a more precise way of handling the services that are provided through Domain and
Email Forwarding and requires that you enter the specific IP (Internet Protocol)
address of your email or web server. This isn't as techie as it sounds! Any
hosting provider (see below) will provide you with these addresses which are
just an expanded postal code and is typically in the form of ##.##.##.##. Just
type them in with your website name and you're set. These "resource" records are
generally called A or Address records for your Web Hosting information and MX or
Message Exchange records for your Email hosting.
If you're setting up your site for the first time, you'll generally need to
secure DNS Hosting. But it is typically included in an Email or Web Hosting
package or can be purchased from your Internet Service Provider, your Registrar
or through many sites on the web.
One thing that's important. Whoever provides your DNS Hosting will provide you
with 2 or more "DNS Server" names. These are typically in the form of
ns1.name.xyz, ns2.name.xyz, but they can be named anything. These names will
need to be added to the information on your .coop domain maintained by your
Registrar. These DNS Servers are where your "resource" records are stored and if
someone enters your .coop name on a web browser or an email address, the
Internet will go and look on those servers to find out where your web site or
email is hosted.
Email Hosting?
If you do not already have Email Accounts, you will need to secure Email Hosting
which will allow you to provide email accounts for those associated with your
co-op or co-op organization. Large organizations typically have their own Email
servers or computers to maintain their email accounts but you can also use a
service provider or even get email accounts for free.
Most registrars offer Email Hosting packages which allow you to use computers
that they own to access and maintain your email messages. Some packages provide
access through any Internet browser and some allow access through tools such as
the Microsoft Outlook that you may already have on your personal computer.
To decide what type of Email Hosting you need, you need to examine how many
email addresses you will need to support (1 for each employee or shared emails
addresses?), think about how many emails (and attachments such as Word, PDF or
graphics files) you might want to maintain, and how you need to be able to
access your email (from your office? from any PC? from your cell phone?)
Carefully compare Email packages on these and other areas such as trial periods,
support access and, of course, cost before selecting your hosting package.
If you don't already have a web site, there are many options for where you can
"host" or store your web site. Large organizations usually have their own
servers or computers where this information is maintained. In addition, if
someone is developing a web site for you, they typically will have hosting
services that you can purchase from them as part of the maintenance of your web
site. There are even services that provide free web site hosting if you just
have some basic information that you want to make available on the web.
Most registrars offer Web Hosting packages which allow you to use computers that
they own to store or host your web site. Besides considering the cost and the
amount of space (typically in Gigabytes) that is provided, you also need to
consider what tools are supported or provided with the hosting package. Is your
web developer using a tool like Dreamweaver to develop the site and is it
compatible with the environment provided? Does the site provide tools to
evaluate which pages visitors to your site are using - or not using? Can you run
site backups easily? Does it provide access to such database tools as SQL to add
to options on your web site? Carefully compare web hosting packages on these and
other areas such as trial periods, support access and, of course, cost before
selecting your hosting package.
If you're new to setting up a web site or email,
contact us and we'll be happy to discuss your needs with you. We can't
specifically recommend any particular vendor but we can get you get you started
with potential options to consider so that you can get the most value out of
your .coop domain right away. After all, education's one of the cooperative
principles, isn't it?
And that's what makes .coop different!