by Matt Hedges

The cost of doing online business is getting more expensive every day. Various fees are involved just to start up a website ranging from a few dollars to hundreds. Some of these fees are for web site design, hosting, email, software expense, and domain name registration. Although buying a domain name is not the most expensive part of starting a website, it is still a recurring yearly cost that is helpful to avoid if possible. Having your own domain name gives your business respectability so it is a great thing to have. Getting a free domain name and registration from your web host is a great way to avoid paying an initial fee and yearly maintenance. It cuts your expenses for running your business. There are some facts you should know about what is involved and what should be looked for in considering the offers of free domain names.

There are a few methods of obtaining your own domain name for free and it is not difficult to learn how. There are several strategies you can use to get your business, or organization a domain name and sidestep the nagging frees charged by external companies just to register your name. You can search for domain name companies’ online or local registration or hosting companies in your surrounding neighborhood.

A few ways to obtain a free domain name are:

* When you are looking for domain name companies online or a hosting company online make sure you completely investigate each one to obtain the best packages available. When you study the details make sure they include domain name registration for free. Many organizations get this service from their web hosts because of the massive business they send their way.

* The best way to obtain a domain name for free from a host company is to use them for the registration of that name along with using their web hosting service, and other options such as email registration, and if available design.

* Hire a local domain registration and hosting company as it is always a better option as they function from within spitting distance, which enable more human contact. Unlike their online counterparts, the local web hosting companies provides the probability of face to face negotiation and bargaining.

* Ask or check the FAQs section of a web host to see if their service offers free domain name registration with privacy. This protects the website from having outside sources attempt to view their privileged information. Many of these companies will alert the client if anyone tries to abuse the service and hack into the customer’s information. This is a great protection for being online.

* There are some free TLD domains which you can obtain for viewing a provider’s offers and signing up for what you can use thereby gaining points. The more points you earn the more likely you are of obtaining more free TLD domains.

There are many online domain name providers where you can find free domain names. These types of services offer sub domain names for free when you use their sites to build your website. There are some disadvantages to these programs and they are not top-level domain names. They include:

Freedomain.co.nr

This Free Domain Name Service Provider allows a number of cool features. They provide free Redirection services which are also popularly known as Domain Forwarding service. The other services offered by this online domain name service provider include URL masking services, Path Forwarding as well as Free URL cloaking. Another special feature of this site is that they provide support for Meta Tags and Favicon. This free domain name provider requires a button link back to their main service site.

Dot.tk:

The dot.tk is a leading online free domain name service provider. In fact, it is one of the best free top level domain service provider offering free .tk domains. However, this free domain name expires immediately after 90 days in case the site had less than 25 visitors within this period. One of the major drawbacks of this site is that it has an invisible structure that comes with a popup advertisement.

Uni.cc

Another very popular provider of free domain names is uni.cc. They offer some really great incentives to use their service in the form of site builders, free domain names, redirection, TLD domains. A major drawback is that this site no longer offers web hosting services, or email hosting as well as no longer providing FTP services. This makes them very limited for the use of a domain name.

GeoCities

GeoCities is a Yahoo company that offers free sub domains with advertising on the websites, and they also offer cheap web hosting solutions where you can obtain top-level domain names for free and no ad websites. Both of the fantastic offers from Yahoo come with a great many features including multiple email capability, excellent site builders, and large space even on the free sites. They are bolstered by the public’s perception of stability because of their branding.

Google Page Creator

It is a free website creation and website service provided by Google offering .googlepages.com domains. They provide 100 Megabytes of file and page storage, 41 web templates, page layout tools, HTML, CSS and JavaScript editing, and AutoSave option etc. A user is entitles for registering three unique sub domains. The best feature of this free domain name service provider is that there are no advertisements of any kind.

Fadlan.com

This domain name provider offers .fadlan.com domains. They give clients free URL redirecton and domain forwarding as well. They have other great features such as DNS that allows a site owner to put their own web server on a sub domain if they have a static IP address. There are a few drawbacks to this service but it is reliable.

Afraid.org

One of the best features of Afraid.org is the ability to pick from several extension sub domains. You need to sign up at their web site and they will give you many services such as updating your IP redirection. There is a 50 sub domain limit for each individual user. They are often used for domain hosting, free DNS and Dynamic hosting.

C-o.in

C-o.in is another effective free provider of domain names. They also include free URL redirection and sub domain forwarding as a free service and they offer the services in 4 available formats for ease of use.

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