WebHostRight

Apart from using web hosting providers as an option to get your website online there are also companies who provide a combined service where you can get your domain, web design and development and hosting all from them and this can be suitable for some companies and may actually be what you prefer but if you do choose to have one company provide all of the above services for you then you need to make sure that you actually own what you expect to.

You need to make sure that the domain is or will be registered in your name or the name of your company, if they are providing web design services for you then you need to ask and understand what you are paying for, for example they may expect a fee from you for the complete design of your site and then tell you that they need to charge you a seperate yearly fee for updates, this is fine if you and the company understand what updates that you may need done to your site throughout the year and if the price charged for this is justified.

Should you want to move away from a company of this sort at anytime in the future, then will they charge you a fee to release the domain to you? Even though it may be registered in your name, will there be other admin fees that may suddenly crop up for various reasons?

There are good companies out there that offer good combined services and you own what you expect you do but some other companies may see opportunities to bill clients for all sorts of seperate charges and a client may not even look into why they are being charged seperate fees on top of what they thought was a combined web design/web hosting and domain registration service.

Sometimes it may be better to keep your design and development completely seperate from your web hosting provider, have a completely different company provide each service to you.

It’s already suggested by most people that you should keep your domain registration seperate from your web hosting provider choice.

As suggested above, you may still choose to use one company for an all-in-one service, but if you do just make sure that you wont be charged for services that are not fully understood by you and that you make yourself aware of their terms so that you have a complete understanding of what services they are providing to you and any costs that may arise from wanting to leave them.