Ask an IT Guy: How Can I Easily Change My Business Domain Name?

Considering changing your company's domain name?  Unfortunately, this process is more involved than simply buying a new domain name from GoDaddy or Register.com.

After building your brand, plus all the little things that point to your company, like your email domain, changing it up can be a bit scary.

If you've reached a point where changing your domain name is the best option, don't worry; we've got it handled. At VC3, Inc., we’ve led several companies through domain changes. It's not easy, but if it’s done the right way, it can be worth the name change.

Corey Kaufman, our Director of Client Development, gave us some guidance on how to manage a domain change.

What Are Some Common Reasons Why Companies Change Domain Names?

If changing your domain is a whim, let me stop you right there. Changing your domain should take a lot of thought. It's not a regular Thursday afternoon activity.   

"Most of the domain changing scenarios I've worked on occurred due to company name changes.  A convention services company wanted to change their name to include the word ‘Events.’ The client thought that the word ’Convention’ in their business name limited them too much.  Another situation would be a law firm adding a partner, and wanting to update their name."

Both of these name changes were strategic - they advanced the company in some way.  Consider this before changing your company name or domain: "How is this improving my business?" 

Migration and Redirecting Company Website(s) and Email

Now that you’re sure you need a domain change, here comes the fun part: redirecting your site. It's a vital part of the process. If it’s done wrong, people navigating your website will land on one of those empty "Error 404 pages." That’s a bad impression, to say the least.

"The website can be migrated to the new domain as-is by changing the pointers. Generally, you have a vendor that hosts the site, you have the website developer, and the domain registrar to secure the domain name. Your IT person will be manning the lead, working with the vendors to move the pointers in the right direction."

Does your email address happen to end in your domain name, such as MFernandez@CompanyNameHere.com? Would you like your email to reflect the name change? If so, there is some planning involved there as well.

"The local domain for the network can remain unchanged. Which is great, saves you time and staff hours. But the domain for the email will need to be changed and reconfigured to match whatever you need it to.

 

One thing that makes it easier is there is no need to ‘forward’ your old email. We can make this change pretty seamless to the client. Most of the time, the client continues to own both domains, so there are no time constraints on the cutover. I would suggest that they continue to own both, at least for a while, to make this as easy as possible.

 

The biggest issues occur when someone stops owning the old domain to soon, or when someone forgets to pay the bill for either the old or new domain. Another problem we’ve seen, although sparsely, is when the domain is actually owned by someone else, like an old web developer. If the domain is not owned and managed by the company itself, this opens up a ton of risk."

Moral of the story: Before you start your migration process, be 100% confident that you own the domain. (Better yet, check that right now just to be sure.) And don't be afraid to keep the old domain around. It'll redirect anyone seamless to the new domain either way.

Changes to the Domain Extension

Domain extensions come with expectations. Anything followed by “.edu” we assume is education or “.gov” is a government agency. Other extensions are more or less vague, think “.com” or “.net” and so on. 

Perhaps when you started your business, the “.com” wasn’t available, but it is now. And since “.com” seems to have more authority over say “.net” you’d like to make that change. Besides “.com” is easier to remember.

Does this complicate your domain change?

"Fortunately, no. It’s the same process. If you go to GoDaddy’s website, you can search for all kinds of different domain extensions. There are some that have more requirements than other like '.edu,' or '.org,' but the rest of them are pretty much the same. The only difference is that the '.coms' are generally more expensive than '.biz' or '.net.' " 

When seriously considering changing your domain name, it’s important that the reasons why outweigh the work behind doing it. If you are indeed set on changing your domain. Make sure your IT provider is aware and has the skill set to make the change. Create a timeline of events and make sure that you have backup points in case anything fails. Otherwise, congratulations on your new domain! 

Related: Words to the Wise on Web Design

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