Ownership
, 3 min read
Who owns your website? Domain and hosting, explained
Three separate things get called "my website", and the person who controls the first one controls all of it. How to check whose name yours is in.
This is the least interesting post on this site and the one most likely to save you real money. Every year small businesses discover that the person who built their site five years ago owns the address, has stopped replying, and wants a number to hand it over.
Three things, often confused
| The thing | What it is | Who should own it |
|---|---|---|
| The domain | Your address, like yourbusiness.in. Rented yearly from a registrar. | You, in your business name, on your email. |
| The hosting | The computer your pages sit on, paid monthly or yearly. | You, or a studio account you can be moved out of. |
| The site itself | The design, the code and the words. | You, once you have paid for it. |
Whoever controls the domain controls where your customers land. Everything else can be rebuilt in a week. That cannot.
How to check, in five minutes
- Search for "ICANN lookup" and enter your domain. It will show the registrar and often the registrant email, unless privacy is switched on.
- Try logging in to that registrar with your business email and a password reset. If a reset email arrives, the account is yours.
- Look for the renewal invoice in your email. Whoever gets billed usually holds the account.
- Ask your developer directly, in writing: "is the domain registered in my name, and can you send me the login?" The reply, and how long it takes, tells you what you need to know.
What good looks like
- The domain is registered to your business, with your email, and you have logged in at least once.
- The renewal is on auto renew and on a card that has not expired.
- You have the hosting login, or a written note of who does and how to get it.
- Your analytics and Search Console sit on a Google account you own, not on a developer's personal one.
- You could hire someone else tomorrow and it would cost you a conversation, not a payment.
What to do if someone else holds it
Ask politely first, in writing, for the domain to be transferred to an account in your name. Most of the time this is not malice, just a developer who set everything up on their own account years ago because it was quicker.
If they will not, you have two options: pay whatever they are asking and get it over with, or register a new domain and rebuild on it. The second costs you whatever ranking and printed material referred to the old address, which is exactly why the first option gets expensive.
The renewal that catches everyone
A domain is rented, not bought. Miss the renewal and the site goes dark, and after a grace period anyone can register it. Put the renewal date in your calendar with a reminder a month before, and check the card on the account once a year. A ₹900 renewal missed is the most expensive ₹900 in small business.
How we do it, and why
Your domain and hosting are registered in your name and paid by you directly to the provider. We never hold them. It is not generosity: it means leaving us costs you nothing but a conversation, and a studio that has to keep you by being worth keeping is a better studio.