Today let’s talk about hosting your own WordPress blog. The first thing you need is a domain name. This isn’t as difficult as you might think. Your domain name should reflect the name of your business. Mine is WordPressGuru. Think of several that might work because your perfect name might already be taken. Get a .com domain. That’s what people look for on the internet. The lines have blurred a bit but .org used to mean a non-profit organization and .net usually means a company that uses the net for its business, like your ISP.

A good place to look for and then buy your domain name is 1and1

I like 1and1 for several reasons.

• It is very easy to follow the instructions to purchase your domain name.
• They are one of the most inexpensive around.
• They have an easy redirect function, which I’ll explain in a moment.
• And if you purchase a domain that you aren’t going to use right away, you can park it on Sedo at no charge. Sedo is a domain selling company. Who knows, one of your good domain names just might make you some money!

When you find a domain name that is available, you want to buy two versions of it. The ’scrunched’ version - like WordPressGuru.com, and the hyphenated version like Word-Press-Guru.com. You will only host one of them. The other will be redirected.

When you have purchased your domain names, you must wait until 1and1 has propogated them across the internet. Sometimes this is almost immediate and sometimes it takes 12 - 72 hours. You will know when this has happened because you will see the status change in your account. The domain is ready when you see the word ‘Ready’ in the status.

So - go to 1and1 right now and see if your perfect domain name is available!

We’ll talk about hosting next time. Happy Hunting!