Having your own domain name, e.g.

<www.yourbusiness.com> - or -
<www.yourorganization.org> - or even -
<town.yourtown.yourstate.us>,
can make your web site’s address easier to remember, and the site itself easier for people to find. (There is also a certain degree of status involved.) It also comes at a price, although that price is small, and many find it a worthwhile investment. Other Top Level Domains (besides .com and .org) that are available for general use include .net, .biz, .info, and .us.

Without your own domain name, the address for your web site (known as a Uniform Resource Locator, or URL for short) will take the form of

<www.yourserversname.com/yourname/>, - or even -
<www.yourserversname.com/~yourname/>.

Domain names are issued on a first come, first served basis, and many of the more common names, particularly those ending in ‘.com’ and ‘.net,’ used for commercial sites, have already been taken. There is still available a much greater selection of ‘.org’ names for organizations and societies. Even more under-utilized are the ‘.us’ domains, which have now been made available for general use, as well as for towns, cities, counties, states, and special districts, libraries, councils of government, schools, museums, and suchlike. Mashwebdesign.com can check whether the name you desire is available, or you can check for yourself by going to the InterNIC Whois web site (or the .US Whois for .us URLs.)

Domain name registration costs from $10.00 to $35.00 per year, depending on who you register with and how many years you pay at a time. Mashwebdesign.com helps you in finding the affordable registrar that charges less per year, payable annually in advance. Most Web Presence Providers also charge a one-time setup fee and/or a monthly maintenance fee.  Mashwebdesign.com can handle all the hassle of setting up your own domain name for you, at negligible cost.