The benefits of keeping your domain and hosting together

If you run a small business website, there is a good chance your domain name was registered years ago by someone who has since moved on, through a company you no longer remember, using an email address nobody checks. Meanwhile your website and email are hosted somewhere else entirely.

That setup works, right up until something breaks. Then you find yourself juggling two logins, two support teams and two sets of renewal notices, trying to work out whose problem it actually is.

Keeping your domain and hosting together is not compulsory, and we will explain below when it does not matter much. But for most NZ businesses, having both in one place takes a surprising amount of hassle out of running a website.

First, a quick refresher

Your domain name is your address on the internet, such as yourbusiness.co.nz or yourbusiness.nz. You rent it by the year from a registrar.

Your web hosting is where your website files, databases and often your email actually live. It is the server that answers when someone types your address.

The domain points to the hosting through DNS settings. If those settings are wrong, or the domain lapses, your website and email stop working even if the hosting is perfectly healthy. If you would like the longer version, we cover it in domain name vs web hosting.

One bill and one renewal date

When your domain is with one company and your hosting is with another, you have two accounts, two invoices and two renewal dates to keep track of. They rarely line up, and the domain renewal usually arrives once a year when you least expect it.

With both in one place:

• you see everything in a single client area
• invoices come from one familiar sender, so they are less likely to be ignored or mistaken for spam
• you can check at a glance what you have, what it costs and when it renews
• if your card details change, you update them once

Our customers manage their domains, hosting invoices and support tickets together in our client area at my.slightlydifferent.co.nz.

One support team that can see the whole picture

This is the big one. When a website or email stops working, the cause is often somewhere in the gap between the domain and the hosting: a DNS record that was changed, a name server that points to the wrong place, or a domain that quietly expired.

If your domain and hosting are with different providers, the conversation can go like this. The host says everything looks fine on their end and it must be your domain. The registrar says the domain is active and you should talk to your host. You end up passing messages back and forth while your website is down.

When both are with us, there is no one to point the finger at except us. Our support team can look at your domain, your DNS and your hosting at the same time and simply fix the problem. That support comes from real people here in New Zealand, by phone, email or support ticket, in plain English.

Faster fixes for DNS, email and SSL problems

A lot of common website problems are really DNS problems in disguise. For example:

• Email not arriving or going to spam. Records like MX, SPF, DKIM and DMARC live in your domain's DNS, but they need to match how your hosting sends email.
• SSL certificate not working. Free Let's Encrypt certificates need your domain to point at the right server before they can be issued and renewed. If you want to know more about these, read what is an SSL certificate.
• Website showing an old version or the wrong site. Often the domain is still pointing at a previous host.
• Adding a CDN. Services like QUIC.cloud or Cloudflare usually need DNS changes. We set these up for customers who want them.

When we can see and change both sides, a fix that might take a day of emails between two companies can often be sorted in one go.

Simpler set-up and simpler moves

Setting up a new website is easier when the domain and hosting are in the same place. There is no need to copy name server details from one company's dashboard into another, or to wait while someone at the registrar works out what you are asking for.

The same is true when you move. If you are bringing a WordPress site to us, we move it for free when you buy a year's hosting. If the domain comes too, we can handle the DNS changes as part of the move, so there is less for you to coordinate and less chance of something being missed.

Fewer lapsed-domain accidents

One of the most common and most avoidable website disasters is a domain that expires without anyone noticing. Renewal reminders go to an old email address, a card on file has expired, or everyone assumed someone else was looking after it.

When a domain lapses, your website goes offline and your email stops arriving. Depending on how long it is left, you can even lose the name altogether. We explain this in more detail in why renewing your domain matters.

Having the domain with the same provider as your hosting does not make it impossible to forget, but it does make it much less likely. The renewal is on the same account you already deal with, from the same people, and if something looks wrong your host is in a position to notice and let you know.

When keeping them separate is fine

To be fair, plenty of people keep their domain and hosting apart and never have a problem. It can make sense if:

• you have lots of domains and prefer to manage them all with one registrar, while hosting different websites in different places
• your domain is managed by a larger organisation, such as a head office or IT department, with its own processes
• you use your domain for things other than a website, such as a separate email service, and the website is a small part of the picture
• you are comfortable with DNS and happy to make changes yourself when needed

If any of those fit, there is no need to move anything. We are happy to host your website while your domain stays where it is. We will tell you which DNS records to set, and help you check they are right.

Whatever you choose, keep ownership in your own name

Whether your domain sits with us or somewhere else, a few things matter more than where it is:

• Register the domain in your business's name, not your web designer's, your former staff member's or a friend's.
• Keep your own login to the account that holds the domain, and know where to find it.
• Make sure the contact email is one you actually read, ideally one that does not depend on the domain itself working.
• Keep your payment details up to date so renewals do not fail.

A good provider will never need to "hold" your domain for you. It should always be yours, and you should be able to move it if you ever choose to.

Bringing your domain and hosting together with us

If your domain and hosting are scattered across different companies and you would like them in one place, we can help.

We register and transfer .co.nz, .nz, .com, .net, .org, .kiwi and more. Per year, a .co.nz or .nz is $34.95 and a .com is $29.95. You can search for a new name or start a transfer on our domains page.

For hosting, our NZ web hosting runs from servers in Auckland, with daily backups kept for 30 days, free SSL certificates, firewalls and malware scanning, and 24/7 automated monitoring. WP Optimised shared hosting starts from $295 per year.

Talk to us

Not sure where your domain is registered, or whether it is worth moving? Get in touch and we will take a look and give you a straight answer. You can contact us, call us on +64 3 541 9468 or email hello@slightlydifferent.co.nz.