To begin with, a domain name, also known as a Web site address, is what people type in to their Web browser in order to find a Web site. For example, yumacity.com is one of my local Web site domain names.

This is also what you give out or share with people who want to find out about your company via your Web site, so it is important that your domain name is short, easy to type and easy to remember.

But, it is not necessary to have your own, personalized domain to have a Web site.

Usually, your Internet service provider will offer a small amount of server space to host a Web page. However, the domain name will display the ISP's name and not the name of your company. Plus, the name is often long and contains obscure characters such as the tilde for their own organizational purposes.

Once you decide to switch to your own domain name, it is recommended to find company that specializes in handling Web sites called a host.

The company hosting your Web site is usually separate from your ISP and their job is to place your Web site on their Web servers.

Simply put, your ISP gives you access to the Internet and your host provides you with server space, features and public access to your Web site via high-speed connections.

As I said before, having a short name that is easy to remember and type is a big factor. Using a domain name other than your own will definitely be longer, harder to remember and more difficult to type.

Furthermore, an even bigger factor than that is the long-term plan of your Internet presence. Hopefully, your Web site is developed as an extension of your business that can grow as your company grows and be used to compliment and streamline your existing operation.

If you were relying on an outside company to supply their domain name and that company were to go out of business, or, if you just wanted to switch ISPs and had been hosting using their name, your Web address would be lost. And, along with that, all the work you had done to promote your site, get your site listed in the search engines and get your customers and clients comfortable with your site would be lost.

And, the same goes for e-mail. Again, most people are using an e-mail address provided by their ISP. This means the address is something like user@aol.com or user@digitaldune.net. If your ISP were to go out of business or you wanted to switch Internet providers, you would lose that e-mail address. Imagine if all your current and potential customers and clients suddenly couldn't contact you.

Fortunately, having your domain name can solve this problem as well. Once you have your own domain name, you also are able to have e-mail addresses that reflect your name (such as feedback@yumacity.com) in addition to space for your Web site.

With this solution, your Web site and e-mail address are kept separate from your ISP and they can be moved from server to server should you decide to do so.

Of course, there are going to be some additional costs involved with this service.

The actual registration process is fairly inexpensive. It costs between $10 and $35 a year to purchase a domain name. In addition to that, you can expect a setup fee and a reasonable monthly server fee to maintain the domain name and provide the features mentioned above.

Finally, your host can also assist you with the actual name registration process. The process is fairly simple, but you will be asked for the dns name servers. This is the information that actually connects your domain name to your Web site files and it is different for every host.

So, if you are ready to take the first, or next step in your Internet presence, consider getting your own domain name.

Here are a few sites to start researching available names:

Network Solutions

http://www.netsol.com/

Register.com

http://www.register.com/

YumaCity.com

http://www.yumacity.com/opensrs/