Domain Registration for Businesses

## Domain Registration for Businesses Registering a domain for personal use is straightforward. Registering a domain for a business involves additional considerations: trademark clearance, legal entity ownership, defensive registration strategies, and governance procedures that protect the business against ownership disputes, unauthorized transfers, and lost access. This guide covers what businesses need to know before and after registering domains, with a focus on the decisions that prevent expensive problems later. ## Before You Register: Trademark Clearance The most common — and most preventable — domain problem businesses face is registering a name that infringes on an existing trademark. Clearing a domain name before registration is substantially cheaper than defending a UDRP complaint or federal trademark lawsuit afterward. ### What Trademark Clearance Involves **Identical search**: Search the USPTO TESS database (for U.S. businesses) for identical marks in your industry class. A match is a red flag — get a trademark attorney's opinion before proceeding. **Confusingly similar search**: Search for marks that sound similar, look similar, or are close variations of your intended name. This requires a professional search because the analysis is subjective and depends on industry context. **Common law search**: Registered trademarks are only part of the picture. Businesses can acquire common law trademark rights through use in commerce even without registration. Search for businesses actively using the name online: Google search, business name databases, state business registries, and domain availability. **International search**: If your business operates internationally or has plans to expand, trademark conflicts in other jurisdictions matter. Marks that are clear in the U.S. may be registered in Europe or Asia. A professional trademark clearance search through a law firm or trademark search service (Thomson CompuMark, Corsearch, etc.) costs $500-$2,000 but is worth the investment for any brand name you're building a substantial business around. ### Trademark Registration After Domain Registration Once you've cleared the name, consider registering the trademark. A registered trademark gives you: - Priority date establishing your rights before others - Legal presumption of exclusive nationwide use - Ability to bring federal court actions for infringement - Standing to file UDRP complaints against cybersquatters The domain registration itself doesn't create trademark rights. Trademark rights come from use in commerce and/or registration. A business that builds on a domain without trademark protection may find itself unable to enforce against imitators or defend against aggressive trademark claimants. ## Who Should Own the Domain: Business Entity Considerations One of the most important and most overlooked decisions in business domain registration is the ownership structure. ### Register in the Business Entity's Name, Not an Individual's Domains registered in an individual's personal name — even the founder's — create problems: **Business ownership disputes**: If the business is co-owned or the individual's relationship with the business changes, ownership of the domain can become contested. Is the domain an asset of the business or the personal property of the individual who registered it? **Employment changes**: An employee who registers a domain for work purposes may claim ownership when they leave. Courts have generally found that work-related domain registrations belong to the employer, but litigation is expensive and disruptive. **Continuity risks**: If the individual registrant becomes incapacitated, dies, or becomes estranged from the business, recovering the domain requires legal action. A domain registered to a legal entity can be managed by any authorized officer. **Registration practice**: Register domains using: - Business entity name as registrant - Business email address for contacts ([email protected], not personal email) - Business physical address - Billing to a business payment account For sole proprietors operating under a DBA, use the registered DBA name and a business-dedicated email address rather than personal information. ### Multi-Owner Businesses In partnerships or multi-member LLCs, document who controls the domain management account in the operating agreement or partnership agreement. Specifying that domain management credentials are an asset of the entity (not any individual partner) and defining procedures for management account access prevents future disputes. ## Registrant Information Best Practices Even with WHOIS privacy enabled, accurate registrant information must be maintained in the registrar's records. For businesses: **Entity legal name**: Use the full legal name of the entity (LLC, Inc., Corp.) as the registrant organization. Abbreviations or DBA names are acceptable if they're the legally registered names. **Administrative contact**: This should be a role-based address ([email protected]) rather than an individual's personal email. When employees leave, role-based addresses can be reassigned without changing registrar records. **Technical contact**: For businesses managing their own DNS, use a technical team address. For businesses using managed DNS, this may default to the DNS provider. **Registrant email accuracy**: ICANN requires accurate, working registrant email addresses. The registrant email receives transfer confirmations, renewal notices, and UDRP notices. A broken registrant email can result in missed transfer confirmations (allowing hijacking) or missed UDRP notices (default decisions against you). Audit registrant contact information annually. Employee turnover, domain migrations, and email system changes all create opportunities for contact information to become stale. ## Defensive Domain Registration Strategy ### Primary Domain: Non-Negotiable Your primary business domain — the one your website and email run on — deserves the highest level of protection: - Registered to the business entity (not an individual) - Transfer lock enabled - Auto-renewal enabled with a dedicated payment method - WHOIS privacy enabled - Annual renewal reminders set independently of registrar notifications - Registry lock considered for critical infrastructure ### Defensive Registrations Defensive registration involves acquiring domain variations to prevent competitors, bad actors, or confused customers from using them. The cost-benefit analysis: **High-priority defensive registrations**: - Common typos of your primary domain (missing letters, doubled letters, transpositions) - .com if you're using another TLD as primary (and vice versa) - Key ccTLDs for markets you serve or plan to serve (.co.uk, .ca, .com.au) - Plural/singular and hyphenated variations if your name is ambiguous **Lower-priority registrations**: - All possible TLD variants (not practical or cost-effective) - Very obscure typos that no one would plausibly type - Variations that don't resemble your brand closely enough to cause confusion A practical defensive portfolio for most businesses includes 5-15 domains beyond the primary. At $10-$15/year each, that's $50-$225/year — a reasonable insurance cost for a business's primary brand. **What to do with defensive domains**: Set them to redirect to your primary domain. This ensures any confused traffic reaches you rather than a blank page or a competitor. A 301 redirect from the defensive domain to your primary domain takes five minutes to configure. ## Domain Registration During Business Formation Timing matters. Secure your primary domain as early as possible in the business formation process — ideally before you've publicized the name. **Pre-formation**: Register the domain before formally registering the business entity. Domain registration doesn't require an entity to exist yet. Use your personal information temporarily with a plan to update to business information once the entity is formed. **Update registrant information after formation**: Once your business entity exists, update the registrant information to reflect the entity as owner. Most registrars allow this through a registrant change or domain push process. **Coordinate domain and business name**: Before finalizing your business name, verify that the domain is available. A perfect business name is worth less if you can't get a reasonable domain for it. Consider domain availability part of the naming criteria from the start. ## Domain Governance for Organizations Larger organizations — those with multiple departments, multiple IT staff, or complex ownership structures — need formal domain governance policies. ### Key Policy Elements **Ownership and authorization**: Define who can register new domains (IT procurement? Marketing? Anyone with a credit card?). Uncontrolled domain registration creates portfolio sprawl, trademark exposure, and shadow IT risks. **Naming conventions**: Should all domains follow a pattern (product.company.com, country.company.com)? Consistent naming makes portfolios manageable and prevents brand confusion. **Approval workflows**: For each new domain registration, who approves? IT? Legal? Marketing? Define the workflow and document decisions for audit purposes. **Lifecycle management**: Define what happens to domains when products, marketing campaigns, or projects end. Without a defined decommissioning process, domains accumulate. **Credentials management**: Store registrar credentials in a password manager accessible to authorized administrators. Registrar account access should be role-based, with access revoked when employees leave. **Legal review trigger**: Define when legal must review domain registration decisions (new markets, new product names, ccTLD registrations in jurisdictions with local requirements). ### Handling Domain Transitions in M&A Mergers, acquisitions, and corporate restructurings often involve transferring domain portfolios. Key considerations: - Identify all domains in due diligence — not just the primary website domain - Verify registrant information is transferable (entity-owned domains transfer with the entity; individually-owned domains require separate transfer) - Transfer domain management credentials to acquiring entity's admin accounts post-close - Audit and update DNS configurations that may reference pre-acquisition infrastructure ## Cost Management for Business Domain Portfolios Business domain portfolios benefit from the same cost discipline as personal portfolios, with additional leverage: **Volume pricing**: If you manage enough domains, negotiate volume pricing with registrars or consider reseller programs that provide wholesale pricing. **Multi-year registrations**: For domains you'll definitely keep, multi-year registration locks in current pricing and reduces renewal administration overhead. For .com at current Verisign pricing caps, multi-year registration is a hedge against future registry fee increases. **Consolidate billing**: Use a single payment method and registrar account for all business domains. This simplifies accounting, enables centralized renewal management, and reduces the risk of missed renewals from fragmented billing. **Annual portfolio review**: Review the portfolio annually. Drop domains you're no longer using or defending. The holding cost of unnecessary domains ($10-$15/year each) adds up, and more importantly, unnecessary domains are a management liability. Domain Registration Checklist Domain Cost Calculator WHOIS Lookup Tool How to Register a Domain: Complete Walkthrough How to Manage Multiple Domains Domain Name Disputes: UDRP Process Explained