We've talked a number of times in the past about the importance of registering relevant domain names for your company website, and about tools such as Domize.com that help you find good domain name. Once you've chosen a domain name to register, however, the large number of different options of places to actually register domain names, all of which basically do the same thing, can be rather daunting. In the past, I've used popular sites such as GoDaddy.com and 1and1.com, both of which offer hosting plans in addition to domain registration. In a recent lifehacker poll for best registrar, however, while both of those showed up on the list, the top honors went to a lesser-known (at least by me) site called namecheap.com. Furthermore, the comments from Lifehacker readers were as positive as I've ever seen during one of these polls.
As I said, most domain name registrars provide pretty much the same service, so there aren't really a lot of differentiators in the services. Basically, companies are competing on price, service, and ease of use. By all accounts I could find, and from my limited experience (registering one domain name through them so far), Namecheap stands out on in all three categories. It's probably not too often that you'll need to register a domain, but when you do, I'd definitely give Namecheap a try.
And if you're wondering what you can do with your shiny new domain without setting up a full blown hosted website, check out our previous posts about setting up Google Apps and Google Sites on your domain for email, documents, and a basic website.
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