Every website runs on three things: a domain name, which is its address; hosting, the computer that serves it; and usually email on that same domain. Most owners pay for all three every year without ever seeing them. Knowing what each one is, and whose name it is in, saves a lot of trouble when something changes.
What is a domain name?
The domain is your address on the internet: yourbusiness.be. Nobody owns a domain outright; you rent it for a year at a time and renew it.
For .be addresses, the registry is DNS Belgium. You do not buy from them directly but through a registrar, a company that registers domains for customers. In October 2026, renewing a .be domain costs around ten euros a year, VAT included. Prices vary between registrars, and first-year offers are often lower. Other endings, such as .com or .eu, cost a little more or less.
The person or company named as the holder, also called the registrant, is the one with the legal right to the domain for as long as it is renewed. That name should be yours or your company’s. Not your web designer’s.
What is hosting?
Hosting is the computer, in a data centre somewhere, that stores your website and sends it to every visitor who asks for it. When people say a site is “down”, the hosting is usually where the problem is.
Hosting usually comes with, or should come with:
- An SSL certificate, which gives the padlock in the browser and the “https” in the address. Browsers warn visitors about sites without one.
- Backups, so a broken update or a mistake can be undone.
- Security updates, especially for sites built on systems with plugins.
- Monitoring, so someone notices when the site stops responding, before your customers do.
Prices vary widely, from a few euros a month for basic shared hosting to much more for managed hosting. The difference is mostly in how much of that list someone does for you.
How does email on my domain work?
An address like info@yourbusiness.be uses your domain, but the mailbox is run by a mail provider, which is usually not the same company as your website hosting. A few records in your domain’s settings, called DNS records, tell the rest of the internet where to deliver your mail.
Three more records, known as SPF, DKIM and DMARC, prove that mail sent from your domain really comes from you. Without them, your emails are much more likely to end up in your customers’ spam folders. If your messages keep landing in spam, these are the first thing to check.
Because the website and the mail are separate, moving a website to new hosting does not have to touch your email, as long as whoever does it knows not to change those records.
Who should own what?
| What | In whose name | Why |
|---|---|---|
| The domain | Yours | Whoever holds the domain controls your website address and your email |
| Access to the domain’s settings | Yours, shared with whoever builds the site | So you never depend on one person to make a change |
| Email accounts | Yours, as the administrator | Your customers’ messages are your business records |
| Google Business Profile and Search Console | Yours, with others added as managers | So access can be removed without losing anything |
| The website itself | Agreed in writing | The contract should say when the code and the content become yours |
What goes wrong most often?
I see these regularly. In September 2026 I checked 31 businesses run by Portuguese and Brazilian owners in Belgium: three had a domain that did not load, and one still showed a “coming soon” page: a domain bought and never built. Another business’s former address now shows someone else’s travel blog.
- The domain is in someone else’s name. A web designer registers it under their own account to save time. Years later they are unreachable, and moving the site turns into a legal problem.
- The domain is not renewed. The card on file expired, the reminder went to an old email address, and the domain lapses. Expired domains can be registered by anyone, including people who resell them.
- The email disappears during a move. Someone changes the domain’s records to point to new hosting and deletes the mail records with them.
- There are no backups. Nobody notices until the day they are needed.
- The certificate belongs to someone else. One salon’s site showed visitors a security warning because the certificate it served was issued for its platform’s own address, not for the salon’s domain.
What should I ask whoever builds my site?
- Will the domain be registered in my name, with my email as the contact?
- What exactly does the yearly or monthly fee cover: hosting, domain renewal, certificate, backups, updates, monitoring?
- Who do I call when the site is down, and how quickly do they answer?
- If I leave, what do I get, and what does it cost to move?
Clear answers to these four questions tell you more than any feature list. The guide to builders, CMSs and custom builds covers the other big choice: how the site itself is made.
How does Ovrick handle this?
The domain is registered in your name from day one. Hosting, the domain, the SSL certificate, daily backups and uptime monitoring are part of every maintenance plan. If you leave, with thirty days’ notice I transfer the domain and the email wherever you want, free, and hand over the site. The pricing page lists what each plan includes.