As soon as you have a website made, three terms pop up that nobody ever explains properly: domain, hosting and SSL. They are on your invoice, they come back every year, and you just nod along. Time to put them in plain language, because when you know what you are paying for, you pay with more peace of mind. We will stick to an image that stays with you: your website is a house.
The domain name is your address
Your domain is the address where your house stands, for example othala.be. It is what people type in to reach you. You rent that address by the year, and as long as you pay, it is yours. An important detail that often goes wrong: make sure the domain is registered in your name, not your web builder’s. Otherwise you are renting an address someone else owns, and you only find out when you want to move.
Hosting is the land and the house
If the domain is the address, hosting is the land your house stands on and the house itself. It is the place where your website’s files are actually stored, on a computer that is on day and night so visitors can always get in. Good hosting is fast and reliable; cheap, overcrowded hosting is like a house on a swamp: it sinks just when you get lots of visitors. For an ordinary business it does not have to cost a fortune, but skimping on the foundations is never a good idea.
SSL is the lock on the door
SSL is the certificate that gives you the padlock in the browser’s address bar and the s in https. It encrypts what travels back and forth between the visitor and your site, so nobody can read along. Two reasons why it is not optional: visitors do not trust a site without a padlock, and Google ranks sites without SSL lower. The good news is that a decent SSL certificate is simply part of proper hosting these days.
So what do you pay for every year?
In short, the recurring costs come down to this:
- The domain name: the annual rent for your address.
- The hosting: the place where your site lives and runs.
- The SSL certificate: the lock, often already included with good hosting.
- Optional maintenance: updates and small changes, so your site lasts for years.
Include those costs when you compare quotes. A low build price with expensive mandatory extras is not cheap in the end, and a site you do not own yourself is never truly yours.
Simply want to know where you stand, without surprises on your invoice? We explain in plain language what your site needs and what it costs each year. Send a message to info@othala.be.