Who Actually Owns Your Domain?

Quick question that surprises a lot of business owners: who actually owns your domain?

Not "who set it up." Who is the registered owner? If a web designer, an ex-partner, or an agency registered it under their account, your entire online identity — website, email, everything — exists at someone else's mercy. We've seen businesses locked out of their own name because a freelancer disappeared.

Three things to check today

Takes about ten minutes, start to finish:

Log into the registrar. If you can't, that's your answer — start the recovery process now, not during a crisis.
Check that the owner/registrant email is yours, on a domain you control (not the old designer's Gmail).
Turn on auto-renew and registrar lock. Expired domains get snapped up by squatters within hours.

Illustration of a shield with a lock, representing domain auto-renew and registrar lock protection — Two settings, five minutes, one less way to lose the domain.

Bonus check: while you're in there, confirm SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records exist. Those three decide whether your email lands in inboxes or spam folders — most DIY setups have none of them.

This is item 1 of 9 on our Business Launch Bundle checklist — domain registered in your name, always, plus everything else a new business needs to launch.

See the Business Launch Bundle →