Help System Search

What Is a Domain?
By setting up a domain, you can change how people can access your site. For instance, if your team name was "Green Way Baseball", you can register the domain www.GreenWayBaseball.com so that people can access your page by typing that into their browser address bar, rather than searching for your team on the HomeTeamsONLINE site. Creating a domain is an easy way to make your site more personal easy to access.


Sounds Great, But Is it Costly?
You can register a domain with us for about $15.20 per year. If you are a CHAMPION or ALL-STAR user, a domain is provided at no extra charge, included within your subscription fee. Get started now at www.UseYourOwnTeamName.com!

IMPORTANT NOTE: By selecting the auto-renew option you are authorizing the domain company to charge you for renewals. Do not allow the auto-renew option if you do not want this. Also be aware without auto-renew you must submit the renewal yourself or the domain will expire (and can be taken by someone else). Notices are sent to the email you use on the domain registration so be sure to use a permanent email.

Also, take extra care when making your choice for a domain name. Make sure that you spell the name correctly and that there are not any similar existing domains that your viewers can easily misspell and be taken to the wrong site. Once a domain is registered, it cannot be changed or deleted.

If you have any issues or emergencies regarding your domain, contact domain support @ 480-624-2500, and have your Credit Card handy to confirm your identity.


I already have a domain name registered. How do I set it up with my HomeTeamsONLINE website?
You can continue hosting with your domain company.

 

USING DOMAIN FORWARDING

(Only an option if you own the domain in your own domain account)

 

This is usually available for a small annual fee, however, many domain registrars provide it for no extra cost. (If you register with our domain service www.UseYourOwnTeamName.com forwarding is included at no additional cost!)

For domain forwarding to work, the NAME SERVERS sometimes have to be assigned to the Registrar's default servers. This may be an issue if you had used your domain name for a custom website in the past. In this case, ask your Registrar how to reset the domain to their default servers.

You do not need any DNS or name server information for forwarding - You need to keep the domain on your domain Registrar's servers and just forward it to your HTO Home Page.

If you follow the steps to set up domain forwarding on your Registrar's account, it should be fairly straight-forward to set it up. Your HomeTeamsONLINE website URL (address) is always in this format:

http://HTOsports.com/your_username_here

You replace "your_username_here" with the USERNAME for your account. Another method is to go to the page you want to link to (usually the team or league home page) and copy the URL (address) from the address bar in your browser. Paste this into the address/URL location requested when setting up the forwarding.

Please ask your domain Registrar for specific information about their domain forwarding service since each Registrar will have its own method for setting up.
 

Will my domain name appear at the top of my site in the URL?

With the DNS it will show up on every page.

 

If you are using domain forwarding, you'll want to set up domain masking as well. Contact your domain company for details. This will hide the default URL with the mask. There is usually an extra fee for this.

 

How do domains (example: www.mydomain.com) work with my HomeTeamsONLINE sports website?
If you're confused trying to understand how to set up a website domain name on HomeTeamsONLINE, don't feel bad - it is very confusing. Here are a few topics which we hope will clear things up for our customers:

1) Your website is NOT the same as your domain
Many customers get confused right off the bat because it is common to refer to a website as a domain. They are two different things. A simple example is your name: if your name is "Bill" you could change it to "John" but you are still the same person. Likewise, just because someone has the same name as you doesn't mean they ARE you. Names are just an easy way to identify people. It's exactly the same way with websites - "Domain Names" are just a way of identifying a website in an easy way.

If your domain is not working that doesn't mean your website is not working - you can go to our homepage and use the search box at the top to find your team website even if the domain name does not seem to be working. (This will not work if you have set your website as NOT SEARCHABLE under User Info & Upgrades > Team/League Info/ Season.

2) Domain registration is only done by official organizations
We cannot actually register domains - we just help you do it. As an example we will use a person's name again. When a baby is born, the hospital usually asks you for the baby's new name and other information, and then you get the birth certificate later on. The hospital cannot actually register a baby's name - they just help to process the information which goes to the State, County or Federal clerk who is authorized to create a birth certificate or social security number. If you needed to update information on your birth certificate you would probably have to contact the County clerk - the hospital would not have authorization to change it. It's the same way with domains, you will have to contact your domain Registrar for help and information regarding your domain. The HomeTeamsONLINE Staff can not directly access your domain account.

3) Changes to your domain can only be made by the official organizations with YOUR permission
HomeTeamsONLINE will do everything we can to help you set up your domain, however, we do not have control over your domain account. If you provide us the customer number and password for your domain account we will gladly fix things on your behalf. Understand that we are not allowed to know your password for your domain - the domain is something you "own" and so it's protected for your security. You keep your domain name for your own use even if you no longer use our sports websites.

4) OK, so this is all interesting but my domain isn't working, now what do I do?
When you contact HomeTeamsONLINE about a domain issue it is best if you have your customer number and password for your DOMAIN account (not the sports website). If not, we can usually find your customer number, but we will need the password to access your account on UseYourOwnTeamName.com. There is a password retrieval process that goes through the email you used when you got the domain, but you will have to do this because we can't access your email. If that is still a problem you will have to call the domain support line directly and they will verify your identity and reset your password. (The domain support line has access to your domain in the same way you might have call the County clerk to change information on your birth certificate.) The buffer between the official domain registrar and HomeTeamsONLINE is done on purpose to protect your rights to your domain name.

If your domain has been set up through another Registrar such as Godaddy.com or Yahoo.com, we'll be very limited in how we can help - your best bet is to contact them.

5) Isn't there an easier way?
HomeTeamsONLINE wants to make having a sports website as easy and enjoyable as possible, and we are well aware that the domain name registration process is not easy. To eliminate the hassle we can register the domain you want under OUR account - when you buy a CHAMPION or ALL-STAR level site, this service is provided at no extra cost. (Since the domain is under our account, you cannot access the domain information directly, but the domain can be transferred to your own private account in the future if you request it.)

If you do not get the CHAMPION or ALL-STAR package, you need to register the domain with any domain reseller on the Web you want, including UseYourOwnTeamName. (In the future we will be offering a service to register domains right within your HomeTeamsONLINE editing pages, however we are currently still in the process of setting up the ability to access domain accounts to make changes directly.)

Refer to our FREE DOMAIN FEATURE FAQ for more information on how to get your free domain once you have registered for an ALL-STAR or CHAMPION account.