How to use your existing domain name with Yahoo! Web Hosting?

Please follow the instructions given here to successfully use the Yahoo! Web Hosting Plan with your existing domain name.

The complete process of purchasing the Yahoo! Web Hosting Plan and using your existing domain name involves the following steps:

Purchase the Yahoo! Web Hosting Plan

1. Access http://in.business.yahoo.com and click on the "Already own a web address?" link on the landing page.
2. In the page that you are taken to, enter the domain name that you currently own and click on the "Search" button.
3. Yahoo! checks whether such a domain name exists. If the domain name exists, you will have to:
   1. Review the "whois information" and confirm that the domain that you intend to use is owned by you.
   2. Understand and accept the instructions required to successfully migrate to Yahoo! Web Hosting Plan and continue using your existing domain name.
4. Sign-in using the Yahoo! Id which you intend to associate with the Yahoo! Web Hosting account.
5. Provide the credit card details as well as the contact information that will be used for billing purposes.
6. Confirm the details of your order. Go ahead and place the order.
7. Note down the order id associated with your order or take a print out of the order confirmation page.

Upload web pages and database content

1. If you already have a hosting account with web pages and content stored in it, access the existing hosting account and download all the directories and files. Then use one of the following methods to upload web content to the Yahoo! Web Hosting Plan.
   1. Use FTP
      1. Access http://in.business.yahoo.com and click on the “My Account” link / button at the top-right side of the page.
      2. Sign-in using the Yahoo! Id associated with your account if you are not already signed in. This takes you to your My Account page.
      3. In the My Account page, click on the “Web Hosting Control Panel” link under “Quick Access”. This takes you to your Web Hosting Control Panel.
      4. In the Web Hosting Control Panel, click on the "Create & Update" tab.
      5. Note down the FTP settings from this page and use this to FTP the content to Yahoo! Web Hosting.
   2. Use "Easy Upload"
      1. Access http://in.business.yahoo.com and click on the “My Account” link / button at the top-right side of the page.
      2. Sign-in using the Yahoo! Id associated with your account if you are not already signed in. This takes you to your My Account page.
      3. In the My Account page, click on the “Web Hosting Control Panel” link under “Quick Access”. This takes you to your Web Hosting Control Panel.
      4. In the Web Hosting Control Panel, click on the "Create & Update" tab.
      5. Click on "Easy Upload" on this page to copy files to your Yahoo! Web Hosting site directory easily.
2. If you do not have an existing web hosting account outside of Yahoo! or any web content on the existing web hosting account then,
   1. Use the Yahoo! Site Solutions tool, one of the simplest web tools, to build and publish a simple website and get online within minutes. This can be accessed through the "Create & Update" tab in the Web Hosting Control Panel.
   2. Get web content developed without the use of Yahoo! Site Solutions and upload the content onto Yahoo! Web Hosting using FTP or "Easy Upload" as suggested under point 1(a) and 1(b) above.
3. It is important to realize that the set of emails stored in the inbox of the previous service provider is not available automatically on the new set of emails created with Yahoo!. This is because, the email ids might be similar but the emails are actually hosted with a different service provider. If you intend to retain your original set of emails, you will have to forward the same to the Yahoo! email account before closing your account with the previous email service provider.

Make changes with your existing registrar

Every domain name is registered with a registrar. Corresponding to each domain there is also a name-server entry maintained by the registrar. The name-server entry indicates where to look for the content and web pages associated with this domain. This would typically be with a hosting service provider.

Note: Whether or not a customer has a web hosting account with a web hosting service provider, there is still a name-server entry associated with the registrar corresponding to a domain.

After completing the steps described previously, you must, as a customer of Yahoo! Web Hosting Plan, change the name-server entry associated with the domain name. This must be done with the registrar and is outside of Yahoo!'s purview. The name server entry at the registrar end must be changed to the following:

1. Primary Name-server: yns21.yahoo.com
2. Secondary Name-server: yns20.yahoo.com

Until this change in the name server entry is made, typing a domain name in the browser will continue to fetch the web pages from the old web hosting account. The web pages from Yahoo! Web Hosting Plan will not be picked up.

The change can be done in two ways. You must contact your registrar to find out which method is supported by the registrar.

1. Method I: Offline Process
   The following are the steps to make changes at the registrar end:
   1. Identify the registrar of your domain.
      1. If the domain information is publicly available, then the domain registrar and other domain details can be accessed through http://www.whois.net
      2. If the domain information is not available on whois.net it implies that at the time of purchase of the domain, the customer chose to keep the information private. In that case, the customer must have stored this information himself.
   2. Contact your registrar
   3. Provide the domain name to the registrar and change name server entries to:
      1. Primary Name-server: yns21.yahoo.com
      2. Secondary Name-server: yns20.yahoo.com
   4. Confirm with the registrar the time required for the change to come into effect. In a normal case it may happen in a few hours and the worst case scenario would be 72 hours.
   5. It is extremely critical that the customer does not do away with his previous hosting account or the web content till the name-server change at the registrar end is confirmed. This is to ensure that there is no down time for his website.
2. Method II: Online Process
   This involves using an online interface, if provided by the registrar, to make the required changes at the registrar end. The following are the steps to make changes at the registrar end:
   1. Identify the registrar of your domain.
      1. If the domain information is publicly available, then the domain registrar and other domain details can be accessed through http://www.whois.net
      2. If the domain information is not available on whois.net it implies that at the time of purchase of the domain, the customer chose to keep the information private. In that case, the customer must have stored this information himself.
   2. Contact the registrar and get the auth-code for the domain. The auth-code serves as a password for accessing the online tool provided by the registrar. The auth-code is generated at the time of registering the domain and remains as long as the domain is active. Also understand from the registrar as to where these changes must be made on the registrar's tool or control panel.
   3. Log into the control panel or tool provided by the registrar and change the name server entries associated with the domain to the following:
      1. Primary Name-server: yns21.yahoo.com
      2. Secondary Name-server: yns20.yahoo.com
3. Confirm with the registrar the time required for the change to come into effect. In a normal case it may happen in a few hours and the worst case scenario would be 72 hours.