Do I Own My Website?

It usually happens when a business tries to leave the company that built its website. The domain turns out to be registered in the agency’s name. The site is on a platform it can’t be moved from. The code is licensed, not sold. Or the login details were never handed over and nobody’s answering the phone. None of this is unusual, and all of it is avoidable if you know what to ask. This guide explains the four things that make up a website, who typically owns each, and what to check before you sign anything.

The four parts of a website

A website isn’t one thing. It’s four, and they can be owned by four different people.

The domain name. Your address: yourbusiness.co.uk. It’s registered with a domain registrar, and whoever’s name is on the registration controls it. If that’s your agency, they can in principle point it anywhere, let it expire, or refuse to transfer it.

The hosting. The server the site lives on. You rent this, usually monthly or yearly. You don’t own a server, but you should own the account with the hosting company, or at least have the right to take your site off it.

The code and design. The theme, the templates, the custom functionality, the design files. This is the part most often licensed rather than sold. If the agency built a theme and keeps the rights, you may be able to use it but not take it elsewhere or change it without them.

The content. The words, photos, videos and logo. Usually yours if you supplied them, and usually yours once paid for if the agency produced them, but it depends on the contract. Photography in particular is often licensed, with the photographer keeping the copyright.

Who owns what, under the usual arrangements

Agency-built site. Varies enormously, which is the point of this guide. The good ones hand you everything on payment. Others keep the domain, the theme or the hosting account, sometimes without meaning anything sinister by it; it’s just how they set things up. Either way, you need to know.

Platform-built site (Wix, Squarespace, Shopify and similar). You own your content and your domain if you registered it. You don’t own the site itself in any portable sense; it only works on that platform. Leave, and you start again. That’s a fair trade for the convenience as long as you know it going in.

DIY WordPress. You own everything if you set up the hosting and domain yourself, which is one of the reasons WordPress is popular with businesses that want control.

The warning signs in a contract

• Monthly “website rental” or “website as a service” fees with no purchase option. You’re paying forever and own nothing.
• The agency registers the domain “on your behalf” without specifying whose name goes on it.
• Wording about a “licence to use” the site rather than ownership of it.
• No mention of what happens when you leave, or a clause saying the site stays with the agency.
• No handover of logins, or admin access that’s “available on request”.
• Exit fees, or a transfer fee for the domain.

None of these is necessarily a scam. Some are perfectly legitimate business models. But they should be in plain sight and you should be choosing them, not discovering them.

What to ask before you sign

1. Will the domain be registered in my name, with my email address as the contact?
2. Once I’ve paid, do I own the site, the design, the code and the content outright?
3. If I leave, can I take the whole site to another host or developer, and will you help me do it?
4. Will I have full admin access from launch?
5. Is any of the content or photography licensed rather than owned, and what are the terms?
6. What are the notice periods and are there any fees to leave?

If the answers aren’t clear and in writing, keep asking until they are.

How to check what you own right now

Look up your domain on a WHOIS service (for .uk domains, Nominet’s lookup) and see whose name is on it. Log into your hosting account, or find out who can. Ask your agency for the admin login to the site and the FTP or hosting login, and see what comes back. Read the original contract, if you can find it. An hour’s checking now saves a very bad week later.

How it works with us

Once a project is paid for, the website, the design and the content are yours. Your domain is registered in your name from the start, not ours. You have admin access from launch. Hosting and maintenance run month to month with 30 days’ notice, and if you ever leave, we hand everything over properly and help with the move. We’d rather keep clients because the work is good than because the paperwork makes leaving hard.