I'm a sysadmin by day and provide managed services for a few small companies on the side. These businesses have 1 to 5 employees and rely on me for tasks like email setup, software licensing, and hardware configuration. I'm looking to venture into web hosting as well. Currently, some of my clients' domains are all under one Namecheap account with their DNS in a Cloudflare account, while a few are in their own individual accounts. What's the best practice here?
On one hand, managing everything in one account is easier for me, and I could include the costs in my bill. However, clients with their own accounts handle their payments, which can be beneficial for me, but it led to a recent outage when their payment method expired. Many of my clients don't care much about domain control, but I want to know whether it's better for them to have their own accounts—or if it would be easier for everyone to have everything centralized under my management?
5 Answers
I recommend using separate Namecheap accounts for each client, but give yourself access as an admin. This way, they technically own the domains, which is important. You could also set up a group email list to keep both you and your clients in the loop whenever there are updates or changes. By the way, client domains can’t be registered to you; they should always list their information on the registration.
Absolutely! Just make sure to keep those login details safe for your clients, so they can take control if needed.
Honestly, you'll save yourself a lot of hassle in the future by setting up individual accounts now. It simplifies things when transferring domains later on. Just keep track of the login details in a password manager for easy access.
Exactly! It definitely would have made my life easier when one of my client’s businesses changed owners recently—having their own account would have streamlined everything.
Every client should have their own account that they control, but you can link them to your management account for convenience. Namecheap makes this pretty straightforward with sub-account billing options.
Wait, so when I create a new Namecheap account for a client, I need to use an email? Should I use one of my emails temporarily? I’m just unsure about how to set it up if they don't have a domain yet.
Managing multiple registrars can be a hassle. I’d suggest setting up two custom nameservers under your domain and having each client use these, so you can centrally manage their DNS while keeping them as domain owners.
Bottom line, the clients should fully own their domains—no exceptions. It’s crucial for their independence and security.
Thanks for that! It sounds like a solid plan. So you're saying that the client should have an email using their domain for the Namecheap account? And for payments, it doesn't matter if I handle them individually?