There are millions of websites online and if you type the URL of any of them, the site pertaining to it will be displayed in your browser. Let's see what stands behind the process of being able to view a website that was created on a single computer somewhere around the world.
Each website has its domain or sub-domain - domain.com, or forum.domain.com, for example. As this is nothing but a name, what you need to bring a domain online is a web hosting account. In simple words, this is the disk space on the servers belonging to your hosting provider, but in reality, this is a set of services that allow you to manage your website files and to create emails and databases.
Each domain name has a number of different records that show where the website it pertains to is located, which server handles emails created with it and so on. All these records can be set individually, or they can all be set to point to a particular hosting company by modifying the so-called name servers of the domain. For example, if you have domain.com and its name servers are dns1.ntchosting.com and dns2.ntchosting.com, all website traffic and emails will be handled by NTCHosting.com. To have the website with one company and the emails with another, then you have to edit specific records called A and MX records. Both the domain registrar and the hosting provider will have an easy-to-use tool to view and change these individual records. The name servers, however, can be changed only on the side of the registrar company.
When a domain name is added as "hosted" in an account and it points to this particular company, every time you type www.domain.com in your browser, you will be redirected to the servers belonging to this specific company. From there on, their system will know in which account the domain is, so you will see the website files located there. Being directed to the right company is possible because all hosting and Internet providers around the world keep DNS information about each domain name - this includes name servers, A, MX and other records.
Hosting your domain name and website allows you to do a number of different things - either through a Control Panel tool, or through a Secure Shell console. You can create folders, upload and download files via FTP connection, move and edit them. It is also easy to create and manage email accounts with your domain name, which is crucial if this is a company website. For script-driven sites, you can create databases that are managed through a tool within the Control Panel. Some providers like NTC Hosting offer a number of scripts and an online website builder, which are included in each and every web hosting plan that they offer, so with a single hosting plan you can get everything you need to create a website from scratch and to bring it online. Since everything is done through a browser, you do not need any previous experience or coding skills.
Usually, detailed statistics are available within the Control Panel tool for each domain name hosted in the account. In this way, you can see how many people visit your website, what site they came from and if they used a search engine - what words they used in their search. This will give you an idea where visitors and potential customers come from, so you can expand your services in this region, or you can concentrate on promoting your website in other regions to make it more popular there.