There are many DNS records which can be associated to your domain. The most popular records are explained below.

1. A record
   The A record, also called the "address record", is the most important part of the DNS record. It is used to link your domain to its corresponding IP Address.
   
   
2. CNAME record
   A CNAME record, or canonical name record, makes one domain name an alias of another. The aliased domain gets all the subdomains and DNS records of the original. Often the one computer has multiple functions such as a web server, an ftp server, and also a mail server. Aliases allow a single host computer to appear to be multiple host computers.
   
   For example, the host xyz.com.au may be a web server and mail server. So two CNAME records can be defined:
   “www.xyz.com.au” = “xyz.com.au” and 
   "mail.xyz.com.au" = "xyz.com.au"
   
   
3. NS record
   An NS record, or name server record, maps a domain name to a list of DNS servers for that domain. It is used to delegate control of your domain to a specified DNS server. For example, if you have your own server running DNS, you might want to create the NS records ns1.yourdomain.com and ns2.yourdomain.com to point to your server.
   
   Each primary and secondary name server should be declared through this record. If you obtain secondary name services from an Internet service provider, be sure to insert the appropriate NS records.
   
   
4. MX record
   MX records, or mail exchange records, identify mail exchange servers for the domain. These servers are responsible for processing or forwarding mail within the domain.
   
   When sending an e-mail to "help(at)marlindomains.com", your mail server must first look up the MX record for "marlindomains.com" to see which mail server actually handles mail for "marlindomains.com" (this could be "mail.marlindomains.com" - or someone else's mail server like "mail.isp.com"). Then it looks up the A record for the mail server to connect to its IP address.
   
   
5. TXT record
   Text (TXT) records provide up to 255 characters of free form text to be linked to a domain name. TXT record may contain any information that the owner wants to be accessible on DNS server. TXT records linked with domain names are widely used in Sender Policy Framework (SPF) anti-spam solution.
   

Protect your web presence
Have you considered registering your .com, .com.au, .net.au, .co.nz variants of your domain? The deciding factor usually depends on how serious you are about Protecting Your Online Value. Ask yourself whether it would disturb you if a competitor registered these domains? Our easy to use and reliable Web and Email Forwarding services allow you to point as many domains as you want to your website.

Web with benefits:
Another benefit of registering multiple domains is the greater probability of being located on Search Engine listings. An interesting fact is that many Search Engines now feature region specific searches. You can perform a generic search, or you can select the 'Search Australia Only' option.

How the search works is simple; an 'Australian Only' search may prioritise addresses that end in '.au'; a 'New Zealand Only' search may prioritise addresses that end in '.nz'. To guarantee your website is listed and accessed by both regions you will need to have both domain names registered.

In contrast to the above, neither the '.au' nor the '.nz' domains will stand a chance of competing against the '.com', or rather the TLD name space, if someone submits a generic search with no regions specified.

If you currently conduct business in other countries, or one day plan to expand then we recommend securing your country specific domains now.