A website feels like one thing. Underneath, it is usually several accounts with different providers, renewal dates and owners. Most of the time that doesn’t matter. It matters a lot on the day a renewal fails, a supplier disappears or you want to change who looks after the site.
This is a short exercise you can do in an afternoon. The result is a one-page map that tells you who controls what.
The pieces most websites depend on.
- Domain name. Registered with a registrar. Whoever controls this account controls where your address points.
- DNS. Often at the registrar, sometimes elsewhere. It connects the domain to your website and your email.
- Hosting or platform. A hosting account, or a subscription to a builder or hosted CMS where the site lives.
- Code and content. A repository, a theme, a project in an AI builder — whatever holds the thing that was built.
- Connected services. Form handling, email sending, booking, payments, analytics, maps, chat.
Not every website has all of these as separate accounts. A hosted builder may combine hosting, platform and content in one subscription. A custom site may split them across four providers. That difference is exactly why the map is useful.
How to check each one.
For every piece, write down four things: the provider, the account holder, the email used to log in and the renewal date. If you don’t know, a few quick checks help:
- Search your inbox for renewal invoices and “welcome” emails from providers.
- Ask the person or agency who built the site for a list of accounts they created.
- Look at the domain’s public registration record for the registrar’s name.
- Check which card or company pays for each service.
Red flags worth fixing now.
- The domain is registered to a former employee, freelancer or agency.
- Nobody in the business can log in to the hosting or platform.
- The code exists only on one developer’s computer or inside a personal account.
- Renewals are paid on a personal card that could expire or be cancelled.
- You can’t tell where enquiries from the contact form are sent.
None of these is unusual, and most are easy to fix while relationships are friendly. Ask for the account to be transferred to the business, or for the business to be added as an owner, and confirm it worked.
AI-built websites need the same map.
If your site was created with an AI builder, the project often lives inside that tool’s account. Check whether you can export the code or content, connect your own domain, and invite a collaborator. Those answers decide how easily someone else can maintain or extend the site later.
A builder is not a problem in itself. Knowing what you control — and what the vendor controls — lets you plan maintenance and development realistically.
Keep the map current.
Store the map somewhere the business can always reach, and update it whenever a service is added or a person with access leaves. Review it once a year alongside the domain renewal.
When we take on a website at SiteComfy, building this map is one of the first steps of the handover. If you’d like help untangling who owns what, tell us about your website.
