Why would you want to transfer ownership of your website you might ask?
If you’re selling your holiday rental business – whether you’re a single property owner, or an agency managing several properties – you may agree with the new owners that they take over the existing website as well.
But with all the legalities and organisation that goes along with any sale, it can be easy to overlook the slightly more trivial elements.
Forgetting to handover important information such as login details, may result in the new owners having a hard time accessing the site or renewing any subscriptions to ensure it remains visible online.
So, as part of the sales process, remember these five steps when handing over your holiday rental website ownership:
Step 1. Transfer ownership of the domain name
This process is often free and relatively straight-forward. However, there are two possibilities:
Option 1. The new owner creates an account with the same domain name provider as you.
In this case, all you need to do, is login to your account and follow the steps outlined by your provider to transfer ownership of the domain name to the new owner under the same domain provider.
If there are no obvious steps, contact your domain name provider and they should be able to help you.
Once you’ve completed the transfer process, the new owner should receive an email with instructions on how to confirm the move.
This is the simplest option.
Option 2. The new owner decides that they want to use a different domain name provider.
This is otherwise called a Registrant Transfer and is a little lengthier to complete.
Some registrars may be able to complete the transfer for you. Nominet (the UK Domain Registry) provide a list that you can check here.
If your domain name provider is shown as Accredited, you can contact them to see if they will complete the transfer for you.
If not, for a small fee you can start the process yourself by creating an account with Nominet’s Online Services and going through the steps entailed.
Step 2. Transfer ownership of the website
This transfer of ownership depends on the platform used to create and manage your website.
For PromoteMyPlace customers, it’s a very straight forward process:
- Log in to you PromoteMyPlace account
- Head into the My Account section and change the password to a new temporary password – unless you’re happy for your password to be given to the new owner.
- Provide the new owner with the temporary password.
- In the same section – My Account – enter the new owners email address. At this stage a re-activation email will be sent to the new owner – so make sure you get their email address right. Once logged in, the new owner can then go ahead and change the password to something of their choosing.
Note: With PromoteMyPlace websites, it’s possible to have one email for your account and a different one for your enquiry notifications. We therefore recommend new owners taking over a PromoteMyPlace website, check the enquiries email address and change if needed.
Step 3. Transfer ownership of any email accounts specific to the holiday let
If you have an email address associated with the holiday rental website and have agreed to give it to the new owners, you’ll need to transfer ownership of that as well.
A mailbox through your domain name provider will automatically get transferred at the same time as the domain name. However, you will still need to handover passwords associated with the mailbox so the new owners are able to connect them to their preferred email client.
Alternatively, you may have a Gmail address in place – seabreezeholidayrental@gmail.com – or one from another free email provider such as Hotmail or Yahoo.
If so, all you need to do is change the password on the email account. Enter a temporary password and share it with the new owner. They can then login and change the password to something more confidential.
Just remember, often there are recovery processes set up on email accounts – whereby an SMS text or email is sent for forgotten passwords or when signing in from a new IP address – change those over to the new owner as well.
Step 4. Transfer ownership of any social media accounts associated with the rental
If the holiday let has an active Facebook, Twitter or any other social media profile, it’s a good idea to transfer ownership of these as well.
1. Facebook
First, the new owner must have a Facebook account and have ‘liked’ the Facebook business page.
Assuming they have, follow these instructions:
- Log in to your Facebook page, then head to Manage Pages
- Open up your holiday rental business page
- Click on Settings, then Page Roles
- Enter the email address of the person you want to add. NB: this needs to be the email address they signed up to Facebook with
- Set the level to Admin
- Then remove yourself. NB: you may need to demote your role to Editor in order to remove yourself
2. Twitter
All that’s required here is to change your password to a new temporary password and share it with the new owner.
Then, if the email address on your Twitter account is different to the one associated with the property (which you are handing over) you will need to change it to the new owner’s email address.
They can then log in and change the password to one they’d prefer.
Step 5. Transfer Google Analytics and Webmaster Tools data
The final step is not essential.
The new owner could setup their own accounts, but they would not be able to see past data.
But if Google Analytics has been tracking data for a period of time already, it would be beneficial to the new owner to be able to assess the website’s performance up to now.
To transfer this data, the new owner needs to have their own Google Account.
Assuming they do, you can add them as an owner, then remove yourself from the property.
More information can be found on Google’s Support Forum here.
So remember, when selling your holiday let business, don’t forget to transfer ownership of:
- Domain name
- Website
- Emails
- Social media accounts
- Google Analytics & Webmaster Tools
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