Why your agency should hand you the keys

Most small businesses find out who owns their website the day they try to leave their agency. The domain is registered to a freelancer who has moved on. The hosting is on an account nobody can log into. The code was never handed over, if it exists at all.

None of this is malicious. It is just the default when an agency sets things up quickly in its own accounts. It is also easy to avoid.

What "owned" means

• The domain is registered at a registrar (Namecheap, Cloudflare, Google) in an account you control, with your card on file for renewals.
• The code lives in a GitHub organization or account you own. The agency has access; you can remove it.
• Hosting (Vercel, Netlify, AWS) is on your account. The agency is a collaborator.
• Email sending, analytics and ad accounts are created under your business, with the agency added as a manager.

What to ask before you sign

Ask three questions: "Whose name will the domain be in?", "Where will the code live?", and "If we stop working together tomorrow, what do we lose access to?" A good agency answers all three without hesitation. If the answer to the last one is anything other than "nothing", keep looking.

Why we work this way

It removes a reason for clients to stay that has nothing to do with the work. We would rather be kept because the site is fast and the automations run than because leaving is a hassle.