Choosing a web host is as important as the content you will put on the site itself. The success of your site will, to a large extent, depend on the versatility of your web host. In this guide, we take a look at services provided by web hosting companies and the features website owners should consider when making a choice.
A web host is a company that provides space to keep your files so they can be viewed across the internet. Most companies charge a fee for such services, and the amount charged will vary from company to company. It would be mostly dependent on the kind of services you are seeking from the firm and the length of time. A month at a time is the most common.
Information about your website is kept on computers called servers. These servers are high speed machines that are capable of delivering web pages to your site visitors faster than ordinary home PCs can.
The web host will price its services accordingly to the length of time the service is been offered to the website owner. Periods are usually calculated on a monthly basis, though a few charge annual fees. Each fee will correspond to a set of features as requested by the client.
The price of each item will depend on the level of sophiscation of the service. For example, if you wanted a security or e-commerce service, your price will be higher than someone who just wanted a place to keep files. Running a website requires shopping cart activities will is more costly than ordinary web space.
You do not own the equipment from which the hosting service is delivered to you, you only rent the space. When you quit the service, the same space will be allocated to another buyer.
The prices, features and characteristics of the web host are usually all displayed at their website. On many occasions you will find a table that spells out the various services, differences, similarities and points that help the customer make a choice.
So, given the jobs that web hosts do, how do we choose one that will best meet our needs? There is no simple answer to this question. Our choice will depend on so many things, including the kind of site we are hosting, our budget and the technology used to create the site. Notwithstanding these peculiarities, web hosts must be able to provide bottom-line services irrespective of your individual needs. The next topics take a look at the issues we must take note of when selecting a web host for our website.
Bandwidth Allotment
Bandwidth is the amount of traffic allocated to a website. It is also called data transfer. As users visit and leave your website, they create traffic. This traffic represents wear and tear on the web host equipment so they charge website users accordingly. The more traffic you have for your website, the more bandwidth you will need. Sites that offer heavy applications such as chat, forum, software download and video uploads and download would have to get very high bandwidth.
As you may see from Figure 1, higher bandwidth makes a site more versatile and therefore costs more.
If you have a small site but anticipate future growth,
you should go for a hosting plan that allows you to upgrade to a higher bandwidth service.
Bandwidth is very important in website management.
It is essential that you buy the right amount to keep your site running at all times.
Every web host must offer a control panel. You will need this feature to administer your website, and at the same time, run essential services for your website. If a web host does not offer this feature, you would have to find another one that does. The reason is quite simple - the control panel ensures that you are able to manage your site and do edits on them in a fraction of time. Many laborious tasks such as assigning emails and installing third party programs such as Wordpress are facilitated with a control panel. No site owner can effectively run his website without a control panel. You definitely need a versatile control panel in order to make a successful website.
Email accounts
Every website needs email. You will need to put up a professional image and a domain based email is one way to do that. You will put up a more credible front if you have an email address based on your website instead if a free one like yahoo.
Again, you will need to have different email address for various segments of your website. If you run an e-commerce website for example, the customer service, sales, tech assistance and webmaster would need their own emails, so that issues related to each department are resolved quickly and conveniently.
Ultimately your web host must provide an elaborate email service so you can be able to administer your website with ease.
Aside from this, you will need to undertake several email operations of which the majority are reviewed here.
Email forwarding is something your webs host must offer. This service will enable you to receive your domain based email at your personal email. For example if your email address is sales@hosting.com, then when customers send you emails, you will get it at jolie@yahoo.com. You will have the added convenience of looking at your corporate emails in your old and frequently used mailbox.
Choosing a webs host requires that you take an appraisal of your website, the technology used to create it, your web page ele ments and your future growth. You will also have to make room for emerging technologies and web trends. All of these scenarios require that you choose a web hosting provider with utmost care.
You will have to first compile a list of all hosts that meet your need and then sift them down to the one that best meets your need at the least price. In determining your ultimate choice, you are considering several factors, such as customer response time, reputation, server uptime guarantee, security and reliability. You are going to choose a host that will give you value for money and at the same time make you retain your hard won customers.
You are going to look beyond the rhetoric of the web hosts. You are looking beyond their marketing gimmicks and rather applying all circumspection to make a wise choice. As part of your due process, you will want to visit forums which review web hosts and read about comments or complaints previous customer have about your prospective host.
You do not expect your website to run into trouble, but from time to time you may need the support of your host. Are they readily available? Does it take weeks to receive feedback from them? Which host will immediately resolve your issues? What tools do they have to address your complaints? Does the service provider offer its clients a web based chat where clients can quickly access technical support? Are they reachable by phone? You will have to consider all these features in your selection of a web host.
Be careful about sites that offer extremely low charges. Many times they are resellers or web hosts providing the service from their garages. They may not be able to guarantee the essential uptime and back up services you need for your site.
He is a fan of hostgator and 1&1 for hosting. They are very economical and offer much in fun extras. Go to http://secure.hostgator.com/cgi-bin/affiliates/clickthru.cgi?id=rockgold
for Hostgator and http://www.1and1.com/?k_id=25298423 for 1&1 Hosting.
Rocky Mcdaniel is an internet marketer living in Memphis, Tn.
