Web hosting is exactly what the name implies; hosting your site on the world wide web. A www-host differs itself from any competition by focusing on certain aspects, such as limited down-time, minimal interference, and larger amounts of bandwidth.
Along with those three concepts, we will focus on some of the important features you should take into consideration when choosing a web host.
If your web hosting service does not notify you of planned outages, you should change. A professional service needs to do some maintenance on their servers and be able to plan when your site will be done. If you never receive this kind of notification, look for another service who communicates with their clients.
Avoid choosing the cheapest web-hosting service out there, and certainly think long and hard before you go with a free one. If you are running a business online, your reputation can be severely damaged if you choose an unreliable hosting service. In addition, the free ones will often have advertisements that make it obvious you are not willing to pay for a basic service that is important to your livelihood.
If at all possible, choose a web host that has 24-hour customer service via telephone. The larger hosting services often provide this valuable service. You do not want to be working late at night and find that are experiencing technical difficulties. Call them before you sign up, and test the level of expertise of the agents, and whether or not they can give simple instructions that are easy to understand.
Take the time to research web hosts on the internet or on specific blogs. Then narrow down your first few choices. There are far too many web hosts, to do research on every one. But, by researching a short list of hosts you can avoid all the pitches and gimmicks that many of the hosts will try to sell you on.
Make sure that you understand the difference between managed and un-managed web hosting. Those that are managed can be invaluable to you if you are not an expert yourself on the intricacies of maintaining a website. You will want to choose a managed one who has excellent availability of technical support teams.
Good customer support is essential to any web host. If something goes wrong or your website is not working, it’s important that you have someone to contact who can help you with the problems immediately and get them taken care of. Inquire about the host’s company support options before shelling out any money.
If you wish to have more than one site, look for a web host that lets you have add-on domains. This means you will be able to store more than one site on their servers without having to open multiple accounts or paying any extra money for your different websites.
Look for a web host that provides a cPanel. A cPanel is quite user friendly and makes it simple for you to include popular applications on your site. Installing these applications is a very simple and straight-forward process. Not only that, but your website management will be more efficient.
Make sure you understand how much bandwidth you are allowed to use for web hosting. Even if you have a lot of space available to store your site, you will need a sufficient amount of bandwidth to allow people to load your site quickly and to increase your traffic. Stay away from a web host that overcharges you if you exceed your allowed bandwidth.
If a host on the world wide web is able to maintain constant, dedicated server up-time and a bandwidth cap that is beyond the reach of common procedures; they will likely acquire a few fans.
Once you’ve got the hosting situation out of the way, you can move on to the easy decisions like design and marketing!
