Web Site Hosting Services - How To Decide

Web Site Hosting Services - How To Decide To get a Web Site or Blog live on the internet you need a domain name and a hosting plan from one of the many web site hosting services.

Domain Name – You need to find a suitable unregistered domain name or buy an expired name. This can actually be quite time consuming but it is worth getting a name you are happy with because you will invest quite a bit of time and effort in establishing the name so changing it later is not a sensible option. You might be able to buy a domain name from your hosting company (or get a free one) but this will probably not be the cheapest option. Prices do vary so it is worth checking a few domain registration sites. It is normally easy to link your hosting company’s nameservers to a domain name registered elsewhere.

Hosting Plan – This will give you space on a server, to load your web site, with a fast connection to the internet. You will access the server over the internet using FTP to load your pages, images etc. Email on your domain will also be included allowing multiple (or unlimited) email addresses, possibly with a webmail service. Your control panel will also usually include lots of other tools for building your site, accessing it, managing domains and databases, statistical reporting and much more. In fact more than you are ever likely to use!

There are a lot of companies selling web site hosting services so it is not simple to pick the right service for you. It is worth looking at sites like webhostingtalk.com or hostjury.com but generally hosting review sites are not a great deal of help as there is no consistency and many are not as independent as they may appear.

It is not a good plan to simply find the cheapest service but nor it there any point in paying more than you need. Basic shared website hosting plans involve hosting multiple users on one server and whilst this is fine in most cases, servers can be overloaded or other users can do things that affect you. There are three key things to look for: Quick Loading Times – Your pages and posts must display swiftly otherwise your site will offer a poor user experience and they will not revisit.

Site Availability – A guarantee of at least 99.9% uptime should be given. Any downtime is damaging as your web site will be offline and you will lose visitors maybe permanently.

Customer Support - If urgent problems occur you will need assistance immediately.

You should therefore look for 24/7/365 telephone support (as well as email support).

The best way to assess the above is to seek the opinions of existing users. Can your friends recommend the service they use, if not you will have to search online for independent user feedback. Do not be diverted by promises of “unlimited” resources as this is really meaningless but if you anticipate your site is likely to become very busy you should seek a hosting company that offers Virtual Private Server Hosting and Dedicated Server Hosting so that you see an upgrade path for the future. If you plan on selling from your web site you should also consider the additional eCommerce features on offer.