BlackMagnoliaDesign.com

Web Hosting FAQ

Part 1

What do I look for in a hosting company ?

This is the one of the singular most common yet important question.

The main reason is that web masters are comparing all the WRONG Specifications with different hosting companies as nearly two thirds of what is usually offered is totally not useful to webmaster.

The most common things to look for when you are hosting a small business or personal site are :

1. Email accounts

Try to give every employees you currently have within your office, including future personal explanation plans.

2. Easy & Quick Setup

Should be less than 5 hours, as some company take up to 48 hours to set

up a new account.

3. Sufficient Data Transfer

This is the most misunderstood specifications of web hosting, technically

speaking most sites just only need about 1 GB. Yes, I know what you are thinking, that’s right !

4. Uptime Guarantee

This is very important. If they aren’t offering it, they can’t guarantee it which is a bad sign.

A 98% Uptime Guarantee or above is deem to be average.

5. Sufficient Disk Storage Space

Most sites only need up to 50 MB, so don’t be greedy or are enticed by the seller providing over the top storage as you won’t need it & are just paying for nothing !)

6. 24/7 Live Support

Good to have, but not necessary if you are just beginning to built your website empire as you will have to pay more for this, but it comes in real handy if you site is down !

Live chat usually works just as good as phone support.

Can I switch hosting companies if I don’t like their services ?

YES, off course. Who is there to stop you from do so ?

Unfortunately, there are many people whom do not realize how easy it is to switch hosting companies.

All you have to do is re-publish your site to the new address for the new hosting company. Most hosting companies will give you your new IP address where you can publish your site in as little as 10-20 minutes !

Just publish your site, and don’t forget to update your name servers. This just means that you will have to go to the company where you purchased your domain name, and put in the name servers that the new hosting company have.

Your domain name will point to your new hosting account in about 24 – 48 hours. Also, you will need to create your new email addresses at the new hosting company. That’s it !

So, don’t feel like you are stuck with a bad hosting company.

Because you’re not.

Do I have to buy my domain name with my hosting account ?

No & Yes.

No, you can buy your domain name anytime. So, don’t loose the domain name you want just because you are researching hosting companies. Buy that now.

But, don’t pay more than $20/year since that is the average price these days.

Yes, if you have not initially purchase it already. If you purchase domain name & hosting account together, some company whom offered both these services may at their own discretion provide a better deals or discount.

So it really depends on what you want to do.

A wide variety of webhosting services are available as choices but not each of them has the same capacities or facilities. Thus, it is very crucial to specify the needs or requiements to the kind of webhosting service that is applicable for use. It is mandatory that your hosting service is apportion to the needs of your client. Otherwise, you may end up in having a high traffic in your web site and such cannot be maintained by your server. Once you’ve attenuated your specifications, the next course of action is to find the web service and type of plan that is best suited for you.

Shared Hosting is a service wherein a number of websites are hosted on a single web server. As the definition connotes, this Shared Hosting service involves sharing space with other clients. Shared Hosting is cost effective and procurable in a lot of ways. This service is one with the cheapest option, so typically the service does not come with extra applications. One of the main problems with hosting on a shared server is the fact that the number of features and technologies available to you will be limited. So if your site is running on a low traffic, shared hosting can do the job for you, but if the site eventually accumulates viewers of numerous quantity, then a great problem lies ahead of you. And when this comes, you should consider taking in a dedicated web hosting.

For dedicated web hosting service, the client will have to use only one server (an opposite of Shared Hosting), which is owned by the hosting company and will be leased on a monthly fee and includes a bandwidth. Here you are on the house to use all available resources since you solely manage and run the server. Thus, installation of software is all at your discretion. Modification of the configuration of the server is also admissible in order to comply with the needs of your company. Creation of different web sites can also be done here and this would alleviate the cost of this kind of web hosting. Generally, your plan of actions here are infinite.

In managed hosting service, the user has his own server, but they are not allowed to have full control over it. The only access that they have is through FTP where they can manage their own data or by the use of other tools that allow remote management. The reason for the allowance of full control is so that the provider can guarantee quality service by not allowing the modification of the server and consequently produce configuration problems.

Ultimately, the kind of service or application that you are planning to put up will to a great extent contingent on the kind of web hosting service that you will put up. With the information given, try to accumulate all the resources that you have, eliminate unnecessary details, collate all options possible and finally choose the best application appropriate to your use. Lay all the cards, analyze it and decide.

© Thom Mia