Good Web Site Hosting

  Finding a Good Cheap Web Host

Finding a Good Low-Budget Host

Web Hosting Service Provides offer a broad range of services and also differ in the quality of service provided. They also differ in Pricing for the same set of services. Due to increased competition, you have a large number of Web Hosting providers to choose from.

Ascertaining Web Hosting Requirements

The first step before choosing a Web Hosting Provider is to ascertain your requirements. Your Webmaster or Web Designer will be in a position to help you quantify this. Following are some of the things you should consider:

a) What is the purpose of the Website? Is it a company brochure? Do you have a catalogue of products and services to present on the Internet?

b) Do you wish to sell the products online by accepting Credit Card and other forms of payment online?

d)Do you have a need for large number of E-mail Accounts?

e) Do you have a special application to be hosted? Is this a standard application available off the shelf?

f) Do you need a large amount of Disk Space to store images and multimedia files?

g) Do you need a way to stream audio and video to your users?

h) Do you intend to provide live online help?

i) Do you have a large volume of content where you wish to insert commercial advertisements?

j) Do you foresee a large number of visitors requiring highly reliable and fast Internet bandwidth?

After you have answered most of these questions, you should start investigating the Web Hosting providers who can meet your requirements at a reasonable price.

Choosing the Best Web Hosting Service Provider

There are several ways to research a Web Hosting Service Provider. Here are some tips for you:

a) Take a look at the various Directories of Web Hosting service providers available online and short list them based on your requirements. Initially, always short list only those who meet all your requirements, because any one requirement could be crucial for your website.

b) Look at some of the directory sites that host applications of the kind that you intend to use online. For instance, you can look at a Directory of Real Estate companies and investigate the web hosting service provider utilized by some of the top Real Estate companies. These web hosting companies may already have dealt with any special requirements for a particular industry.

c) If you are looking for a special type of hosting - like .NET hosting on Windows 2003 Server, then it is easier to just search for them in a search engine. Also look for advertisements on sites dedicated to these technologies.

d) After you have short listed the service providers, ask them questions about your requirements and ensure that they can meet all the requirements. Also ask them to suggest a good plan for you. Look around for similar plans of other companies and then settle on a Web Hosting Service Provider.

More Web Hosting Requirements

One good place to start looking for a Web Hosting Service Provider is your ISP who provides you Internet Access. They have a technical team who are able to direct you to the best web hosting service provider.

Choosing the right host is an important aspect in lowering your web hosting costs. The web hosting industry, boasting several thousand web hosts, is still young and growing at a remarkable pace; hence finding the right host is not only difficult, but very time consuming; fortunately though it is worth the time and effort. There are a few things to keep in mind when exploring; when deciding to form a partnership with the host. Below are just a few things to consider, which directly attribute to final cost.

Disk Space — Knowing how much web space your web site needs and compensating for a bit extra, for growth. For example, if your web site needs 200 MB of disk space, look for the plan which offers at least 250 to 300 MB of web space; this will prevent a large unexpected bill at the end of the month when high priced costs, charged by most web hosts for extra disk space usage, are added on to your bill. As a rule of thumb, an average web site should cost you no more than $1 per 10 MB

Bandwidth — Figure out how much bandwidth (data transfer) your web site uses. As above, ensure you get more bandwidth than your site uses. For example, if your website uses 8GB bandwidth per month, then choose a plan, which offers at least 8 or 10GB bandwidth per month. This again will prevent 'spikes' of over usage, leading to higher extra costs. As a reference, an average web site should pay no more than $3 per GB for bandwidth usage.

Block buying — Ask the web host if they have "block buying" facilities for purchasing projected extra disk space or bandwidth. But, be careful, if your web site needs only 2 GB extra bandwidth, you may have to buy an extra package in blocks of 5GB bandwidth; in this case, look for the host which will allow you to purchase extra disk space and bandwidth allowance as per your needs, this is crucial to cost savings.

Note: Ensure that you know the over-usage allowance rules; you need to know what happens if your web site uses more disk space or bandwidth than you have been allocated. The web host who informs you of possible over-usage well in advance, allowing you to take measures to reduce or budget for extra usage, is 'worth their weight in gold'.

Number of web sites — if you have more than one web site, sign up an account with a web host who provides multiple domains hosted on one account; this will work out a lot cheaper than an account per website.

A good tip would be to ask your friends and colleagues if they want to host their websites with you on one account. For example at M6.net a person or persons with 4 websites can save roughly $20 per month by signing up an M6-2, multiple hosting account.

Applications and databases — Ensure that all the applications your web site uses (FrontPage, ASP pages, databases, cgi, PHP, etc.), are supported within the chosen account type. Find out if there are any extra fees for particular applications or associated database support. For example allot of hosts charge extra set-up fees to install FrontPage, which may be avoided by choosing another host offering the same features with no extra costs.

Mail Server — Emails are the lifeblood of your online business. Ensure that you get a sufficient number of email addresses with your own domain name (preferably unlimited); these are necessary for other email features like forwarders, and auto responders, etc. There is no need to pay an extra fee for use of a mail server as many hosts offer this service now for free, within the hosting plan.

Avoid long-term contracts — Many web hosts offer huge discounts on yearly or half yearly payments in advance, this may appear a good way to go, but note how long you are locked in. If possible avoid long-term contracts until you are sure about the services and reliability offered by that particular host. Paying on a monthly basis obviously has its benefits. If there are concerns with your service encouraging you to seek a new host elsewhere, you may lose out on many months of hosting fees when breaking a yearly or half-yearly contract; but, if the necessity arises, a loss of only a few days to close a troublesome account, is preferable.

Thinking ahead with reference to an established plan of action will help you avoid most surprises, and definitely help towards cutting costs, short term or long-term. Work out your growth rate and project future expansions. Keep a good record of past and present bandwidth and web space usage, this will help to project future needs.

Savings are mostly a matter of common sense, but in this industry of high technology most people forget this rule and try to look for the best, most efficient and most expensive technical programs and software to save them a buck or two. As in most businesses good cost effective groundwork is the best start to cutting costs.