Overselling in Web Hosting Industry
December 18, 2009 by Web Hosting Watch
Filed under Top 10 WebHosts
What’s Overselling
Overselling is a term used in the web hosting industry to describe a situation in which a company provides hosting service that are unsustainable if every one of its customers uses the full extent of services advertised. The term is usually referred to the web space and bandwidth transfer allowance, but now has been extent to the service after the selling.
Below is an example will give you a better understanding about what’s overselling:
If web hosting company has a server with disk space 100GB, and it will host 10 web sites for different customers and promise 20GB diskspace for each, then overselling will happen.
Why Overselling
Overselling is a marketing strategy. We can use the same case in above as an example. When web hosting companies provide 20GB disk space for each customer, and only host 5 web site in one server, he will find that not all the customers have used up all 20GB space, there will be a lot of space there without being used. So, the service providers decide to take some risk, and sell more accounts in one server. What he bets on is that not all the customers will use up all the signed resource.
Is Overselling Bad?
Overselling is very common in almost all the service industry. Let’s take the telecom companies as an example. They have millions of customers, what if all the customers dial out at the same time? Can their infrastructure support so many customers? The answer is definitely NO. So, shall they upgrade their infrastruture to avoid it, the answer is NO as well since it won’t happen in the real world. So, overselling is not really bad if you can monitor the service status closely, and make sure what you provide to your customer is still in line with the service level agreement, it should be ok. And overselling will bring more profits to the companies.
I believe almost all the web hosting companies now are using overselling strategy in their business. They host thousands of web sites in one server, promise thousands of GB for each and only charge you less $10 per month. Some of companies can manage the overselling very well and are able to keep up with the serivce they have promised to their customers. But in most case, what we heard are:
Server becomes in-stable and more downtime happened on the web site:
As a web hosting company, in order to fall into the trouble brought by overselling, below are some methods which definitely should be referred to:
Summary
Overselling can help making more money without investing too much, but keeping up with the service level agreement is a key thing should not be forget in companies what to win in this marketing strategy.
Reference:
Reliable Affordable Web Hosting Review, Guide and Awards
How to build your website for online business?
December 5, 2009 by Web Hosting Watch
Filed under Setting Up Accounts
There are basic components that you need when starting your online business.
Get a Domain Name and Web hosting.
The domain name is the address of your website on the internet. Having your own domain name indicates for your visitors and potential customers that you are a serious businessman.
Depending on what you want out of your domain name, this will determine how you choose it. You will want to take out a piece of paper to write down ALL the keywords related to your Internet Business.
Your domain name must to be:
-short, simple and easy to remember,
-relevant to the product or service you’re selling,
-include keywords of your product or service to improve search engine rankings.
Next, check whether the domain name has been registered or not. If the domain name has been registered by someone else, you will have to use another domain name. Once you register a domain name, it is yours, as long as you pay the annual fee.
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http://www.workathome-makemoneyonline.eu/buildwebsite.html
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Now, you need to set up a virtual web space. You need to find a good web hosting company.
Do not be tempted by FREE hosting. The risk of your site having downtime and lousy support far outweighs whatever you can save by not having a proper hosting company. Also, this would give a bad impression to your customers. Free accounts are not for anyone even half serious about doing business on the Web. Not when you can get a perfectly acceptable commercial host for as little as $10 / month.
Most hosting companies provide a range of services, starting with low-budget packages and moving up to more advanced and expensive features. Generally, you want to make sure that your host has a fast connection to the Internet and can handle large numbers of simultaneous visits (bandwidth) to your website. And you’ll need secure server capabilities. As is the common practice now, they should be offering you a variety of related services (cgi. capabilities, ftp. accesses) and support for your business use.
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http://www.workathome-makemoneyonline.eu/builwebsite.html
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Payment Processing Systems.
The next phase of building an online business is to integrate it transaction systems. Transaction is the most important aspect of any online business! Payments with credit card are the fastest and the most efficient form of a transaction on a website. The most vital aspect of the complete transaction process is security and authentication of the transactions on your website. You should incorporate a payment system that accepts all major credit cards. After all, you wouldn’t want to lose a sale just because you do not accept a certain credit card.
Your Follow Up System.
As good as your website conversion rate may be, a big number of your prospects will not buy your products at first contact. They might want to do a comparison between your product and other people’s product, need more time to think about it, or leave your web page for whatever reason. And the truth is that we all can hardly remember where we were ten web pages ago.
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http://www.workathome-makemoneyonline.eu/buildwebsite.html
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So, you need to set up an automatic system that follows up with your prospects to continue persuading them to buy your products. A good followup system will allow you to close sales even after your prospects have left your web page.
1. Write a Series of Follow-Up Letters.
Your short newsletter must contain valuable information that is especially useful to your prospect because he would not like to be followed up on to reconsider. However, he would not mind receiving something of value to him through your newsletter, which will enable you to end with a reminder of the value of your product to him at the closing of your letter.
2. Sign Up For an Autoresponder Service.
If you’ve ever asked for information online about a product or service, or signed up for an e-list or group membership on the Internet, and received a nearly instantaneous response in your e-mail inbox, an autoresponder program was responsible for delivering the reply.
An autoresponder is a computer program that automatically sends out prewritten e-mail messages to subscribers within its data base. You can determine the sequences and intervals of each of your messages, sparing you the time to manually follow-up with your prospects.
3. Store Your Follow-Up Letters into Your Autoresponder and Set Intervals between Your Letters.
Add all of your pre-written letter templates into your auto responder system. Set your first follow-up letter to go out immediately – 0 days. This means that your prospects will receive your first letter as soon as he subscribes to your follow-up series. Your second letter may be set to go out on the 2nd day, and the third 2 days after the second letter is sent out.
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http://www.workathome-makemoneyonline.eu/buildwebsite.html
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The Importance of Web Hosting Reviews
November 27, 2009 by Web Hosting Watch
Filed under Top 10 WebHosts
Web hosting reviews contain wide selection of reviews and comments which helps a person to pick the right web hosting company. In other words, web hosting reviews are actual customer comments about specific web hosting companies which helps you to decide to purchase a great web hosting company, all by yourself. A web hosting review can be positive as well as negative. It is on this basis, you will be able to decide the right web hosting company for you.
The competition in a web hosting industry is growing and many web hosting companies are dishonest where they treat their customers in an unacceptable manner. Hence, one definitely needs to read web hosting reviews so that the level of support of web hosting companies is revealed. Web hosting reviews can be considered as a method to find honest web hosting companies. It also makes a customer aware of many other important things that a customer should know about the web hosting company. Web hosting reviews save valuable time since you as a customer would other wise spend on investigating a web hosting company which is definitely a time consuming act.
A web hosting review site can be basically termed as a place where real people have expressed their feelings about the companies with which they hosted their website. It is on their basis of their experience, you can decide on your own about choosing the web hosting company that you feel is good for you. However, let me also inform you that many web hosting reviews which talk good about a particular web hosting company by posting good ratings or are seen on top 10 or top 20 web hosting company’s lists, may not be necessary true. Are you surprise with the above mentioned statement? Well, it’s the fact. Certain low profile web hosting companies manage to be at the top because they pay to be listed there. There are web hosting companies which run their affiliate programs and offer among the highest affiliate commissions in the web hosting industry. So, such companies don’t get ranked on the basis of the quantity of service, although they claim to, but ranking is done on the basis of the size of the commission. In other words, the companies offering the highest commissions usually make it on the top list.
Now, let us come back to the positive reviews. There are many web hosting companies of which not many reviews are to be found about them. So, being big is not enough to be rated as good or one of the best. It is only when they are supported by their genuine credible reviews; a person would then like to choose that particular website.
Normally, you as a customer would not use the service of a company simply because the company is big. You would like to use a web hosting company that has happy customers. This will prove that the company actually provides what it has promised and this will create chances for you to be happy customers. Once you get to know different views of people about a particular web hosting company, you can then make your own opinion. There are also certain websites which contain only reviews of various people who have shared their experience with their web hosting companies. Now, such websites have been purely created for people to value various web hosting companies under one roof. They don’t have to spend time searching. These website contain recent credible reviews. Also, these website contains those web hosting companies which have positive reviews in the web hosting forums. So, based on what you read on this special type of website containing genuine web hosting reviews, you can go ahead to sign up to use the web hosting service of a particular web hosting company without thinking twice.
How to Choose a Web Hosting Company
November 21, 2009 by Web Hosting Watch
Filed under Setting Up Accounts
Given the sheer number of web hosting providers, making the decision as to which one to go with can become a daunting task. What many people don’t realize is that the wrong choice can introduce a “single point of failure” into your otherwise successful online business. In this articles, I will discuss some of the major factors you should consider before you make that choice.
If you have always wanted to know more about this topic, then get ready because we have all the information you can handle.
interval AND BANDWIDTH
The most usual thing people look for in a hosting source is the total of floppy storeroom cosmos and “bandwidth” vacant to them. While these are indeed important, they should not forlorn be the deciding truthors. truth is, most sources nowadays allocate more floppy cosmos and bandwidth than most people would want. As I explained in an past thing, 5-10 Gigabytes (or more) of storeroom is A LOT of storeroom. Most people will never want this greatly. If you alprompt have your website intended and prompt to go on your own notebook, plainally right-click the folder and choose properties to verify how greatly cosmos it needs. Even if you use backend databases (e.g., MySQL, MS ACCESS), the gigantic margin of sites would never come close to requiring 5GB or more. As long as the hosting sources you are considering give you that 5GB or more, you will be excellent in all but a few underdone suitarguments. If you realize you want more at a later time, make surely your source gives you an painexcluding upgrade avenue to a hosting design with a advanced allocation.
The same thing applies to bandwidth. Many, if not most, sources now give bandwidth allocatioins of 200Gb/month or more. That total would be more than adequate for most small businesses. Let’s look at an example. If each visitor to your site uses, on ordinary, 1MB of bandwidth to side through your pages, a 200GB/month bandwidth allocation would sell 200,000 visitors/month. Even if each visitor browsed an ordinary of 10MB on your site (which is decidedly dodgy), you could still sell 20.000 visitors/month. Of course, if your business truly explodes into a massive victory, your failsafe fallback locate is choosing a hosting source that allocates for a painexcluding upgrade avenue.
Keep reading further to learn how this topic can benefit you, as the rest of this article will supply you will the needed information.
communal VS. DEDICATED HOSTING
In a common hosting environment, your site is sited on a server that also grants hosting for a number of other people. You have your own cosmos, your own domain and the respite, but other people are also with the capital of that server for their sites. There is no chance of your pages viewing up on the other people site, or associate versa. Each site has its own sole set of folders, logins, and so forwards.
likewise the truth that common hosting expenses considerably excluding, the important consideration for most people is that the hosting circle prop workers administers the server. If there is a catch with the server, they have to fix it, not you. When the working technique or other technique software wants to be upgraded, they do it. All you care about is your own site and the pages enclosed on it.
For a large number of small businesses, common hosting is more than adequate. In a common hosting environment, there is no want for you to have official skill of Windows or Unix server administration. Thats not your soul business so why would you want to take that on?
In some suitarguments however, there may be exact reasons why superstar wants to administer their own server. These generally need people who have specialized needments. In that argument, a dedicated server would be the decision of choice.
In a dedicated server environment, you have packed manage over everything. You configure the server the way you want it. You ensconce working technique upgrades and patches, and you fix stuff when they crunch. You verify what components run on the server (e.g. ASP .NET 1.1 or .NET 2.0). You verify if the server runs CDONTs or some other mailer series. Its almost as if the server were in your home or place of business, excepting that you are administering it distantly.
Again, in the gigantic margin of suitarguments for a small business, common hosting would be the preference. In those suitarguments where a dedicated server is vital, most hosting companies grant that, along with the headaches.
expense
It is amazing to me what some hosting sources trust for their serassociates. It is even more amazing that so many people pay these worths. Let’s consider a few of the “low end” hosting designs untaken by some of the “big boys” in the web hosting sector.
One of them trusts $9.95/mo for their plain serassociate. They also need a $25 system fee. For that, you get 2GB of storeroom cosmos and 20GB of bandwidth. Another trusts $14.95/month. With that, you get 500MB (MB, not GB) of storeroom, and 30GB of bandwidth. Are you kididng me?? There are thousands of hosting sources that will give you 10 period these totals for $5/month or excluding. And if you relate other skin, you will find that in most suitarguments, these other sources also give you more in language of dispatch accounts and other “boundlessbies”. It pays to relate. For those who want to expend lookalike, or even triple, for domains and web hosting, go right before. It is your money after all.
Of course, you can forever go with a boundless hosting account. You cant beat the worth. But that doesnt routinely allocate you to use your own domain. You just become an increase of superstar elses (e.g., somehostingserassociate.com/yoursite). That doesnt do greatly for your branding. With boundless sites, you can also presume a boatload of ads that the hosting circle puts there. I disbelief that is truly the aura you want to portray to your customers.
HOSTING supplier VIABILITY
Many people overlook this consideration, but liability so can be a important gaffe. The last thing you want is to get a great site online, jerk getting a ton of visitors and sales, and then have your hosting circle go stomach-up on you. Its happened all too regularly.
It is to your help to make surely that whoever you host with will be there tomorrow, next month, next year and five days from now. You would be astounded how many hosting companies are run by a single self out of the basement of their home, or how many of them are working on a shoestring.
Dont be anxious to ask a possible hosting circle where their servers are located, or how many people are on their workers. I have confirmed in other stuff that it is truly important for all businesses to have a issue Continuity chart. Ask your possible hosting circle if they have one. Ask them what happens to YOU if there is a fire in their server knotty. And dont be anxious to ask them what happens to the circle if the possessor gets hit by a beer truck on the way to work. It happens.
OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
Depending on the wants for your online business, there are numerous other truthors to consider when choosing your hosting source:
- how many dispatch accounts do they grant?
- do they grant “Blog” software or do you want a 3rd-group plugin
- do they grant “Discussion Forum” software, or do you want a 3rd-group plugin?
- do they grant a “shopping drag”?
- do they grant “business accounts” if you don’t alprompt have one?
- do they grant “SSL” certificates for obtain transactions?
- what is the upgrade avenue for adding skin at a later court?
- do they grant robust transfer statistics?
You may not want all these skin, but if you do, it’s easier to go with those that are integrated into your hosting design. affect what YOUR wants are, then choose the hosting source that gives you the best combination of worth and skin.
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Web Hosting Services: Mantra for Website’s Success
October 12, 2009 by Web Hosting Watch
Filed under Top 10 WebHosts
No doubt, web-hosting services play a crucial role in one’s website’s success. In absence of a web host, one do not have any way to support his/her site on the Internet, so one should not make any form of compromise in choosing a quality hosting account that provides a wide range of features and services. There are several important points one should look for in a quality web host but some crucial ones are given below:
Tips to consider while choosing quality web host:
1. Support
Top priority should be given to the web hosting service that provides support 24 hours / day, 7 days / week, 365 days / year to the user. The reason for this is that one needs his/her website up and running at all times which allows the maintenance in sales. If the condition arises when one’s website is down then it could cost the user a lot of money, and even not to mention, visitors who cannot access the site. If the user has a problem at 6 A.M. on Christmas Day, and he requires contacting the web host support and having it taken care of. No doubt, this is a mark of a good web hosting company. Also, one should not just believe on the words of promise but should also judge their responsive potential through a couple of test calls at off hours and weekends.
2. Contact Information
One should possess all the important contact information for his/her web host. In the condition when this sort of information is unavailable, then he/she will most likely have problems for a long period of time. When the host does not provide user a way to contact them in the period of problem or need help then the user may need to wait for several days before his/her problems gets resolved. No doubt, this is intolerable in any sort of condition. In the situation, when contact information is not listed online, one should keep searching for hosts.
3. Free more expensive than paid
When the user is developing a website for business purposes, his/her own URL is the top most trustworthy and which provide real website support that one pay for. The user preferring free web hosts will definitely bring the user into a condition when he/she will loose both bucks as well as business since customers will not take care of someone’s business who do not take care of his/her own site.
4. E-mail
One should inquire that his/her web host supports electronic mail and permits multiple addresses or not. One would certainly need it in business so one would definitely desire a server that supports this. In the situation when scarcity of it prevails, one should search for an ideal host because most good web hosts permits for electronic mail addresses.
5. Room for the Server and Bandwidth
Sufficient server space is one of the key aspects for one’s website to flourish. Bandwidth is another key aspect because the more bandwidth the host has, means the sooner one’s page loads, and which indirectly means that more customers rush towards the site because of it’s capability to respond quickly.
Web Hosting Business for Fun and Profit
September 29, 2009 by Web Hosting Watch
Filed under Setting Up Accounts
As per study conducted by the Forrester Research, the current market is an ideal one for the emergence new web hosting companies, currently there is “positive — if modest — growth for Web hosting and managed IT services, at both the enterprise and SMB levels.”
It is an ideally suited business if one indulges as a web designer or rather IT consultant. This business suits best for small consulting firms. Now the question arises why to ignore such services which several small businesses potentially require? Hosting is a supreme source of revenue on monthly basis.
If one talks about the flourishing sectors of Internet then name of hosting industry will be among one of them. Several corporations such as Yahoo are in the race of providing web hosting services. Anyone who wishes to join this highly profitable business is always welcome and has the right to grab his/her financial share, except when he/she can rightly perform his/her duty.
For a dream web hosting company, one should adopt two tested and wrathful rules as mentioned below:
1.) The prime aspect of the user should be on offering high-quality services in a two-tiered pricing schedule.
2.) The user should know about the importance of an automated infrastructure for development of self-sufficient customers. In the case of marketing, it is very important for the user to increase the chances of accurate opportunities.
The facility of automation will not only enhance the self-sufficiency of the client but also will reduce the expenses of the user to a low level. For the purpose of giving level best services, the prime thing which user requires is at least the following processes to be automated:
1.) Order forms (in case of new customer account set up or existing customer updates),
2.) Billing system,
3.) Administration system,
4.) End-user control panel, and
5.) Technical support interface.
Order Forms:
It is mandatory that the front end of user’s order form should provide a minimum of the four key functional aspects given below:
a.) It should ensure the information of domain for registration purposes,
b.) It should legalize entered results,
c.) It should provide the facility to process the customer’s credit card or else provide creation of an invoice,
d.) It should register customer’s information into billing database for the future prospects.
It is must that the backend of the order form must process the domain registration, in case it is required by the customer and should generate the Web hosting account.
Administration System
One should know that the administration system is quite an essential factor in the purpose of managing ordered accounts. The user might require manually adding or eliminating several new domains, change passwords, etc.
End-User Control Panel
If one wants his/her customer should manage his/her account, then an end-user control panel is necessary. At the end, the customers should be in the condition where they can set up their own e-mail accounts, view Website statistics and can manage files etc.
Billing System
Another very important thing is the presence of automated billing system. The billing system should not only perform the functions like making e-mail invoices, charging credit cards, suspend overdue accounts etc, but should also enable user to issue credit or discounts as per requirement.
Technical Support Interface
There is a wrong opinion that technical support interface is merely a system that generates trouble rather it is an effective tech-support interface that automatically generates an FAQ-interface that customers can look out for before submitting trouble tickets. The advantage of these interfaces is that they can reduce technical support requests by a factor of 10.
Not only that, the company with which the user go with offers the option of taking care of technical support on his/her behalf but branded with user’s brand. Thus one can concentrate his/her potential on other parts of his/her business which requires greater attention.
How to maximize good marketing opportunities
If one knows about what platform to use, what packages to offer and set up a tiered pricing schedule and automated systems. So now how one does maximizes good marketing opportunities through new hosting service?
Pay per Click
This facility allows user to reach to a large segment of customers. In this case although one needs not to pay to list his/her site, he/she does pay when a customer clicks on one’s listing and connects to user’s site. Now an important question arises in one’s mind i.e. how does one gets his/her site high on the results lists? One option is user must engage in a bidding war over how much he/she is willing to pay for each person who clicks through to his/her site. Recently the prices of bidding have grown too high, so one needs to act careful. There are cases where one clicks into one’s site but didn’t convert into a new account. Thus, one needs to be sure to just select targeted keywords and not contending with everyone else for the same keywords. It is not at all an easy game, so one should find his/her role.
How to host Directory Sites?
There are plentiful Web sites known as hosting directories that intend to attract Web hosting customers. The utility of these directories lies in the fact that they are an excellent place to advertise, but one needs to be selective in his/her placement. There are several sites offering banner placement, spotlights, search enhancements, and other forms of advertisement. A key tip in this case would be one should always keep in mind that banner ads are considered much better for building brand recognition rather than generating new accounts, so one should advertise based on his/her budget, and should not just focus on his/her expectation for new customers.
How to influence current Client Base?
If one is running an established Web design firm, information portal, or domain registration service, he/she can quickly start marketing to his/her current clients. For him/her its not easy to generate clients as by sending a simple e-mail to his/her current customer base he/she can immediately generate a large number of accounts. Talking about marketing strategies, there are permission-based email marketing services that work best for earning more revenue from one’s current customers and gaining additional customers. Thus, one should try a free trial of one or more of these services to find one that works well for his/her needs.
How to retain customers?
One should always keep in mind that in order to retain his/her customer; one has to develop and offer new products and services and to make them feel better. This will not only help in retaining customers but also to generate additional revenue. But the most important factor is quality should not be compromised as it is in reality a key to success.
Find the Best Web Hosting Provider Easily for Your Website
September 11, 2009 by Web Hosting Watch
Filed under Top 10 WebHosts
When building your website and getting it hosted online, you wish for your site to be up and running on the World Wide Web 24/7 without any snag so that it is making you money all the time and all you have to worry about then is the main mission getting visitors to your site, doing some SEO, getting targeted repeated visitors, maximizing your sites profits, etc. You don’t want to have to concern about your web hosting and its reliability.
Therefore, when choosing a web hosting company to host your website with, you would like to seek and find the best web hosting provider so that your site is always up and running efficiently on the World Wide Web.
So what makes a best Web Hosting Provider?
There are many things that make up a top web hosting provider. a number of of these consist of first-class support, first-rate uptime, high-quality backup system in place, excellent hardware, offers loads of web hosting features including email features, scripting features, domain features, marketing features and more.
So where can some top Web Hosting Providers be found?
There are various places across the web where you can find some of these top web hosting providers. Although finding the perfect hosting company for your web site requires time, energy and experience, however a good place to start is using this great site you can compare top USA Hosting Providers and hope you will find the company which best fits your site.
As you can easily compare these web hosting providers in opposition to what other hosting companies are providing that’s listed within this web hosting resource. There you can without problems discover and compare a great amount of some of the top and most popular web hosting providers online. You can straightforwardly contrast each web host against each other as a result you can easily see what they offer for the amount of money that they charge.
“Summary”
Almost all experts will advise you that when selecting a web hosting company you should look for do they provide free setup and money back guarantee but you don’t have to worry about this, Good news is that all our top USA Hosting Providers offer free set-up, free domain, great features, great features and also money back guarantees. This is because if you discover that they don’t fairly offer what you want for your website, then you can easily get your money back and choose another web hosting provider.
Points to Remember While Choosing a Web Hosting Plan
September 8, 2009 by Web Hosting Watch
Filed under Windows Hosting
Is selecting good web hosting plan, really important? Many people who are starting out in Internet marketing wonder about this question. However, unfortunately, much attention is not given to, selecting a web-hosting plan. Many people just trust their web designer or web developer to choose a web hosting plan for them; they don’t even review their hosting plans, as they consider choosing a web hosting plan as a minor factor that will not matter too much.
Usually people do not pay much attention to web hosting plan unless there is a problem with it. So, if one is fortunate and gets a decent web hosting plan without considering his/her options, he/she perhaps will not think of choosing a web hosting plan as a very important aspect of website development. On the other hand one may view the selection of a web hosting plan in a different light, if he/she had an insufficient web hosting plan, or he/she been burned by a unreliable web hosting company.
Important points to remember are-
1. Security
2. Support
3. Speed
4. Space
5. Administrative functions
6. Cost
7. Email capabilities
8. Reports
9. Reliability
10. Extra features
Security
For website development, the security features of a web hosting plan’s servers is important, particularly if website is an ecommerce website through which customer payments are processed, or personal information is transmitted via their website. Customers may be cautious to transmit personal and financial information through their website, without a secure server. One should look for security features like: -Encryption capabilities and the ability to set up a dedicated secure server for his/her company in their web-hosting plan.
Support
Different web hosts have different levels of support with some responding to email or online requests while others offering person-to-person phone support. 24 hour technical support is being provided by few web hosts but not by all. Technical support should without any doubt be a part of a web-hosting plan. Before choosing a web-hosting plan one should make sure to find out about the quality and convenience of technical support that is being provided by that web host.
Speed
In an e- business, loading speed of a website is very important. Because, if the site takes more than a few seconds to load when people visit the website, they get annoyed and go on to the next, forgetting this website altogether. So ensure to find out the type of Internet connection the web host is using for example whether it is a high-speed connection or not, while evaluating a web hosting plan.
Space
The space and the bandwidth that ones web hosting plan allows for his/her website use matters. Any web hosting plan offers adequate space for a standard website, in most cases. However, one should make sure that if his/her website grows, he/she can increase the space provided for his/her web hosting plan if necessary. Restrictions of bandwidth can obstruct the ability of website visitors to download or upload data.
Administrative Functions
The owner of the website should be able to quickly and easily make changes to the website though sometimes a web developer serves as a Webmaster. Through the administrative features of a web-hosting plan, this can be accomplished, normally on online accessible control panel.
Cost
While choosing a web-hosting plan, cost is very important; though, it is not the most important consideration. Sometimes one really gets what he/she pays for. Therefore, cost should be one of the factors while deciding upon web hosting plan but picking cheapest web hosting plan is not always the best idea. Furthermore, it’s not worth having free web hosting plan.
Email Capabilities
In every web hosting plan email capabilities should be included. The ability of using email aliases, number of email addresses being provided, and the ability of setting up auto responders are things, which should be considered. Restrictions on the size of files that can be sent and received or stored on the email server can also be of much value.
Reports
Reports about website activity and access to server logs should be standard features of a web hosting plan. These reports helps in marketing pains, as one can know from where his/her traffic is coming from and which marketing mediums are producing results. With the help of reports, one can even find out which of his/her web pages are most popular and which ones are not being visited at all.
Reliability
The reliability of the company who will be providing web-hosting plan is important. Like their percent of uptime, the duration of time they have been in business, and their backup and data retrieval practices play an important role in deciding whether or not the web-hosting plan one is deciding to take is reliable. Reliability is an important concern, as downtime of sites results in the loss of business.
Extra Features
Apart form standard features that are provided in a web-hosting plan, there can be options that may cost extra. Limited plans cost less than a full- service web-hosting plan. However, Full- service web hosting plan may be worth if chosen. Some of the extra features to look for are-
FTP access capabilities for sharing files and
support for software one may use for his/her website.
3 Mistakes to Avoid While Choosing a Web Hosting Company
August 5, 2009 by Web Hosting Watch
Filed under Windows Hosting
Have you ever been ripped off by web hosting provider? Be frank, I have. And the experience is painful. I have tried a web hosting before that claimed to offer lifetime hosting for one time fee. I was blown away by the ads in an auction site, and decided to give a go due to seller’s reputation. But guess what? After 2 months, the server went down without any notice. And there was nothing I could do. In this article, you will find 3 useful pointers to avoid being scammed like me.
Is the offer too good to be true?
If a web hosting provider offers unlimited web disk space for one fixed lump sum payment, isn’t it a bit unrealistic? Hosting industry is a very competitive market. Companies are getting their share by either, giving more features or discounts. But some are just looking for short term profit, just like the one in my case. Your best bet is to identify the market price in the industry and compare different hosting plans. Be realistic in choosing the right plan.
Does the service meet my requirements?
Depending on teh infrastructure of your website, you may need a dedicated hosting option, or just a simple shared hosting. Obviously, if you are merely running a personal web site without much dynamics or server side requirements, you won’t need those premium hosting plan with mega disk space and technical support. You will also need to consider the server side language adopted by the server. Do you need a windows or linux hosting? Make sure to check if your web script is compatible.
Is the company credible?
Even if a web hosting plan is reasonable, it doesn’t imply that you can totally trust the service provider. Try to read web hosting reviews for your favorite companies. How long have the companies been in business? Pay attention to the security measures and support channels. You will need help from the staff who manages the server hardware for you.
When you buy a web host, make sure to compare hosting plans. Check your hosting needs, and read hosting reviews. These can assure that your purchase matches with your expectation of the web hosting company. Are you tired of looking for a good web hosting provider? There are two hosting services I can recommend, and they are ezwayhost.com and builthost.com. They are both highly reputated in the industry. I can tell if I had known about them earlier, I would not have made that mistake again.
The Ways by Which One Can Choose a Web Hosting Company
May 27, 2009 by Web Hosting Watch
Filed under cPanel
These days, anybody can afford to order a feature-packed web hosting plan for next to nothing; however, cheap price cannot said to be the decisive factor which one should have to considered while purchasing web hosting services. This article provides a lesson of not considering the best price and features as the only passport of getting a good web hosting company but also emphasizing on reliability and honesty. If one is investing his/her money and effort into finding paying customers and he/she wouldn’t like to lose them in the condition just in order to save a few dollars per month on a web hosting service.
If a user is searching for a web hosting company, it is not a matter of concern that it is just for the inception of a web or the move of an established site; the user has to widen his/her thinking area before coming to a judgment that along which company he or she has to go with:
Customer support
Website hosting service is not restricted just to storage or bandwidth. Lacking customer support, a top-notch service is also nothing. If one is owning a business website, it is both duty and requirement of his/her hosting provider to be available for the service- 24/7, as any time any sort of technical fault may arise; neglecting it the hosting provider may suffer from serious shortage of customers and money.
Downtime assurance and service monitoring
It is a minor inconvenience to go down when it is a case of personal website; but it is serious when it comes to business website. Can anyone guess how much amount of profit would he/she lose if his/her site had been down for a week? As it is a trend of spending a large amount on advertising the website a long downtime can be lethal for today’s companies.
Basically, there are two rules upon which one can relay:
1. One should check if there is an uptime guarantee offered or not. An ideal service-oriented provider will not only give a money-back guarantee, but also offer a discount or free service as compensation for downtime. A company which avoids taking such liability will not provide an ideal service.
2. One should not go with a company claiming 100% uptime, as there is no such thing as a server with 100% uptime. If anyone ever announces that their server has a 100% uptime; one can easily conclude that they are either lying or they don’t perform the necessary upgrades that avoid a machine from being compromised.
Reputable web hosts will post statistics on their site, the remedial solution for the questions like for e.g., what is the frequency of interruption. How about the average percentage of downtime? If these aren’t posted, ask; if the answer isn’t forthcoming, that is not going to be a good sign. If one still likes to go with a host which doesn’t monitor servers, one has to do it by his/her own.
Backups
IS there any host who is safe against different types of technical and programical failures, the answer is NO! So, one should make sure that the company runs scheduled backups. The other probable advice would be that one must always have a backup of his/her website himself/herself, as one cannot predict what exactly is going to happen next. CPanel, currently the most popular web hosting management software, has a very comfortable backup-making tool. Which allows the user to backup files and databases quickly and easily, so backups are not a long head ace.
Acceptable use policy
Web hosts may have 200-300 or more clients per server; one cannot predict the exact number, as companies possess different hardware; while, each hosted website has different resource usage. One cannot ignore the probability of that a few of those customers host illegal content. There are several web hosts who have had their servers unplugged, resulting in their clients’ websites going down. Definitely ,one would never like to put his/her business at risk and locate the website hosted on the same server along with illegal pornography and software sites, so to avoid such types of problems one must check host’s acceptable use policy to find out, whether the host takes care of what’s hosted on their servers or not.
Hosting one’s site on an uncared-for server will also result in a low speed. If somebody on the same server sends spam, the server’s IP address will be blacklisted and he/she will have serious problems as recipients would stop his/her receiving emails. Spam is being sent almost everywhere, so having one or two red records isn’t that bad; but, if there are more, it may become a problem later on.
Infinite bandwidth and web space
If one talks about the adage “you get what you pay for” it ideally suit for the Web hosting industry. One should not fall in the craters created by the hosts like for e.g., unlimited allowances, as there is neither unlimited bandwidth, nor unlimited web space. Host’s pay for each GB of bandwidth themselves. One can think that hard drives are free but they aren’t. They are just a mirage to attract customers. The average website doesn’t use more than 1GB of bandwidth per month; the customer is satisfied as he/she bought something “unlimited” and through this host automatically receives a new customer, on whom they don’t need to spend more than $1-2 USD per month. But for imagination what would happen if one person had a website, burning much more bandwidth than an average site does, and he signed up with a hosting company offering unlimited traffic? The host would simply suspend his account and tell him, that it was via too much bandwidth. There even several companies there which offer unlimited bandwidth for the user and have a statement on their requisites of service, explaining that unlimited bandwidth means 40GB which they actually mean, for example.
Will someone really own his/her domain name?
If a user buy a domain name together with a website hosting package, he/she must make sure that the host is registered the domain name under his/her name or not. The name usually should be written in their FAQ, but, if there is no such information is provided, the user simply needs to take a step and contact them. This will also give the user a chance to detect whether their customer support team is fast enough or not. If the hosting company registers domains under someone else’s name, the user may have to face the challenges switching hosting providers later. If the user is in such situation, he/she have to file for a Uniform Dispute Resolution Policy (UDRP), which costs much beyond both domain name and web hosting service together.
Control Panel
A necessary tool for easiness and for regular maintenance, including, email mailbox additions/deletions, password resets, web additions, web count reports, statistics etc. This tool is unavoidable if the site is meant for any sort of business. That is why it is currently the most demanding web hosting management software. It is behind the screen role of a next-generation web hosting control panel system that allows a user to manage his/her domain through a web interface. The key idea is to transfer as much of the control of managing users web site to him/her; So one can say that, user have the ability to manage all the dimensions of e-mail, files, backup, FTP, CGI scripts, web site statistics, etc.
Value-added services
In the regular interval of time, hosting companies offer diverse sort of value-added services in order to give themselves an outstanding look. Of course, these are an advantage, but customers forget that many of the services cannot be applied in any of the field. But still some of the valuable features are mentioned below:
1. Auto-installer script –
Play a role saving the user’s time if he/she is going to install a forum, image gallery, content management system, etc. Installation procedures on an auto-installer script can be done in seconds and can be easily performed by novices by avoiding difficult tasks generally related with installations.
2. Online website builder –
Mainly dedicated with showing the way by moving on which the user can design a website in a few minutes without having any creation software and knowledge. One very powerful website builder established in the market is Site Studio; this quality based editor allows for ease of use, full control of color schemes and themes, one-click publishing, and a collection of templates to brought into use.
The last tip
The purpose of this article is to feel the users that price and allocations cannot be given reference over importance of quality of service; if the user possess limited budget, then the price can be a valid criterion, but if not, it should not be given much importance.
By going through this article and asking questions, one can narrow down the list of web hosts to the extent where the user by his/her own can make the judgment between what is right and what is wrong



