How to Choose the Right Web Hosting Company

مرسلة بواسطة WELCOME , , الخميس، 24 مارس 2011 5:37 ص

You have made up your mind that you will buy a domain name (or several) and take out web hosting from a website hosting provider.
First some considerations about the domain name(s)
Domain names do not really have anything to do with web hosting and can be registered independently from the hosting package. There are advantages if you have domain name and hosting separate. For example, if the hosting company you selected fails to provide a good service, all you need to do is find a better website hosting company and change the domain name settings. If you have domain name and hosting with the same company and the company ceases trading, the last thing they think about is your hosting or domain name. By having them separate, you are lowering the risk.
Disadvantages of registering the domain name with your hosting company
Many website hosting companies offer to register domain names on your behalf. You think that your domain name is with your hosting company, when, in fact, they register it through some third party registrar for you. You then receive an invoice in 2 years time from a company you never heard of, ignore it, and in the worst case lose your domain name.
Furthermore, in many cases, you will not get access to your domain name details nor will you be given a domain name control panel. Why do you need a domain name control panel? You need to be able to update the contact information for your domain name(s). If you move house for example and do not update you domain name details and for some reason you need to change registrar etc. (or because your web hosting company ceased trading), you are in danger of losing your domain name because you cannot prove any longer that you are the owner of a certain domain name.
Also, a domain name control panel allows you to change email forwarding, web forwarding, and most importantly, the domain name servers, as well as some other settings. Check out 123-Reg if you want to find out more about that.
Larger hosting providers
Have a good look around online and check out different providers. There are many large hosting companies out there such as 1and1. The advantage of registering with a large hosting company is that they have hardly any downtime and their servers will be fast and up-to-date with the latest spam protection etc. Website hosting can be costly though if you register with a large web hosting company and if you want any additional services, you will have to pay for them. Support can be an issue too - you usually have to fight through hundreds of "Frequently Asked Questions" before you are allowed to send an email to their support team. You might also have to call a Premium Rate phone number if you need to speak to someone urgently. These rates can rate from £0.50 to £2 per minute (!) or even more. In most cases, you will receive good support, but in some cases you might be put through to an unexperienced person who has to speak to their supervisor to double-check things frequently - and all that at a premium rate!
The biggest problem with large web hosting providers is that if you miss the annual payment and do not react to their payment reminders - they will remove your website, your account, without further notice. In some cases, there will not be any chance to recover your website. With a large web hosting company, your website is just a number in a very large pool of websites. If they lose your custom, so what!
Web hosting with a smaller web hosting provider
If you find a reliable smaller web hosting provider, chances are that you will receive a personal service, and support questions are answered with a lot more detail and a lot quicker. Most likely, you can call a UK landline or an 0845 or 0870 number which is a lot cheaper than £2 per minute. In some cases, you might be able to receive a reply to your support question - which you sent on a Saturday evening - that same night.
If you miss your payment with a smaller web hosting company, they will most likely call you personally and remind you on your late payment. They are keen to keep you as a customer and will probably not remove your account and your website immediately.
Web Statistics
Ask the web hosting company if they provide extensive website statistics. You want to know how many visitors have accessed your website, what search terms they used to find your website in Google and other search engines, how many visitors you have per day, on a certain day of the week, and so on. Please also ask if you can have access to the website log files. You might think that adding a website hit counter will provide enough information, but that is actually the most inaccurate method of counting your website visitors - and apart from that they look tacky and unprofessional. Your web hosting company should provide statistics that are at least as comprehensive as Webalizer and if statistics are important for you, you need to have access to your log files which can then be analyzed with statistics analysing software (such as Surfstats).
E-Mail issues to watch out for
Before you take out sign up with a hosting company, ask them if they provide SMTP/POP3 which you need to set up email accounts. If you want one or several e-mail addresses with your website - such as sales@mydomain.com - the web hosting company needs to provide SMTP/POP3 setup. Some web hosting companies only allow you to receive emails sent to sales@mydomain.com, but they will not allow you to use these e-mail addresses to send e-mails from. They will simply argue that you can use your Internet Service Provider E-Mail address - such as joe.smith@btopenworld.com. This does not look professional at all, and you should avoid web hosting companies that do not provide SMTP/POP3 service.
Backups
Check with your web hosting company how often backups are made. Usually, backups are made on a daily basis. If you have a large online store on your website and the server room at the web hosting premises is on fire, you will lose all your work if they do not back up their web server files. So please check if they have a backup routine in place.
Free Webhosting with your internet service provider
Please do not use this! Your internet service provider company provide an internet connection. That is what they specialise in. They sometimes "throw in" free web hosting for up to 100 MB or even more. They normally do not provide SMTP / POP3 setup for the sending / receiving of emails related to your website (such as sales@mydomain.com ), nor will they provide databases, server scripting language support and such like. Usually, you can only upload websites developed in pure HTML, and in some cases you will not be able to use FTP software for uploading your files and managing your files on the web server. Your business website will probably use some sort of server-side scripting language - such as ASP, PHP etc. and maybe use a database such as MySQL. If your website is with your Internet Service Provider, the support for this service can be poor and the account can sometimes not be upgraded to include server-side scripting languages, and/or databases.
Web Hosting Costs
Web Hosting costs can vary greatly. You can take out web hosting for as little as £15 per year, or you can get web hosting, including 5 email addresses, 100 MB web space (which is a lot for a small business presence) for as little as £30 per year (check out Plugsocket). If you buy a web design magazine, you will see many adverts from bigger web hosting companies. Check out their prices, their policies, and maybe give them a call - you will find out how long it takes until your call is answered.
Do not jump in because it is cheap, and conversely, do not think the service must be great because it is expensive. Check out what is on offer and then make an informed decision.
Nadin Dunnigan Web Developer of Marketing Agency in Scotland West Lothian.
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Keep Your Web Hosting Secure - Security Mechanisms Used by Hosting Companies

مرسلة بواسطة WELCOME , , 5:34 ص

Whether you are fantasizing a soccer-forum or opening an online store, you need to be very careful about the security of your website. From Virus & malware attacks to website hacking, there are many threats that your website faces. Choose web hosting secure packages that can protect your website data and keep it safe.
There are various hosting plans available to suit different budgets and website types - Shared hosting, Virtual Private Servers, Dedicated web hosting and so on. But are all these web hosting secure?
If you are not a tight budget, you should choose dedicated hosting plans for maximum security and privacy as you don't have to share the server with other websites. But if you cannot afford dedicated servers, just ensure that your web host implements and offers optimum security mechanisms.
Here's a list of various security features that should be a part of all hosting packages irrespective of the pricing:
1.) Secure POP3: Secure POP3 assists you in downloading your emails with the help of mail client called Outlook, even from Public net cafes. It ensures that the links are encrypted so your mails and passwords are safe from hackers and frauds.
2.) SSL Security: SSL stands for Secure Sockets Layer and it is the most powerful form of data encryption used by hosting companies. A lot of web hosts advertise themselves as SSL ready, which means that they can purchase the certificate if you want and install it on your site.
All SSL certified websites have' https:' in the beginning of their URL which means that all the transactions that take place on that site are encrypted and secure. Websites of Banks, financial institutes, ecommerce sites etc, display the https: link before their urls.
3.) Anti Denial-of-service: Denial-of-Service is often used by hackers to make your website unavailable for visitors. This results in loss of customers, business and money. To prevent this, it is important to keep your softwares updated and to choose a hosting provider that has strong fiber connections capable of withstanding DOS attacks.
4.) Plesk and cPanel: These two are the most recognized secure hosting control panels. They allow you to manage software configuration, billing, emails, and website administration. Ensure that you choose a web host who uses either Plesk or cPanel to make your web hosting secure.
5.) Antivirus and AntiSpam: With an increase in spam, viruses and malware, it is necessary that your web host installs powerful antivirus and AntiSpam softwares on the server as well as your site. This will ensure that your inbox is not jammed with junk mails and no malicious program is loaded on to your website.
All the above mentioned security options are very effective in dealing with various online threats and risks. It is the responsibility of the hosting provider to install necessary softwares and offer you a web hosting secure environment, so you can carry out all your business transactions safely and create a credible image online.
Like this article, learn more at http://hostingpackageweb.com for additional tips on web hosting information.
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Choosing a Web Hosting Service

مرسلة بواسطة WELCOME , , 5:31 ص

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.
SPACE AND BANDWIDTH
The most common thing people look for in a hosting provider is the amount of disk storage space and "bandwidth" available to them. While these are certainly important, they should not alone be the deciding factors. Truth is, most providers today allocate more disk space and bandwidth than most people would need. As I explained in an earlier article, 5-10 Gigabytes (or more) of storage is A LOT of storage. Most people will never need this much. If you already have your website designed and ready to go on your own computer, simply right-click the folder and select properties to determine how much space it requires. Even if you use backend databases (e.g., MySQL, MS ACCESS), the vast majority of sites would never come close to requiring 5GB or more. As long as the hosting providers you are considering give you that 5GB or more, you will be fine in all but a few rare cases. If you discover you need more at a later time, make sure your provider gives you an easy upgrade path to a hosting plan with a higher allocation.
The same thing applies to bandwidth. Many, if not most, providers now give bandwidth allocatioins of 200Gb/month or more. That amount would be more than adequate for most small businesses. Let's look at an example. If each visitor to your site uses, on average, 1MB of bandwidth to surf through your pages, a 200GB/month bandwidth allocation would handle 200,000 visitors/month. Even if each visitor browsed an average of 10MB on your site (which is HIGHLY unlikely), you could still handle 20.000 visitors/month. Of course, if your business really explodes into a huge success, your failsafe fallback position is choosing a hosting provider that allows for a painless upgrade path.
SHARED VS. DEDICATED HOSTING
In a shared hosting environment, your site is placed on a server that also provides hosting for a number of other people. You have your own space, your own domain and the rest, but other people are also using the resources of that server for their sites. There is no risk of your pages showing up on the other person's site, or vice versa. Each site has it's own unique set of folders, logins, and so forth.
Besides the fact that shared hosting costs considerably less, the important consideration for most people is that the hosting company support staff administers the server. If there is a problem with the server, they have to fix it, not you. When the operating system or other system software needs to be upgraded, they do it. All you worry about is your own site and the pages contained on it.
For a large number of small businesses, shared hosting is more than adequate. In a shared hosting environment, there is no need for you to have technical knowledge of Windows or Unix server administration. That's not your core business so why would you want to take that on?
In some cases however, there may be specific reasons why someone needs to administer their own server. These usually involve people who have specialized requirements. In that case, a dedicated server would be the option of choice.
In a dedicated server environment, you have full control over everything. You configure the server the way you want it. You install operating system upgrades and patches, and you fix things when they crash. You determine what components run on the server (e.g. ASP .NET 1.1 or .NET 2.0). You determine if the server runs CDONTs or some other mailer program. It's almost as if the server were in your home or place of business, except that you are administering it remotely.
Again, in the vast majority of cases for a small business, shared hosting would be the preference. In those cases where a dedicated server is required, most hosting companies provide that, along with the headaches.
COST
It is amazing to me what some hosting providers charge for their services. It is even more amazing that so many people pay these prices. Let's consider a few of the "low end" hosting plans offered by some of the "big boys" in the web hosting sector.
One of them charges $9.95/mo for their basic service. They also require a $25 setup fee. For that, you get 2GB of storage space and 20GB of bandwidth. Another charges $14.95/month. With that, you get 500MB (MB, not GB) of storage, and 30GB of bandwidth. Are you kididng me?? There are thousands of hosting providers that will give you 10 times these amounts for $5/month or less. And if you compare other features, you will find that in most cases, these other providers also give you more in terms of email accounts and other "freebies". It pays to compare. For those who want to spend double, or even triple, for domains and web hosting, go right ahead. It is your money after all.
Of course, you can always go with a "free" hosting account. You can't beat the price. But that doesn't normally allow you to use your own domain. You just become an extension of someone else's' (e.g., somehostingservice.com/yoursite). That doesn't do much for your branding. With free sites, you can also expect a boatload of ads that the hosting company puts there. I doubt that is really the image you want to portray to your customers.
HOSTING PROVIDER VIABILITY
Many people overlook this consideration, but doing so can be a critical mistake. The last thing you need is to get a great site online, start receiving a ton of visitors and sales, and then have your hosting company go belly-up on you. It's happened all too often.
It is to your benefit to make sure that whoever you host with will be there tomorrow, next month, next year and five years from now. You would be surprised how many hosting companies are run by a single person out of the basement of their home, or how many of them are operating on a shoestring.
Don't be afraid to ask a potential hosting company where their servers are located, or how many people are on their staff. I have stated in other articles that it is vitally important for all businesses to have a Business Continuity Plan. Ask your potential hosting company if they have one. Ask them what happens to YOU if there is a fire in their server complex. And don't be afraid to ask them what happens to the company if the owner gets hit by a beer truck on the way to work. It happens.
OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
Depending on the needs for your online business, there are several other factors to consider when choosing your hosting provider:
- how many email accounts do they provide?
- do they provide "Blog" software or do you need a 3rd-party plugin
- do they provide "Discussion Forum" software, or do you need a 3rd-party plugin?
- do they provide a "shopping cart"?
- do they provide "merchant accounts" if you don't already have one?
- do they provide "SSL" certificates for secure transactions?
- what is the upgrade path for adding features at a later date?
- do they provide robust traffic statistics?
You may not need all these features, but if you do, it's easier to go with those that are integrated into your hosting plan. Determine what YOUR needs are, then select the hosting provider that gives you the best combination of price and features.
Ray has a 30+ career in the Computer Information Technology (IT) field. He has been a Systems Analyst, DB and Network Administrator, Website Development Manager, IT Architect and Director of IT. He has owned several successful online businesses. He is also the author of several books related to technology and business.
http://www.webhosting-123.com
http://www.wantanonlinebusiness.com
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8Ways To Host Your Site

مرسلة بواسطة WELCOME , , 5:20 ص

There are 8 basic types of the web hosting available in the market today. Hosting even by IT standards, is not considered exciting, if it was a country it would be Belgium. If it was another business it would be fleet car leasing, where shared hosting would be company car pooling. Dedicated, leasing of cars to a sales force on a rolling annual rental contract or lease agreement. Like the gold rush in the Sierra Nevada in 49, nobody pays much attention to the stores the picks and shovels, but this is a mistake it can be vital to your sites success. It is crucial to security and in vital if maintaining site integrity, to have a hosting partner who will grow with you and react quickly and decisively to resolve problems when they arise. A good host can even be a source of revenue for your site.
·  1. Dedicated Server - rental as well as the exclusive use of an internet connection, server and software
·  2. Shared hosting - Multiple websites are being hosted on just one remote hard drive and server
·  3. Reseller hosting - reselling of hosting accounts for another web host under a brand of your own. You determine the pricing structure and other aspects of the offer.
·  4. Virtual Private Server - You are not renting a real server, but you are rather splitting hardware with the other virtual servers running on the same machine. Many self contained virtual server can exist on one rented remote server.
·  5. Free hosting - Service usually offered by ISP's or compensated with advertisements on your website. Free hosting usually offers little or no support, bandwidth, space, or the free scripts or site building features you enjoy with shared and dedicated hosting.
·  6. Managed Hosting - Expanded dedicated web server hosting. In dedicated servers, the client has to take care of his or her own server but in managed hosting, the provider would have the responsibility of doing that Unmanaged Hosting - Total remote control administration of your web server. The server's technical aspects are controlled by the designated administrator which you would select to manage and handle your website information.
·  7. Colocation - Requires that you to bring your server to the data center of your host.
·  8. Clustered hosting - Used by the biggest and most important websites, you buy manage and physically house the servers yourself. Clustered means that the same content would be served on a number of servers enabling better redundancy and resource. Works well for Google.
As you can see there are many types of hosting account. Whether you are planning business web hosting or you intend to run a school site or maybe you are simply planning on getting a small hobby site up and running, you have a decision to make, what hosting package do you chose.
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Part of a comprehensive series of articles on web design for everyone. Author of the free web tool 123FTP/2zen web express -Free. Downloads 50,000 rated and reviewed - 100 % popularity April 2008 tucows
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