TEN Things to Look for in a Web Hosting Service

Here's a look at the kinds of questions and issues you want to think about before deciding where to host your website.

Gone are the days when having a website for your business was optional. In fact, many businesses these days can't afford even a few minutes of downtime where their customers can't access their site. That means that choosing a reliable web hosting service has become mission critical for most business owners. But that can be easier said than done given the hundreds of options out there that range from local mom-and-pop providers to national providers like Go Daddy and Rackspace, all of which range in terms of their price and service offerings. But how do you know whether you need to spend $10 a month versus $100? What follows are 10 tips, from business owners and experts alike, about the kinds of questions and issues you want to think about before deciding where to host your website.

1. Support
Ask yourself what type of support will you need, says Angela Nielsen president and creative director of One Lily, a web design and hosting company in Barstow, California. "The worst thing that can happen is for a website to go down, or having an email issue," Nielsen says. "Nobody can prevent glitches 100 percent, so if and when you find yourself in the middle of one, its best to have someone you can call on to get immediate resolution." That means looking for providers that provide 24/7 free phone support with customer service reps who speak your language and actually pick up the phone when you need them to.

2. Parking Service
Find out if you can easily park your company's other domain names. "This is a big one," says Beatrice Johnston, director of Brand Excitement, a branding agency in New York City. "Most companies buy their .com, .net, .org, hyphenated versions of their domain name, misspellings, service names, and more. It's most efficient and convenient for brand management to have these in one control panel and know that you're not going to lose any traffic."

3. Backup
Make sure your web hosting service provides adequate backup, says Johnston. "I once mistakenly deleted the entire blog directory for my website—ouch," she says. "I contacted my host and because they provide automatic backup every day, I was able to hit a few keystrokes, select two days previous, and voila—my blog and content was back online as if it never happened." Find out what your host's disaster recovery plan is, as well, to ensure that they are backing up their backups.

4. Uptime Guarantee
The last thing you want your customers to experience is a blank screen when they type in your URL, so you'll want to shop for a hosting service with a strong reputation for uptime and redundancy, says Nielsen. "Your site can't be seen if the host constantly has server outages," she says. "Look for an uptime guarantee of 99 percent or more. Also make sure the server has multiple backup locations (mirrored servers) so that if one goes down, they have another already online and ready to go."

5. Accessibility
You might find that some hosting services make it difficult to make changes to your site. If so, avoid them. "Make sure the host you choose gives you access to the server so that you can easily create new email accounts, make changes to server settings, etc.," says Nielsen. That goes double for ensuring that you can get access to your email online and not just through Outlook. "Most hosts provide this, but some do not," says Nielsen. "Make sure you will have the ability to login online to check your email from when you are away from your computer, and in case of emergency like when Outlook crashes."

6. Blogability
Another staple of most company websites these days is a blog, in addition to other social media tools. Even if you don't blog, you might in time, so make sure that the hosting service meets the minimum requirements for WordPress, the leading blogging platform. "So many small businesses are utilizing WordPress for blogging and or for their entire website, and not all hosts yet support this," says Nielsen.

7. To Share or Not to Share
One of the ways that you can save money on hosting your website is by turning to something called "shared hosting," which basically means that your site is being hosted along with dozens (if not hundreds) of other sites which is why you might pay as little as $5 a month for hosting fees. The downside, though, can be that troubles with one of those sites could lead to problems for all the sites hosted on that server, says Roland Reinhart, owner of the Reinhart Marketing Group in Bridgewater, New Jersey. "Having a fast website response time is crucial so that your visitor doesn't grow impatient and click away and that Google uses page load speed as one of its many factors in determining whether your page will be show high in search results," he says. That's why he prefers to pay more for access to a Virtual Private Server (VPS)—also called a Virtual Dedicated Server (VDS). "VPS is a bit more complicated to set up, but at $40 to $50 a month, you have a much higher quality web server and faster performance," he says.

8. Watch for Add-ons
Even if you like the price a web hosting service quotes you, make sure you know what you're paying for. "Hosting services often grab you with a low start-up rate," says Marianne Carlson, president of Emcie Media, a communications and marketing firm in DeLand, Florida. "But then it's, 'Oh, you want an email account too? That's extra. You want to forward the email to your existing email account? That's extra. And you want a blog? That's extra too.' You get the idea."

9. Scalability
While you might be shopping for a hosting service for your small business, you should consider partnering with a service that can scale with you as you get bigger. That can mean that the service offers different tiers of service based on the number of expected visitors you receive each month where, as your business takes off, you can easily upgrade your plan. Just as importantly, you may want to evaluate providers based on how they deal with unexpected "spikes" that tear into your available bandwidth. Consider what happened to Scott Gerber, managing partner of New York City-based video production service Sizzle It and founder of the Young Entrepreneur Council, whose site crashed after The New York Times ran a cover story on him and again after he wrote a blog post for Inc.com titled, "Why 'Be Passionate' Is Awful Advice." "You must make sure that your service provider—or at least your service plan—are capable of dealing with spikes," say Gerber. "Additionally, you want to make sure that spikes don't cost you an arm and a leg as some providers charge you very large amounts of money for additional usage."

10. Exit Strategy
Even if you're excited about everything your new web hosting service has to offer, make sure you read the fine print about what they have to say if you decide to take your business elsewhere, says Ken Dawes, who helps small businesses build websites through his business, The Web Mechanic, which is located in Aptos, California. "One of my pet peeves is when a host makes it difficult to find what you need to move your domain name away from them," he says. "I think a provider that is confident in their service won't need to make it difficult."

The Things To Know About Web Hosting

Web hosting, by definition, is the process of making a webpage or website available for viewing online in the Internet.

There are several web hosting services that offer to store information, images, video or other content for individuals, institutions or entities.  Web hosts provide store information, such as web pages on their server.  Internet service providers, aside from giving customers a way to connect to the internet, also offer to host web pages without any additional charge.

Hosting services offer different service packages to fit the need of the consumer.  The most basic type is the web page and file hosting.  This type of hosting package is usually free.  Customers can upload web pages or files via FTP or file transfer protocol, and the website will be posted “as is,” although advertisements may be posted on one part of the web page.  This hosting service package is offered by companies like HostGator and IX Webhosting.      

For more complex and technical websites, some companies offer database support and application development platforms such as PHP, Java and ASP.NET.  These programs allow customers to write scripts for their websites.

If one is planning to create an e-commerce website or a website that allows credit card or debit card transactions, then he would need to get a package which employs the SSL technology.  This is what makes a “secure” website.  SSL, or secure socket layer, is a type of program or platform that encrypts sensitive information such as social security or credit card numbers for security purposes.

Some web hosting companies may also provide customers direct access to the web server, through programs such as the cPanel. The customer can then access and manage the website’s e-mail accounts, domains management, sub-domains, and other
actions required to run a website.

Below are the types of web hosting services, in detail:

1. Free web hosting service

It may be offered free by ISPs, but most companies will host personal websites for a minimal fee.  This type usually supports advertisements, and offers limited support.

2. Shared web hosting service

Companies offer to store a website’s information and content in their server, along with other websites.  Some companies, such as freewebs.com can offer this service free of charge, but one would need to provide a link to the host’s website.  Some features can not be added to the website, too, like forums.

3. Dedicated web hosting service

With this particular hosting service, one has more freedom because the webmaster will have full control of the entire web server.  Some companies advertise web servers for rent or lease, and the webmaster is given administrator access.

4. Co-location web hosting service

This refers to the physical space offered by hosting companies for rent.  Because a server needs to be running all the time, it needs to be placed in an area that where it can be maintained by technicians.

5. Reseller web hosting

This type of web hosting service allows clients to sell server space.  A client can choose to rent a server, for example, and have other customers use the server space for their own websites.

6. File hosting service

This is a type of internet hosting service created to host static content, usually large files which are not web pages.  The files which can be stored in these servers can also be freeware or shareware, programs that are offered free to everyone.  Because downloading programs eats a lot of bandwidth and are costlier, most shareware authors sign up for file hosting service accounts.

Aside from these six primary internet hosting services, there is also specific web services such as image hosting, video hosting and blog hosting services.

Because of the popularity of blogs or web journals, image hosting and video hosting services have also become popular.  People who sign up for image hosting accounts only have personal web pages provided by their ISPs.  Since ISPs provide limited storage space, webmasters get image hosting services to store photos and direct link from the host’s server to their web page.  Although there are restrictions to the maximum file size and the bandwidth allowed per user, it is usually higher that what ISPs are offering.

Blog hosting services, on the other hand, are hosting services that offer to host web journals online.  “Bloggers” access weblog applications to update their website.

The seven web design errors and how you can avoid them

Seven Common Web Design Errors

1 . Busy pages make bad pages

Trying to cram too much on to a single page is a sure fire way of putting visitors off. Not only is this practice generally a bad idea, but it can actively impede users logging on via a mobile device (of which there are ever-growing numbers).

White space is a good thing and gives users valuable breathing space to digest content. Make sure you’re spacing out columns, graphics, text and especially links. Above all, don’t try and do too much on one page.

2 . Hiding your links away

Links are arguably the most important feature of your website, so don’t hide them away or obscure them. First and foremost, you want to be consistent with how you highlight links, then apply this format across your entire site.

The opposite also applies, so don’t make un-linked text look like linked text. Some easy ways to distinguish links from regular text are with colour, underlining or bolding.

3 . Needless navigation is a no-no

It’s hard to overstate the importance of navigation on web design. This element will impact how easy and ergonomic your site is to get around, so spend some serious time putting yourself in the shoes of a new visitor.

While arty navigation (e.g. turning the page on a virtual book) is both pretty and tempting – and was fashionable for a period – it’s remarkably unintuitive to use. When setting out navigation for your site, bear in mind the key tenet of content being easy to find with the least amount of effort.

You should apply this doctrine to every aspect of your site, from drop-down links to images and beyond.

4 . Where’s your call to action?

Having a brilliantly designed and easy-to-navigate site is all well and good, but if it doesn’t prompt visitors to do the thing you want (i.e. click on something, share something, sign up to something), then it’s of no use at all.

You need to make sure that you include a clear call to action in a relevant place. However, this should by no means be intrusive, nor should it annoyingly interfere with navigation.

5 . Search and ye shall find

If you’re running a website (and particularly an e-commerce site) there is no excuse not to include a search function. Whether you have the resources to create this yourself or outsource it to a specialist, this is a necessity in the 21^st century.

Not only will this improve the functionality of your page, but it will also help to keep visitors who couldn’t immediately find what they were looking for on-site. One easy solution for newcomers to site design is Google’s Custom Search. By simply copying over the appropriate HTML code, you can incorporate a custom Google-powered search box for your users.

6 . Testing

Like GLaDOS from Portal, this should be your watchword. People will visit your site via a growing variety of means and it’s more important than ever to ensure an ergonomic experience for all.

Some common issues to look out for include being able to view the site in different environments, browsers and with different settings (e.g. having JavaScript disabled). There’s a vast variety of tools for such tasks available for free or at a marginal price, so there’s nothing holding you back from getting stuck in and keeping your website functioning at its peak.

7. Keep your content coming and current

If you do opt to include a news, blog section or social media feed on your site – make sure to keep it up to date. If you fail to keep content relevant, it can make it appear like you’re out of businesses or are vastly behind the times.

Even if you have nothing to say yourself, it’s always possible to curate content you – and ideally your target audience – will find interesting and relevant.

Lastly

Successful web design is more of an art than a science, but what doesn’t mean you can’t be empirical about the process. Look at your competitors’ sites and see what they do well – and badly – and then co-opt or discard these elements as needed.

Test the functionality of the site on those who’ve never used it and above all, have empathy. When viewing your work, try and put yourself in the shoes of a first-time visitor and alter elements accordingly.

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How SEO Can Help You To Get Best Returns From Your Website

 

What is an SEO?
SEO is a short form for ‘Search Engine Optimization’ or ‘Search Engine Optimizer’. SEO is normally used to explain the procedure of optimizing the website in such a manner that it will come out higher in rank while exploring the search engines of the world wide web. The natural or organic results denote those search results that are put back on left side of screen. Specialized SEO services intend to advance your position in organic search result. A website that is optimized using effective SEO tools can obtain vast returns from your online business marketing.

Why is SEO so Significant?
Since several users utilize the search engines, especially Google, to check on the services and products prior to opt for purchasing, it is vital for the powerful and strong existence on the internet search engines. If your product, service or brand cannot be seen on the search results, users will obviously turn to your competitors in the same field who have top rankings of their sites at the time of search results. If your internet presence has been set up strong with an attractive and search engine friendly web site the opposition parties or groups will fail to pass you through in the search engine results.

Why to Opt for SEO?
Though ‘Pay Per Click’ results can increase the clicks to your website fast, for long term, it is a very costly means to advertise your website. It is believed that if PPC is used combined with SEO, it can get you clicks of numerous targeted visitors. Some of the benefits of SEO which you must know about:

• Majority of Click fall On Organic Results – Researches have proved that internet surfers are more tempted to go for the site appearing in result in this sector than on paid results.
• Branding – It is the high position in the SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages) that helps you to build a “top of mind” branding among the customers and it is a highly influential means of marketing.
• Free – Different from pay per click (PPC) marketing, if your website is optimized and developed once and standing on top for the required keywords, you don’t need to pay and it is absolutely free for going to the organic results.
• Long Term Traffic – If your page is well-optimized, it will usually rank on the top position of the search results for over prolong period, and will get dividends in due course.

How SEO can help you get Best Return from your Website?

• Keywords Analysis: Select the best keywords for your website.
• Website Optimization: SEO ensure your website is content wealthy and search engine friendly.
• Link Competition analysis: SEO assess how many links will be needed to get your site into that looked for after 1 and 2 rankings on key search engines.
• Link Building: SEO make appropriate and permanent links that make targeted traffic to your site and augment your place on search engines.

Proper use of Search Engine Optimization helps your site to render what the customer need and to appear before the customer when they search. Search Engine Optimization increases the exposure of the website to increase your profitability. To sum up, SEO is certainly one of the most important and helpful internet marketing methods to attract customers offered today…