Web Host Reliability - What You Absolutely Must Demand
Low prices mean nothing if they don’t come with reliable web hosting.
There is a clear correlation between the reliability and the longevity of most web hosting companies. And while it is intuitively obvious that these traits go hand in hand, there is quite a bit more to it than just a simple correlation.
The fact is that it takes both money and talent to provide low cost, reliable web hosting services. And as a web hosting company’s business volumes grow, the complexities of maintaining reliability grow exponentially.
Great Hosts
The most reliable web hosting providers are the ones who are adept at using state of the art system management tools to ensure optimum performance and minimal service disruption. The very best of them employ redundant servers and mirror sites that instantly take over when one or more servers experience the inevitable glitches that create service interruptions.
How they do this is not really the concern of most webmasters who host their sites with them. What matters is that they can count on their websites being available all the time and accessible with great speed.
Two ways to find reliable low cost yet reliable web hosting services
One way is to examine the web host’s service guarantee. This will always be expressed as an availability percentage, always greater than 99%. But 99% is not very good at all if you are going to operate a serious business online.
The fact is that 99% availability calculates out to a web site that is down the equivalent of 22 four hour periods per year, hardly acceptable in an age of 24/7 customer expectations. And this doesn’t even count availability impacted by network problems outside the web host’s control.
So what should you be looking for? All truly reliable web hosting companies offer uptime guarantees in the 99.8 - 99.9 range without a lot of fine print.
A second way is to verify access speeds. You can easily do this yourself by trying to access the web sites of the hosting company’s other clients at various times of the day, week, month, or quarter. If it’s always speedy then that’s a pretty good indicator of what you can expect for your web site.
If playing “mystery shopper” at all hours of the day and night is a bit too tedious for you, there are a number of services such as Alexa.Com who publish speed ratings. For example, you can see that this site, Web-Host-Watch, ranks in the top 4 percent of all web sites in terms of access speed.
No matter whose web hosting services you choose, there is no reason to accept anything less than speedy access and 24/7 reliable web hosting.
Another important trait of all great web hosting providers is: flexibility.
Anthony Hamill is the founder of Web-Host-Watch.Com which helps online business owners master the basics of web hosting. Get all the facts you need to find affordable web hosting plans including tutorials, tips on avoiding common mistakes, a glossary of web hosting terms, and a web hosting review that profiles the web hosts who provide the best overall value in each hosting category.
Tags: 99.9% uptime, internet access speed, reliable web hosting, Web HostingCheap Web Hosting Package eCommerce Web Hosting - Choosing A Web Hosting Provider
One of the important decisions you’ll make when you decide to put your business on the web is which web hosting provider to use. The web hosting company that hosts your personal page may not offer the best plan for your business needs. Here are some things to take into account when you’re looking for a web hosting provider for your professional web pages.
Windows or *nix Web Hosting
When a web hosting provider refers to operating system, they mean the operating system that their server uses. You do not need Windows hosting if you’re using a Windows operating system on your machine. You don’t need Windows hosting if you’re building your pages in Front Page. The major reason that businesses use Windows web server hosting is to take advantage of .asp and .net programming capabilities, which can be extremely powerful. If you’re unsure, check with the person who will be designing your pages and ask for their recommendation.
Choice of Web Hosting Services
Look for a web hosting provider that offers all the services that you need to build the web site you want. Some of the services that make a good deal even better are:
Reduced price or free domain registration
When you’re building a company web site, having your own domain name is essential to present a professional image. Many web hosting providers will register your domain name for free, and take care of all the details of renewing and updating information so that you don’t have to worry about it.
Secure server transactions on their server
If you’re planning to accept payments or exchange personal information over the Internet, access to a secure server is an absolute must. Look for a web hosting package that includes SSL in its basic price.
PHP and mySQL support
If you choose a UNIX server, PHP and database support can give you powerful tools for running applications and forums, content management systems and more. Most business and e-commerce plans include them.
Design Services at reduced prices
Many web hosting providers offer professional web design services to their customers at a discount. If yours does, consider taking advantage of it. A professional looking web site inspires confidence in your customers.
Web-mail services and POP Email Boxes
Look for a business web hosting plan that offers you the maximum POP email boxes you can get so that you can assign email addresses to all your employees and departments. A web-mail interface will allow them to access their mail from any computer.
You can find a web hosting provider that offers all the features that you want at an affordable price. It only takes a little comparison shopping to come up with the best business web hosting for your professional web site.
To view our recommended web hosts, visit,
Recommended Web Hosting Companies.
Carrie Reeder is the owner of eZerk, an informational website, with articles
and the latest news about various topics.
Don’t Forget About Email Requirements When Choosing A Web Host
One of the factors that many people forget about when they are looking for a web host is email. The types of accounts offered along with sizes and limitations are as varied as the web hosting companies are themselves.
Every web host should provide you with the ability to have several email accounts, most will offer up to 10 with a basic low end account. Another feature to look for is a company that offers an account that will accept and hold any email sent to your domain that does not match an email address. This is due to the fact that many people misspell names and such and therefore emails get lost.
You basically have three different email services available to you. The first is probably the one that most are familiar with, the POP or post office protocol works like a normal inbox such as your Outlook Express. You will be given a certain amount of storage space you are allowed but generally can only access from one computer.
The second choice called IMAP or internet message access protocol will allow you to use your email account on many different computers so that you can access it at work and home.
The third choice you have is a web based email which is of course the most flexible, allowing you to access your email from anywhere on the planet with a computer and an internet connection though a web browser. I like having all the options.
The next consideration that you have is on the size limit of storage you have. Nearly every web hosting company will have some sort of restriction on the size of account you can have as well as on the size of messages that can be sent. This is especially crucial if you are using your email to send pictures or documents. One key thing you want to do if you are using outlook or outlook express is to select the notify option for when your email is opened so that you know it was received. Many times if a file is too large you will have no other way of knowing. If you don’t get the notification then you know they didn’t receive your message.
Now, back to actual storage space, you should pick a web host company that offers a reasonable balance between the bandwidth limits and the size of the mailbox storage. For example if you have an account that offers 500MB of bandwidth but only a 3 MB data storage for email accounts.
Another important issue to look for is outgoing email limits. If you are using your account for business you may need to send emails out to a large number of people several times a day, if the system automatically flags that as spam you will not be able to send them. Check the limitations on outgoing mail and be sure it suits your needs.
Gregg Hall is an author and internet marketing consultant living in Navarre Florida. Find more information on low cost web hosting at http://www.lowcostwebhostingpackages.com
Tags: cheap web hosting, reliable web hosting, Web Hosting