Finding An Excellent Web Hosting Provider

No matter how good a website is, it’s all a complete waste if the hosting isn’t upto scratch. Before starting anything, it is absolutely essential to find a good web host to match the purpose and needs of the website. Here’s a few tips that’ll help narrow down the options.

Reviews: Good reviews are the life blood of this business. There are plenty of web host review sites, but it’s easier to find reviews for a specific host directly through search. Do a search for ‘xyz hosting reviews’ and read all the reviews. One review won’t cover all the aspects, so take some time finding reviews and make sure that the host is reliable, and capable of providing the requisite level of service.

Price: The cost is subjective, based on the needs. What kind of bandwidth and disk space is the site going to need? Is a shared server sufficient, or does the project need a dedicated server? How about email accounts and domains, sub-domains, FTP accounts, etc?

There are plenty of add-ons such as eCommerce tools, design tools, etc. These things may be essential for some websites, in which case the price goes up with each new requirement. It might be a good idea to shop around and find a web host that offers everything required inclusive in the base price.

Windows vs Linux: Most site-owners don’t put too much thought into this, and the majority will get a Linux server by default. But sometimes, it turns into a big headache. For instance, Wordpress does not work on a Windows server, so if the site needs a blog, then it’s a problem. Linux servers, on the other hand, cannot run ASP, so for sites that need ASP functionality, it’s better to choose a Windows server. Either way, it’s not a good idea to switch afterwards.

SEO: Many people find out quite late that search engines like some hosts better than others. It’s mostly because of the algorithm and the science behind running web servers. Page loading speeds vary from host to host, and each one hosts specific categories of websites on different IP ranges. It’s a bit hard to grasp for those unfamiliar with these things, but it is very important for getting more search traffic. Look up what a bad neighborhood means (as relates to a web host) and what a Class-C IP address has to do with SEO.

Features: Regardless of budget or needs, some things should always come by default with every package. The must-have features include a control panel (cPanel or Plesk), POP/POP3 email accounts with webmail access, FTP access, scripting support (PHP, CGI, MySQL database, etc) and web analytics with access to log files. The list of features every web host offers is huge, but the aforementioned things are the ones which are sometimes left out by a few hosts even though they’re all necessary for most websites.

To summarize, choosing web hosting providers is not just about 24 hour support or rock-bottom prices. There needs to be a match between what the host offers and the website’s intended purpose and its needs. The reputation of the host needs to be good, if not perfect.

We’ve got the low down on how to choose a good webhosting provider now in our comprehensive email hosting review.