Selecting the right Web Hosting plan

Published: 15 Dec 2007 In: How to's

Today’s market for web hosting is competitive and confusing for the average Internet user, to say the least. How many of us have visited Web Hosting sites only to be bombarded with technical terms and specifications that we don’t understand? Let’s take a look at some of the features that you should be the most concerned with, what some of those technical terms mean and why they are important.

What kind of support can I expect?

This is by far the most important question you should ask when selecting a provider. Unfortunately, it is not usually the first question that comes to mind until we have a problem.

The first thing you should look for is a phone number that is obviously visible on the providers web site. Let’s use the following hosting provider as an example:

http://www.scgdmains.com

Click on this link and have a look at the home page. You can see in the upper right hand corner, there is a US based telephone number indication that this is the phone number you can call for support. But does this carry through to the rest of the site in case you get in trouble? Click on the ‘Web Hosting’ menu choice to go to a list of Hosting Plans offered.

Notice again in the header, just under the menu, in plain site, it the support number again. Notice though that it is a clickable link, so let’s click on it.

Now a page is loaded that provide the visitor with a complete listing of support options. Also notice on the right hand side a menu has been expanded under the heading of ‘Customer Support’ with some very valuable information. It shows you how long you can expect to wait for telephone support and again another expected response time for email support requests. Review the other information in the different tabs in the content area of the page as well. There is a truck load of options to help you find the solution to any problem you may encounter.

The Support features for this site are excellent and should be the level of support you should expect from any hosting provider. If you want to know how knowledgeable the people are on the other end of the phone, call the support line before you order and ask questions. Get an idea of how helpful they are, are they friendly, did they know what they were talking about … the list goes on and you probably have you own questions to ask.

Linux or Windows

This is an item that is probably not as critical as support, but may be important depending upon the additional applications you may want to have on your server. For instance, if you want to operate a blog, it is much easier to install a blog application under a Linux environment than in a Windows system.

Based on personal experience, Linux is a much more robust and reliable platform to operate a Web site from. However, Windows is not a bad choice and most Web Hosting providers have implemented the necessary security to ensure that a Windows server solution is just as reliable. Usually, the higher end hosting plans are only provided on Linux based platforms.

Hosting Plans

When you look at the plans on offer, there are a variety of features and pricing that can seem daunting. Usually, pricing is stated as a setup fee and a monthly fee. Many providers are willing to waive the setup fee if you sign-up for a full year of hosting. Let’s define the most basic categories for hosting plans. These include links so you can get an idea of the features you should expect at each level. Make sure you scroll down the page and click the tabs to compare plans so you can see the major differences:

• Business
• WebMaster
• Corporate
• Enterprise

Disk Space and Bandwidth

Web hosting plans usually state the two specifications right up front. Let’s define these terms before we understand how much we need:

• Disk space – This is the amount of space that the provider has allocated for you to store your web site.
• Bandwidth or transfer – This is the maximum amount of data that can be transfered to and from your site by computers that visit your web site.

Now that we understand the basic definitions of each term, let’s take a look at the factors that impact each item and why this is important.

Factors that impact Disk Space

There are many factors that contribute to the storage meter applied to your hosting plan. These can include any or all of the following:

• Web pages
• Images and pictures
• Databases
• Additional applications (blogs, etc.)
• Email accounts

You should determine which of these items effects the amount of disk space you have been allocated. You can determine how much space you will need by how complicated your site will be. If you plan on storing a lot of web pages or pictures on your site, a very basic plan may not be enough. However, even the most basic packages will be sufficient for the needs of the beginner.

At SCGDomains.com, the amount of disk space is allocated for the use of Web Pages and images only. There is additional space allocated for databases, email and applications.

The most basic packages usually offer about 5GB (gigabytes) of storage. If you look at the contents of the hard disk on your own computer, you can see that most of that space is occupied by system files. As a comparison, 5GB is equal to about 1000 MP3 music files. This amount is more than enough for a very basic site with one or two web pages and a blog.

On the average, you can get a reasonably priced hosting plan that offers 100 or 200GB of disk space.

Factors that effect Transfer limits

Any communications with your site that involves the transferring of data to or from your site is taken into account against your monthly transfer limits. Web sites that host very active forums or streaming content need loads of transfer bandwidth. On average, a web site will receive less than 100GB per month if they have a basic web site and low levels of visitors (less than 100 per day).

Email Accounts

The most basic hosting plans limit the number of email accounts you can setup and the total amount of storage than can be allocated to email. In today’s market, it is not unusual for a provider to offer you more than 100 email accounts under their most basic plan.

Features relating to email should also include a web based email system that allows you to access your email via a web browser in addition to your favorite email client.

Databases

This is usually another limit imposed by hosting providers. A database is an application that operates in the background to store data that will be accessed multiple times but with the option to format the data in a variety of presentation formats. Applications that use a database would be an online photo album, a membership list manager or a blog.

The most basic plans should offer you 5 to 10 databases and a database engine such as MS SQL or MySQL.

Additional Features

Every good hosting provider should give you freebies. These should be things that can really benefit your site the most such as Google Adwords credits, easy to install applications, a nice control panel for managing your site (like CPanel or Plesk), support for Frontpage, PHP, CGI, Java or Coldfusion, and a Statistics application to help you monitor your web site traffic.

A Simple, Quick Start Solution

But all of this may still not be enough to help you get started. You may just want a plan to help you get started quickly and help you design your own web site online. Well, an answer comes in a package called ‘Web Site Tonight‘.

With WebSite Tonight – and its more than 800 easy-to-use templates – you can build your own Web site even if you have no technical skills. Just open your Internet browser, select your images and type your text. Just like that, your site gets built or updated.

Take advantage of these favorite features and visitors will think your site was built by a professional!

• Flash Animation Introductions – Select from over 60 introductions in various categories.
• Music Upload – Add music to your Flash Intro or to a specific Web site page.
• Forum – Create a forum for visitors to post messages or engage in discussions
• RSS Feeds – Plug your site into various RSS (Real Simple Syndication) news feeds that keep your content fresh and visitors coming back for more.
• Guestbook – Add a guestbook to your site to see who’s been visiting!
• Video Uploads – Add movie and video files to your site.

Visit the site today and view the product tour to see how it works.

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