The first thing to consider is the feature set being offered. However before you spend any time feature shopping you need to have an idea of how much disk space you need for now and the future and how much traffic you expect to receive. You should also know if you need databases, how many and whether or not you will be building more websites in the future. These are difficult questions to answer especially if you are new to website development. To help make selecting a web hosting service plan easier the following is a rule of thumb guide that can lend some direction for making an educated choice.

• Small websites (1 – 5 pages) with low traffic volume, no need for a database and limited future expansion can use free and the cheapest hosting service.
• Sites that have 6 – 50 pages, use graphics/videos, a database or two, a few forms, with a moderate level of traffic should opt for the next higher level of hosting services. This generally ranges from $3.49 to $8.99 per month and is typically the most appropriate hosting plan for most sites. If you are planning on adding more websites in the future make sure the hosting plan will allow multiple domains.
• Sites that have 6 – 50 pages or more use lots of graphics/videos, lots of content, high level of user interaction, maybe offering lots of downloaded information with a high level of traffic, and plans to add more sites in the future, need to select a higher level of hosting. You will find this level of hosting will be in the range of $6.99 to $17.99 per month.
• For sites on the upper level of capabilities which include perhaps 100’s of pages with heavy use of graphics/videos, content, interactivity, high level of security, extreme level of traffic (lucky you), plans for future growth, need to select the highest level of hosting services. For sites like this, generally you need dedicated services. Pricing ranges from $14.99 to $99.00 per month.

Once you figure out what level of hosting service you’ll need you can begin your shopping. The things that are of most importance are the amount disk space, bandwidth, databases, and domains you can get for current and future needs. In general you want to get the largest set of features you can. There is a broad range of features offered by the various hosting companies but you’ll find that individual hosting plans are similar from company to company. So what is the difference maker from one company to another?

Perhaps the most important factor and the difference maker for selecting a hosting provider is customer support. There are many things that you have to know when managing a website, such as the uploading of files, domain management, DNS setup, Email setup and other misc. web operations. A good hosting provider will be able to give you customer phone support anytime of the day or night, and can reply to emails in 1 or 4 hours. The customer support team should be knowledgeable and supportive enough to help solve any problem that you may encounter. A good thing to do is call customer support of a few hosting companies and ask a few questions. See what kind of response you get. Were they readily available? Could they answer your basic questions? Here’s a good question to ask: Will there be any penalties for either upgrading or downgrading hosting features?

Some web hosting providers offer a wide selection of free add-on applications to allow additional functionality to be quickly and easily added to your site. This is a distinct advantage as this factor alone can make a significant difference in your success. The question here is will the customer support staff help you install new applications?

One more consideration before selecting a hosting provider is to evaluate whether or not the hosting provider can offer everything you might need to run a website. Besides the basic hosting plan, does the company offer Dedicated Servers, Dedicated IP’s, SSL’s, eMail Accounts, Domain Registration, Website Marketing Tools, Traffic Analysis Tools, eCommerce Support, Shopping Carts, Web Design Tools and Website Management Tools? You may never need these things but if you do it is far easier to integrate and manage these features if they are provided by one hosting provider.

Once you have carefully considered the above mentioned factors, you will be ready to select a web hosting provider for your website. A good place to end your web hosting shopping is at the Web Hosting Goods Store.

Web hosting enables you to create a piece of cyberspace (a website) that contains documents, news, information, files, and email that represent your business. To create this space, you need to have a direct connection to the internet infrastructure as well as a shared or dedicated server from which to operate your website and email. Most business owners cannot afford to own web servers and the associated Internet infrastructure. The cost of maintaining and operating such systems can be quite high and requires an extensive technical knowledge in IT operations. A more affordable solution for business owners as well as individuals, is hosting services provided by companies that specialize in web hosting. In short, web hosting companies rent out their server space to those who want to own websites. This makes it possible for anyone to own and operate a website by substantially reducing the cost and eliminating the task of performing and managing hosting operations.

The process of setting up and obtaining web hosting is a simple and quick task. For less than one hundred dollars per year and within fifteen minutes you can have server space ready, willing and able to start providing the world your glorious new information.

To set up a website through a web hosting company, you have to become a registered member of the chosen company. Once an account is set up, you will have to select the type of hosting needed for your web environment. Don’t worry, if you need help with this aspect simply contact the support staff at the hosting company, they will be glad to help. After this is done, you will receive a login and password that will enable you to access the web and email servers. Assuming your website has been created, and is ready, it can be uploaded to the server where it will become instantly available to millions of potential new customers.

There are many types of web hosting plans providing various levels of operation for your site:
- The simplest and lowest cost hosting plans offer basic functionality for the creation of small websites at low to moderate traffic levels.
- Other slightly more costly plans provide a higher level of server options, databases, languages, disk space and bandwidth.
- Some web hosting plans also provide security and even a web design application for do it yourself website design.
- If your site will contain large amounts of data in the form of graphics, videos, pictures or text content you should opt for a plan with large disk space capacity.
- If you expect your website to accommodate many visitors (1000 or more per day), you should opt for a hosting plan that offers higher bandwidth ratings.
- At the highest levels of operation you can opt for a dedicated server with unlimited capacities.
- If you plan on having multiple websites select a web hosting plan that supports multiple sites on the same plan.
- Last and perhaps the most important is to make sure you select a hosting plan that comes with 24 x 7 customer support.

There are a number of important components that are essential for proper functioning of a web space. When selecting a hosting plan a general rule of thumb is to select the next higher level of hosting than what you think is necessary. This will provide you expansion room as your internet business begins to grow. If you do not want to deal with the technicalities of all this, simply contact the customer support team of the selected hosting company. They will be glad to guide you through the process of selecting and setting up your web hosting.

Web Hosting | Internet Web Design | Internet Website Marketing

 
Before you start spending money for domain names, web hosting service, SSL’s, merchant accounts or any other eCommerce item, take the time to learn about eCommerce. Do a Google search for “how to build an eCommerce business”; find and read as much information as you need to understand what it takes to setup and run an eCommerce business. Be careful however, there is a plethora of free information that can quickly become overwhelming. At this point you only need to understand the basics; there will be plenty of opportunities to master the details as you move forward in the development of your new business.

 
If you are new to the online eCommerce world it is vital to your success that you learn the basics of online sales. After doing your homework and having gained an understanding of eCommerce you can begin by answering fundamental questions related to your online aspirations. How many products will you sell, one or hundreds? Will you be providing informational content about your products or services?  Do you want a simple catalog type site or will you include a lead-in informational home page? How many visitors do you anticipate having each month? What form of payment will you accept? In the case of shipping products, what shipping methods will you use? How will you maintain inventory control? These are important questions that you must answer before selecting or shopping for eCommerce web tools and products.

 
Once you have a thorough understanding of what it is you wish to accomplish, you can begin shopping for eCommerce and web hosting services that are right for your needs and budget. Traditionally, web hosting refers to the service that maintains a Web site’s content at a specified URL or domain, making that content available to web surfers worldwide. Today it is typical to find eCommerce tools bundled together in a low cost all inclusive package.

One of the more important services of an eCommerce hosting package you’ll need to consider is the shopping cart application. This is the tool you will use to build your online store.  Most hosting companies provide a demo of this tool and perhaps customer support is available to answer any questions you may have. Be sure to test out the tool. Does it have the capacity to handle the number of products you wish to sell? Does it include built in inventory control, live shipping rates, foreign sales?  Besides the shopping cart tools provided by web hosting providers, there are also hundreds of third party shopping cart applications available. These can be found by searching the internet. One thing to note, a shopping cart provided by a web hosting provider generally is an integrated package so you are likely to have less integration problems, enhanced features and better support.   

 
When it comes to selecting web hosting for your eCommerce store make sure the hosting company can provide the backbone features you’ll need for success. What are backbone features?

 
Available disk space. The disk space provided to store your site text, graphics, scripts, and tools.
Connection bandwidth. The amount of traffic your site can handle.
Customer Support. 24×7 is needed.
Site uptime Guarantee. Nothing less than 99.9% will do.
Expandability/Scalability. You want the ability to grow your site with additional products or upgrades. 

Take the time to ask questions about these features, if your hosting plan has any short coming with any of these features you may have problems to overcome later on.

 
The role of eCommerce and its influence on our life is nearly beyond measure; it is here to stay and will continue to grow and be a viable way to shop for products and services in the future. It is becoming increasingly easier for entrepreneurs to set up and run an online store. For those entrepreneurs that are looking to generate additional income or replace an income, there has never in history been an easier or more cost effective way to sell products or services. Be brave, take action, you too can be successful with your very own eCommerce business.

Web Hosting, Internet Web Design, Internet Website Marketing 

1. Databases
Be sure you are getting ample databases to support and expand your website. All blogging, forum, and Websites that use any form of dynamic data applications or capture user data require a database to function. Unfortunately, most shared hosting packages only offer one to five databases; this can limit your ability to expand and may not be enough to carry out the planned functions of your website. The minimum number of databases you should look for is ten. Granted you may not need that many but if you do they will be readily available without spending additional money to add on databases. Usually the higher priced hosing plans offer more databases but you should not have to opt for a more expensive plan to get 10 databases.

2. Multiple Domains Set-Up
Web hosting companies usually limit the number of domains you can serve from your hosting plan. Some hosting plans, usually the lower cost or free plans, only allow one domain name per plan. If you are for sure you will only have one website then this will be of no consequence. However, if you plan on having multiple websites then you should look for a hosting plan that offers the ability to host multiple sites from a single hosting plan. A hosting plan that offers at least 5 domains is a minimum. You should be aware that the resources of your hosting server will be shared by all domains assigned to the web hosting plan. Make sure the plan you get provides ample disk space, bandwidth and databases to keep multiple sites up and running.    

3. Developer Support
Developer support is the litmus test for any Web host. You may be starting with a simple website but as time goes on many times you may want to add additional functionality or features to your site. Also when adding new websites to your hosting plan additional capabilities may be needed. This is where a hosting provider can easily make or break your plans. If your web hosting provider is limited on developer languages or web application offerings you may have to find a new hosting provider. This is something you do not want to do. Having multiple hosting accounts or hosting providers is a sure way for confusion and frustration. Most hosting companies offer various language support and misc. application support but why not get it all. Yes there are hosting providers that offer everything you will ever need and it doesn’t cost any more.
 
No matter what hosting package you are considering, make sure you are getting the most support possible. Below is a list of the most popular website development items available:

• PHP
• MySQL
• Ruby on Rails
• Python
• CGI
• Perl
• Java
• ASP.net
• Coldfusion
• Frontpage Server Extensions
• Content Managment Tools
• eCommerce Solutions
• Project Management Tools
• Blogs
• Message Board/Forum Tools
• Photo Gallery Tools
• Admin Tools
• Misc. web-site add-ons

4. Customer support
Working late at night on that website, or perhaps on the weekend (Sunday Night)? Got a deadline to get a site up and running but just ran into a problem. Perhaps you just discovered you need an additional web app or database. It can be very frustrating and sometimes costly if you cannot get customer support from your hosting company when you need it (on your schedule). Always look for a web hosting service provider that provides 24×7 customer support. That is 24 hours a day 7 days a week and I don’t mean just Email support. Email support is important and should be part of the customer support package but what you really want is phone support. Many times problems or issues need to be discussed to reach a quick resolution, passing Emails around can takes days or sometimes weeks. Your number one tool for support should be the phone, make sure your web hosting company is awake and working when you are. You will want to make sure there is an on-line knowledgebase as well. Not only is a knowledgebase good for answering questions, it is also very usefull as a learning tool.  

5. Server Uptime
Your website should be up and running 24×7. However things do happen in the real world that can sometimes cause a website to go down. In spite of real world problems, your web hosting provider should offer a 99.9% uptime guarantee. With today’s internet technology there are ways to insure websites stay functional virtually every minute of every day. Don’t settle for a hosting company that cannot guarantee your website is up and running around the clock.   

Web hosting is the backbone of the success of your website. While the content of your site is vitally important, any short coming in your web hosting service is sure to translate to failure at your site. The hosting company you start with is most likely the one you will stay with, so take the time to choose the right web hosting company from the start, you’ll be glad you did.

Web Hosting, Internet Web Design, Internet Website Marketing 

Web hosting is basically the process of providing a connection service which enables website files to be accessed for interaction by individuals on their personal PC. This can only be done by web hosting service providers as it is only them who have dedicated computers, which are directly connected to the internet. These computers are used to serve up websites onto the internet, lending them their official name as “servers”.  Servers, while providing a place for websites to exist, also are the backbone to the World Wide Web, their connection to the internet provides instant website access to anyone, anywhere in the world. 

Web hosting service providers generally host many thousands of web sites that require high speed computers with large data storage capacity and fast connection to the internet. They have an abundant, but set amount of access to the internet, which they rent out in the form of  hosting plans or hosting packages. In addition most web hosting service companies provide additional services, tools and applications necessary for establishing and running a successful web site. In order to have a website on the internet a hosting plan must be purchased from a hosting company. Once you have a plan set up, you can upload your website files to the hosting company server for access VIA the internet.

In order to have your own website you need to do more than just rent space from a web hosting company. For example, you will need to design or create the website, either personally or by hiring the services of a professional web designer. In the case of an online store or ecommerce website you will need to establish additional services to collect payment. If you want to blog or have an open informational forum you will need other specialized services.

Whatever form of internet activity you wish to carry out you will have to enlist the services of a web hosting company. Be sure to shop around before signing up for a hosting plan, there are thousands web hosting companies and prices vary from free to costly. One word of caution, hosting services are becoming quite inexpensive, however avoid the free hosting plans that are available. These will only cause you grief, select a quality hosting plan even if it costs three – six bucks more than free.

Web Hosting, Internet Web Design, Internet Website Marketing