Web Hosting: 4 Factors in Choosing a Hosting Company
When choosing a web hosting company there are a whole
lot of different factors that should go into your decision
making process. One of the biggest factors should be:
1) Phone support. Email support is nice, but email occasionally
falls in between the virtual cracks. Getting someone on
the phone when your site goes down can take a lot of mystery
out of the entire process. A lot of the bigger web hosting
companies offer toll free support and weekend hours to boot.
Phone support is a great benefit for any web hosting client.
2)Another factor to use in deciding whether to use a particular
web hosting company is their history. How long has this
company been in business? Web hosting companies that have
been in existence for less than a year might not be the
best choice. A hosting company with a proven track record
and a ton of happy clients is certainly a good sign and
might work well for you.
3)How about the company's software? This varies widely
between web hosting companies. I am rather fond of Cpanel
merely because I am used to it, understand where the buttons
are and what the features do. It's much easier to stick
with something you know than switching to a new User Interface.
Some web hosts offer Frontpage features and others don't.
Another specific area you might want to research are the
statistics programs. What sort of web statistics software
is included with your web hosting account? Is Awstats included?
This is one area you definitely want to heavily research
before signing up.
4)Fees. I'd rather pay a little more to get all the features
than fight it out with a sub par web hosting company who
I can't reach if my site goes down. I've found decent web
hosting for as cheap as $4 per month but generally pay around
$15 per month if I want all the bells and whistles that
I'll need to host a larger site. A lot of people worry about
hosting fees, but I've had the experience that I generally
get what I pay for. Finally, I'd look carefully at the web
hosting company's refund policy. Most offer a full refund
if you aren't happy with your service. If you are paying
for a full year of web hosting up front, you might want
to examine the company's refund policy in detail.
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