Choosing a webhost | Hosting Glossary | Internet Marketing Home
Before you have your website built it is important to consider hosting your site, it needs somewhere to live. There are 3 basic options available Hosing the site on your computer, can be a cheaper alternative than paying for hosting. But it is important to consider that the computer/server on which the site is hosted must be switched on 24 hours a day (unless you have some kind of "opening hours") with this you would need a high speed internet connection, a 56Kbps modem would not be adequate, so a broadband connection would be advisable. Hosting the site on a dedicated server is probably the most comprehensive way of doing the best for your website, because this server is dedicated to your website you are not sharing it with others websites as is the case with "shared hosting" this makes administration and security easier to mange. You would of course need someone with technical knowledge to manage the server, this could make your website more expensive to manage this is also exasperated by the fact that dedicated hosting can be as much as 20X the cost of shared hosting. Getting someone else to host the site is on balance the best route for hosting your website, while you may lack a bit of usability and control. If you have a new website or a relatively small site that offer services and information without the requirement for big downloads or high volume visitors then this is the best package for you, you will get support and help from your webhost until you get the required experience to be more adventurous with a dedicated server. |
FeaturesWeb hosts will offer you many features. See Hosting Glossary Webhost research Try to find a a list of some of the sites hosted by them and contact the owners and ask them what they think of there webhost. Terms and Conditions Read this carefully (especially with free host or companies that design and host) you could find your self in a position that you don;t actually own your own website. |
Types of hosting: free, paid and dedicated.If you run a site that is for family and friends to post there pictures and isn't a commercial website then there is no need for you to pay for web hosting you can get free web hosting from many places on the internet. Although paying for web hosting has many advantages over free hosting. Paying for your hosting package will probably enable more features for you to work with (databases, auto responders and shopping carts to mention just a few). Technical support can be vital should you run into any problems and while some free webhost's offer support it is usually no as effective. The server itself will be faster than a free server because the free host will probably have many many websites to host. If you are a paying customer then you will be treated like a paying customer rather than getting the attitude "what do you expect for nothing". Many free webhost's will but banner or even worse pop-up adds on your website, this is fine for family and friends but if you are trying to attract business this can make your website look "tacky" . Finally don't think that just because you have paid someone you are guaranteed an excellent service, there will always be a "bad" company out there, do you research first and pick a webhost on recommendations rather than the first one you find on the search engines. Like most things, you get what you pay for. You will never get as good hosting from a free web host as from a paid one but if you are building a site for fun or a small commercial site, free hosting is the best option. |
Purple Parrot offers web hosting services for private and business use.Web HostingWe offer two web hosting packages (contact us for prices)
All have free submission to 10 Search Engines Dedicated ServersWe can supply you with a dedicated server at £850 Per Year |
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