Posts Tagged ‘hosting’

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How to Choose a Hosting Plan for Your Site

Tuesday, June 16th, 2009

So you think you want to start up a website.  Prior posts from me were about domain name choice and website creation.  Next we will discuss hosting:  One of the critical decisions you will have to make is what type of hosting plan to use and what hosting provider to choose.

Once you have created the pages for your website, now you want to publish it to the internet.  To have your website seen on the internet you will need to choose a hosting plan.  A hosting plan is different from a domain name.  You own your domain name but you rent a hosting plan.  With a hosting plan you will be paying a service provider to publish your website on the internet for all to see.  Let’s go over some of the key important factors to consider when choosing a hosting plan:

SERVICE  The most important consideration is the level of service provided.  Bells and whistles and fancy features will do you no good if you can’t get customer service in a timely fashion.  After you have published, or “gone live” on the internet, the last thing you want is for the website to go down and become unavailable to potential customers.  Therefore should a problem occur it is important to select a hosting provider that is readily available and will resolve the issue in as timely a manner as possible.

UPTIME  What is the hosting company’s “uptime guarantee”? Many guarantee 99% uptime for their servers.  That sounds great, but it does mean that your site could go down for 1% of the time, which means over 7 hours out of each month! The best hosting providers will have a track record of up to 99.9% uptime, which essentially guarantees you that downtime is negligible or even non-existent.

SIZE  How large is your site?  One of the determining factors for the price of most hosting plans is the amount of space required to store the website on their server’s hard drive.  If your website will be media rich with videos or music or photo files, or a large e-commerce site with a lot of catalogue pages, you will have to take space into consideration as a criteria for choosing the right hosting plan.

LINUX OR WINDOWS  This question refers to the operating systems available for hosting and which one to choose.  This question has no relevance to the brand of operating system you are using on your computer.  The determining factor here is what programming language was used to design the website.  For example, if CGI or PHP programming language was used, the best choice for the hosting operating system would be Linux.  For a website designed with ASP, the best choice would be Windows.  For the novice user who is building a simple html website the above may not be a consideration at first, but may become important later on as you become more experienced and add more features to your website.

TRAFFIC  Will you be expecting lots of visitors to your website?  Most hosting providers sell their hosting plans on a sliding scale according to bandwith usage.  The more visitors or traffic you expect on your site, the higher the bandwidth you will need, and the more the plan will cost.  The best advice here is to start off with a low cost, low bandwidth plan and upgrade it later as the traffic to your website grows.

 

SHARED OR DEDICATED HOSTING  The question of shared vs. dedicated hosting is really answered in a very simple way:  First a brief description of shared hosting, which is sharing space on a server with dozens or perhaps hundreds of other websites.  The main factor here is that you will have no control over the operating system, database structure, etc., and will have to work within the structure setup by the hosting provider.  Dedicated or virtual dedicated hosting is different in the sense that you will have full control over the environment that your website resides in, and you will have the only access to that space.  In other words, you would determine what operating system to use, what type database management software, what type of blog software, what type shopping cart, etc., etc.  This type of hosting is definitely geared to the more advanced user, and usually you won’t be able to get as much customer support because it will be a custom setup.  The bottom line:  start off with shared hosting if you are a beginner, until you are advanced enough to progress to your own controlled dedicated hosting environment.

At StartMyWebsiteToday.com our uptime guarantee is 99.9% and we offer 24/7 customer service.  The hosting plans that are offered include a variety: shared hosting, virtual dedicated hosting, and dedicated hosting plans with either Linux or Windows operating systems for every need and budget ranging from the small personal website to large online multimedia sites to those interested in ecommerce website building. To review the options we offer, click HERE: Hosting plans.

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Web Design and Web Hosting Facilities Are Valuable Tools

Thursday, May 28th, 2009

Web Design and hosting facilities have made a significant difference to businesses large and small.  These web design and hosting facilities could make a great difference to other businesses that have not already taken advantage of these tools.  Data shows that the use of web sites accessed via the internet have increased profits for the businesses that use them.  The main attraction is the global exposure that can come with web design and hosting facilities.  Companies that once had to depend on business in one town or area can now reach clients around the world.  This could increase the client base from one hundred thousand to one hundred million with a web site on the internet.

Web Design and hosting facilities are helpful to business with all degrees of computer expertise.  If a company has their own web site designer, they are probably a large, profitable company that can afford this expense.  A good web design and hosting facility has web designers available at a cost.  These experts usually have great experience designing web sites so they know the important features that should be included on each web site.  These people are usually very talented artists and technical experts who can create effective web sites and great tools for sales and marketing.

Web Design and Hosting Facilities Help Businesses that Lack Computer Expertise

An excellent SEO web design hosted by a great facility could make a significant difference for a business.  Web sites offer different capabilities, and some of these depend on the effectiveness of the web design.  A web site can describe the products, provide facilities for ordering products and provide the latest news on the products.  The web design can be well written or confusing.  The web site can make ordering the product easy or difficult.  Customers are not all computer experts so they come to a web site with a wide variety of computer skills.  A web site that is easy for everyone will be more effective than one that is easy only for those with computer expertise.

A web design and hosting service will provide access from all over the world.The clients come from a variety of cultures and with different language skills.  Many will be fluent in English while others will have limited language capabilities.A good web design will accommodate this wide variety of clients.A customer who cannot easily use the web site may give up in frustration to explore an alternative web site.This could mean lost business to a competitor.

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Traffic To Your Website Begins With Domain Name Choice

Wednesday, May 27th, 2009

So you want to start up a website?  One of the best things you can help yourself with in your domain name choice is to develop a strategy and plan of attack.  A well chosen domain is a key component to your website’s success. Hopefully at this stage of the game you already know that Search Engine placement is critical to getting visitors to your website.  Among other factors, the domain name you choose will help you in getting to the “top of the charts”.

What if someone already owns the domain name you covet?  Would it still be possible to buy the domain name?  Maybe.  It’s possible, but there are some things to consider.  With some research and hard work you can possibly obtain the name from the current domain name owner.  Instead, let’s check out some alternative strategies to get the domain name you want:

Hyphenated Names One strategy to consider if the domain name you want is already taken would be to hyphenate it, as in turning ricksantiqueshop.com into ricks-antique-shop.com.  Is hyphenating the best way to go?  Yes and no.  For example, if the domain name you want is already taken AND well known, most likely this is not a good idea, because most web surfers would likely just type the non-hyphenated version into their browsers and thus could end up at your competitor’s website.  Not a good strategy.  Word to the wise: keep the domain name as short as possible.  The longer the name, especially with dashes in between words, the more likely that potential visitors to your site will enter it incorrectly into their browsers, thus foiling the chances of them visiting your website and costing you customers!  So keep it short.  But if the name you have chosen is already taken and there is no chance of getting it from it’s owner, and the owner either has no website or a poorly designed one with little traffic, this can be a good strategy in purchasing a name.

Longer or Shorter?  You can purchase domain names up to 67 characters in length.  You could purchase a domain name like thelongestdomainnameintheworldandthensome
andthensomemoreandmore.com which is 63 characters long, but why would you want to do that?  Who would want to type it into a browser?  My website is www.StartMyWebsiteToday.com    When choosing my domain name I wanted something that in a few words would tell the web surfer what to expect from my website.  Good name selection can be helpful also with search engine ranking.  When choosing your domain name try to keep it short and concise, and if at all possible let the name tell the story of the site.  Shorter is better here.

Brand Name or Generic  Should you give your website a descriptive generic name or do you want to use a brand name?  Definitely if your business is known by a fairly well known brand name, then you would want to try and secure that as your domain name.  Budweiser.com is a site that is well known and gets a lot of traffic, even though there is nothing specifically in the domain name that says anything about beer.  But because Budweiser is known all over the world as a beer brand, people know what they are getting when they surf to the website.  If your brand name is well known, definitely try to obtain your brand name as a domain name.  But if your company is Nike or Coca Cola or Budweiser don’t discount the idea of buying the domain name shoes.com or soda.com or beer.com if they are available as well.  People often search the web using generic terms, more so even than brand names.  A person is more likely to search the internet with generic terms like shoes or footwear or sneakers than to search by a single brand name, even one as big as Nike.  Research your domain name as thoroughly as you can, including looking for generic keywords which could be a good fit as a potential domain name.  You can have as many domain names as you want pointing to a single website, so the more generic terms you can acquire that directly describe your business, the better.   A generic name if your business is new or not yet well known can get great results, if you can find a good one.  To start your search for your own unique domain name, here is a link to a domain name search engine.

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Help! My Website Needs a Good Domain Name

Tuesday, May 26th, 2009

A crucial building block in setting up a website is the choice of a domain name.  Whether you are building a site to advertise your local business, an e-commerce site, photo or video or music download site, information site, or if you want to start up a website to advertise your garage band, the entire undertaking begins with the registration of a domain name.

Next you might ask- “What is the best choice of domain name?”.  There are various factors to take into consideration.  What I mean by that is if your site is just going to be devoted to family photos and events, domain name choice isn’t as important as it might be otherwise.  Why?  Most likely in that case you’re not looking for lots of traffic, friends and family are your desired visitors, to keep them informed.  So your domain name choice in a case like that is not as crucial as it would be if you were looking for tons of traffic to the site.   

So you can name a website anything as long as it is only meant for a select few.  It’s only if traffic is a factor and you want to attract customers, and as many as possible, that the domain name you choose to register really matters.  So……

What if you want as much traffic to your website as possible?  What if you are looking for business on the internet?

The simple answer is, it pays to have a domain name that drives traffic to your website or company.  If your website is about car parts for example, do you really expect the average web surfer to remember how to get to your website if it is named “bobsthingsforsale.com” or some other unrelated name?  The best strategy is to find a domain name that directly relates to your business, whether it is the business name itself or related to the category of business.  For example, a car parts website should have a domain name like carparts.com or bobsautoparts.com, something that immediately associates the domain name with the theme of the site.  It’s all about branding, and making a lasting impression on the target audience or customers.

The WhoIs database contains all domain names registered, and when you are searching it will show whether or not your desired name is already registered.  I have conveniently placed a domain name search engine on StartMyWebsiteToday.com for this very purpose.  When searching for the domain name, the results given will instantly show whether or not the domain name is available, and if so, give you the option to immediately register it.  If it’s not available, several alternative domain names will be proposed, to help you fine tune your search, or possibly giving you an acceptable alternative domain name to register instead.

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Give Designing Your Own Website Your Best Shot

Thursday, May 14th, 2009

Personal web hosting can be a great deal of fun and allow for a considerable amount of personal satisfaction when the job is done.  There are many websites that encourage, support and even assist the website owner as they create their own web page.If you decide that you would like to provide your own personal web hosting, there are hosts that will allow you to do just that.  Homestead.com is a website that encourages the self-creation of the website, even going so far as to make available 2,000 “professionally designed website-in-a-box”.  These “quicksites” are created by website design professionals at a much-reduced rate of what an actual independent web design expert would charge.

Why Personal Web Hosting Could Be Your Answer

Homestead.com has taken the fear out of personal web hosting and web site creation and personal web hosting.  They have 2,000 Quicksite designs for your web page that are organized into various categories to choose from whether your business is a restaurant or retail, now you can find the one that best matches your business and you are ready to begin.  Homestead.com is an award-winning site for their creation and editing tools, having simplified the program to a basic point, click, drag and drop creative process.  They have an image library that provides over 250,000 royalty free, quality stock photos that can be used as chosen on the web page.  It is possible to get and register a personal domain with your business name.  If that domain name is unavailable, they have multiple website consultants to help you creatively choose alternative names.  If you already own a domain name, your current name will be compatible with any Homestead website.

A competitor in the personal web hosting market is the Hyperstreet website builder.  They have over 15,00 template combinations and over 900 unique designs for web page set up.  Their website building program has built over half a million websites, providing a high quality of professional designs to fit the needs of most businesses.  Their constant rate of development and growth keep them competitive in the fast growing technological world of ecommerce and information.They have a program that allows you to upload your own images, logos and other designs to make your website your very own. 

How to Choose Which One is Best For You

If you have decided to try personal web hosting, make sure to actively research the various companies that offer such a service.The two discussed earlier are not the only options and it would be wise to be well educated prior to making any decisions.  Remember, this is the company that will represent your business image and support your success or failure in the future.

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