Monday, February 1, 2010

Affordable Web Hosting - Ups and Downs

By Nick Halmond

There are plenty of people that want to get their website online, but are not contented with the free web hosting services that are offered around the Internet. There are social networking sites and free website builders as well, but their customization features are lacking. Affordable web hosting is perhaps the best solution for people that dont want to spend too much, yet get all the nice commercial web hosting features. However, affordable web hosting has its ups and downs.

On the upside, most affordable web hosting packages are complete. They have a reasonable amount of space and bandwidth for blog sites to be hosted or even small forums to be managed. The PHP support along with other support for databases like MySQL should be enough for several different types of sites to be set up with ease.

What you should really focus on upfront is the types of back-up systems available. While it's something to worry about, there shouldn't be a problem finding a suitable site that keeps your information from being discarded in unfortunate situations. Plus, it's always nice to have back office help when needed, and FTP access if you want to upload files from the computer.

Another thing you'll want to look for is speed and security. Most affordable web hosting has uptime at 99% and speeds that reflect high speed Internet use. Even if your site is full of traffic, their servers will do the job. Just keep in mind that the more multimedia items you have on your website, the performance starts to go down some. However, just compare these to a free web hosting site and you'll notice the difference.

Unfortunately, some website owners don't understand the issues that come about with too much multimedia stuff on their site. If you mix this in with a good amount of traffic you will see a steep decline in the site's performance. When you reach this pinnacle we recommend switching over to a dedicated server. If you don't, you're sharing servers with several other websites and the experience could get worse over time.

Since you will be sharing servers with other websites most of the time, you could suffer if they're attacked by a virus. It's a major security even if you feel as though your site is secure. We always recommend backing everything up as an insurance plan so you can avoid any future issues.

Privacy may also be an issue as well since most affordable web hosting companies do not allow custom nameservers to be made. The least that you can do is pay extra for domain WHOIS privacy. Still dedicated servers offer better privacy protection and some enhanced security options as well.

So as you can see there are a few minor drawbacks to using affordable web hosting. However, they are all in the later stages of your website's success. It's important to understand when you're starting any business, you should only spend what you need to in the beginning. Once you are able to accumulate the traffic and conversion rates that will bring you a return on your investment, then it will be time to take a look at dedicated servers. For now though, stick with affordable web hosting and keep the costs down. It will truly help you out in the end. - 16890

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