How To Find The Best Webhost
What is Hosting?
Hosting is where you buy space on a server (which is a big commercial computer storage space). You usually pay a monthly fee for your hosting service and the fees can vary a lot depending on the hosting company that you choose.
When you buy hosting you buy your very own space on a server. Your server is where you put all of your website files so that your website can load when someone enters your domain name into the browser bar of your internet program.
Hope I haven’t lost you there.
If you want a different analogy. Your domain name is essentially your address on the internet and your hosting is the land where you build your house. Your house is where you store all of your files that you need for your website (or blog)
Why do you need your own hosting?
It’s a matter of control.
There are many different website options out there and it’s really hard to figure out what the best web site hosting solution is for you. It really depends on your individual situation. As an internet marketing newbie, the easiest option would be to choose a package where domain name, hosting and website templates are all bundled together in the same package.In this scenario, setting up the website is extremely easy especially for the newbie because you don’t need to know anything about websites, hosting, ftp or html. All you have to do is choose a template, add your content and bingo you have a website.
The problem is that you have no control. You can’t customize the website template. You can’t choose your domain name. You have no idea which keywords have been used on the site. You cannot control the layout of the site. If the company you choose to design and host your website goes out of business or changes its terms and conditions then you may loose your entire business.
Yes, buying your own domain, organizing your own hosting and using ftp programs is harder, but you know exactly what you are doing and you have complete control. Once you have all of the information, you don’t necessarily have to do all of the work yourself. It all comes down to what you have more of – time or money? If you have more time then use it to learn how to do all of this stuff yourself in the beginning at least, anyway. If you have more money than time then you can pay someone else to set up your website for you but if you have the knowledge yourself you can ask for exactly what you want and need and you can check that the job is done properly at the end. (Paying someone else to do a job is called outsourcing).
When you own your own domain name and hosting no-one can take your business away from you.
Hosting Platform
Linux or Windows?
This does NOT refer to the operating system on your computer. It refers to the operating system of the server. Linux is better because if offers more features. It is the more commonly used server operating system and is supports mySQL databases. (You need this for a self-hosted wordpress blog)
A linux server can be used with any personal computer operating system, windows, mac, etc. It has nothing to do with your desktop/laptop operating system.
Type of Server
Shared vs Dedicated?
This decision is based on the amount of space that you need for your website files and the amount of traffic that you anticipate to your website.
There are 3 levels of web hosting.
The most basic of which is a shared server account.
There are various levels of basic webhosting depending on which web hosting company you choose. I think that the best webhost company is hostgator.
Their hatchling package allows only one website (domain) which is probably not the type of web hosting account to choose if you plan to be a successful affiliate marketer. As an internet marketer, you definitely won’t make your fortune from just one website.
(Internet marketing is all about multiple streams of income – small amounts each week or month from many, many different websites, in many different markets – you learn how to make one small website a successful money-making entity and then you move onto the next one)
Their other packages allow multiple domain names and have unlimited disk space and bandwidth. To see the details of the different account sizes and prices click here. All of your domain names are on the one c-panel which can get a bit confusing once the number of your websites gets beyond about 10.
The next level of hosting is a reseller account. There are various levels of reseller accounts depending on how much disk space and bandwidth you need. The reseller accounts are still on a shared server but they do have their own ip address and you can resell space on the server to anyone else and charge for it.
The final level is having your own dedicated server and you usually need this only if you have an extremely large website with many, many hundreds of webpages connected together. You may also need your own dedicated server if you have massive amounts of traffic visiting your website. (This is a problem that we all need – it’s like having too much money!)
What is Disk Space and Bandwidth?
Just like you choose the size of your hard drive in your desktop or laptop computer, you can choose the amount of storage space on your server – this is your disk space.
Bandwidth is basically the amount of data that is downloaded from your server to your visitor’s web browser program. (Everytime someone visits your website or any website for that matter the website files are dowloaded onto the visitor’s computer and this download is calculated in your monthly bandwidth quota)
Image files are larger files than straight text or html files so having a lot of images on your website will increase your bandwidth requirements. Video uses up even more bandwidth. So the amount of bandwidth that you need per month depends on the size of your website and the amount of people per month who will be viewing it.
The Best Webhost Has These 5 Things:
C-panel (control panel)
this is a graphical interface that is designed to make the process of hosting a website simple.
FTP Access
is the ability to upload and download files to and from your server using an FTP (file transfer protocal) program
MySQL database
is a database application that is most commonly used with the wordpress program (wordpress is the program that you use to set up a blog)
Traffic Statistics
-so that you can monitor the number of visitors to your site. You can see which countries they come from. What time of day they visit and many other parameters.
Support
the best website hosting has support available 24/7. This is particularly important for internet marketers who live outside of USA timezones. Having 24/7 support available is crucial because if your website severs goes down you want the problem fixed asap.
Click here to take a look at what I think is the best web site hosting in terms of both value and service.
Related posts:
how to video, website | imnd | July 20, 2009
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hi blogger?
Great! it look pretty, clever and sweet. i love it so much? thanks
cheers,
Can anyone suggest a reliable Dedicated Server hosting that is not very expensive?~.’
You can get great deals here. I’m not sure if they are the cheapest but they are extremely reliable and have fantastic customer service.
Anne
Dedicated servers are the best when you want a stable webhost. *,”
when possible, i always use a dedicated server for my webhosting needs eventhough it is expensive”,*