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Seven Common Web Hosting Mistakes to Avoid

Web hosting services are extremely beneficial for the business or individual looking to establish a web presence.  However, this market consists of many pitfalls and without taking precautions, you could fall right through.  Here are seven common mistakes you want to avoid when looking for a web hosting provider.

1.) Take the Price Bait

True, hosting plans are generally affordable these days.  At the same time, you should know that the cheapest price usually doesn’t translate into the best service.  There is nothing wrong with purchasing the so-called “cheap” plan, but use your instincts to make sure the host isn’t sacrificing quality for that low price.

2.) Fail to Define Your Website Requirements

One of the worst things you can do is enter a web hosting contract without knowing what your site needs.  This could end up costing you a lot of money and grief in the end.  To avoid this, jot down and seek all the features and resources your site needs to successful.  Moreover, put emphasis on a host that provides an easy way to upgrade as your needs increase.

3.) Excuse a Poorly Designed Site

More than likely, you are looking to create a professional website to promote yourself online.  If this is the case, then why would you choose a web host whose site lacks professionalism?   A hosting company that does not take the time to properly design their site probably cannot provide the tools you need to create a professional site of your own.  They don’t care about their own image so, why would they care for yours?

4.) Put Too Many Eggs in One Basket

On the surface, hosting multiple websites on a single account appears to be a good idea.  Unfortunately, this is often not the case.  If you intend to generate money from one or more of your websites, you may want to strongly consider running them on separate servers.  Just think if something happens to the provider’s server.  Can you really afford to have all your sites down at once?

5.) Fall for the Testimonials

It is refreshing to see positive feedback on the web host you’re looking to do business with.  That doesn’t mean you should always take all hosting testimonials at face value.  Many companies have been known to toot their own horn so you need to be very cautious when approaching testimonials.  Instead of putting all your faith in what you see on the company’s website, get out and comb the web for some genuine customer feedback.

6.) Rely on Someone Else to Backup Your Data

Most web hosting companies backup their servers and customer data on a regular base.  The key term here is most.  You should never rely on a web host to perform such critical tasks.  If you really want the ability to restore your data, back it up yourself.

7.) Trust that a Host Utilizes the Latest Technology

CheapHostingRUs optimizes its servers with load balancing. SuperIncredibleHost fights network attacks with DDoS protection and intrusion detection.  That doesn’t mean the host you’re looking into takes the same precautions.  Never assume that a prospective hosting company is using the necessary technologies and security mechanism to keep you protected.   If not, you just could be in for a rude awakening.


Comprehending Website Traffic Terminology

Analyzing traffic can be crucial to the planning and further development of your website.  When accessing traffic data, it is important to know what you’re actually looking at.  Hit counters such as those built with earlier versions of Microsoft FrontPage can be rather misleading and give you very inflated stats.  This counter and others like it only report numbers and make for a poor method of obtaining accurate, detailed website statistics.  Even the more comprehensive tools such as AwStats and Webalizer can be a bit much if you don’t know what the terminology means.  We will try to clear some of those terms up in this article.

The Hit

A hit is what you get after one of the files from your site is requested and served.  This could be an HTML document, image file or an audio track.  Pages that contain a lot of elements generally yield a high number of hits.  While hits sound good, they are actually of very little importance when it comes to analyzing your traffic.

The Page View

A page view is simply that.  Just like the hit, it does not really give you a good indication of how many different visitors are stopping by your site.  It is however, an effective way to judge the stickiness of your site, which refers to the site’s ability to retain the interest of visitors.  Carefully analyzing page views could go a long in boosting your ad revenues.

The Unique Visitor

The unique visitor area is where your true stats lie, the ones that really count for something.  Hence the name, it refers to a visitor that has a unique IP address, usually visiting the site for the first time on a given day or period.  Thus, even if a visitor refreshes or comes in and out of your site multiple times, they will only be counted for once, thus giving you one unique visitor.  This is the stat that will actually tell you how many people are visiting your site per day, per week and per month, providing a much more accurate way to analyze the performance of your site.

The Referrer

A referrer is not all that difficult to understand.  It simply refers to the origins of the visitor to your website such as the last site they visited, the page on that site and many other insightful details.  This information can be helpful for your affiliate programs and networking ventures.

Conclusion

Going over and analyzing your website traffic data can be vital to its longevity.  Though it may take up a chunk of your time, you will find that this is time well spent.  You don’t want to spend too much time on it though.  After all, you probably also need to put effort into promotions, networking, checking on links, creating new content and all that fun stuff that goes into maintaining a website.  No one ever said that running a website was easy, but it sure can be rewarding when giving it your all. 


Getting to Know Web Hosting Terms

When you are hunting for a service to host your website, you are likely to encounter a language that is unfamiliar and just plain old confusing.  Aside from the all the different types of hosting and servers, you have a host of words and phrases used to describe all the underlying technologies.  The purpose of this article is to arm you with a little knowledge about the most common web hosting terms.

Web Server

A web server can refer to one of two things: a web server application, or the computer that application is running on.  An open-source program, Apache is the most widely installed web server and usually accompanies the Linux platform.  Microsoft IIS (Internet Information Services) is designed to run on the Windows platform.  The major difference between the two is the technologies they support.  Apaches is naturally compatible with open-source technologies such as PHP and MySQL and IIS utilizes Microsoft products like ASP and MS SQL.

Platform

The platform refers to the operating system installed on the server.  There are numerous platforms but Windows and Linux are the most popular.  The differences between these systems varies greatly depending on the type of hosting involved.  For example, you won’t necessarily feel the impact of Windows or Linux when hosting on a shared server, but that all changes when using a dedicated server.  In this environment, you need to get more hands on and therefore, choose the system you are the most comfortable with.

Control Panel

A control panel is a software application that allows you to manage your website.  Capabilities are only limited by the features of your account but the basics including setting up emails accounts, creating databases and viewing website statistics.  The control panel is one of the most important features as it acts as the administrative office for your hosting account.

Bandwidth

Bandwidth is a critical resource relied on by web surfers, hosting companies and internet service providers.  On the web hosting market, it is often called data transfer because it refers to the amount of data transferred from your site.  Without enough of it, your site can’t function.   You will find that some companies offer fixed bandwidth allotments while others advertise “unlimited”.

Disk Storage

Disk storage or disk space, refers to the capacity on a computer hard drive.  In regard to web hosting, it describes the amount of space that has been allocated to you on the server.  This space is what you need in order to store your files, documents and applications.   Similar to bandwidth, disk storage is either offered in fixed allotments or as unlimited.

Uptime

Uptime essentially refers to the availability of your site.  Most hosting providers offer a 99.9% uptime guarantee, which is typically calculated over a monthly period.   The keyword here is “guarantee” so you want to find out how you are compensated should your site be down longer than advertised.

This is just some of the technical jargon frequently used in the world of web hosting.  It all may sound foreign now, but you will get to know these terms quite well after becoming more familiar with your hosting account.


Overselling in The Hosting Business

Though always at the center of controversy, overselling continues to be an integral part of today’s web hosting industry.  Unfortunately, this practice places the customer in a tough situation because many of them are unknowingly putting themselves at risk.  Regardless of what attracted you to a hosting package, it is important that you know how to recognize overselling and what actually lies behind this common marketing ploy.

The Truth About Unlimited

The web hosting industry has become highly competitive in recent times and companies are doing whatever it takes to gain that competitive edge.  One of the most effective ploys used to gain this advantage is the offering of “unlimited” or “unmetered” bandwidth.  While it all sounds good on the surface and definitely better than capped amounts, you should know that these claims are simply marketing tactics employed to add appeal to a hosting package.  In fact, it is impossible for unlimited bandwidth to exist since the resource itself has physical limitations.  The same can be said for disk space as every server is limited to a certain capacity.

You can better understand the relationship of overselling and unlimited offerings when looking at the situation from a financial aspect.  Hosting providers have to purchase bandwidth and the more they give you, the less profit they make.  What allows a host to get away with overselling is the fact that most customers only use a small portion of the bandwidth that is available to them.  Some have this technique down to a science, making fairly accurate predictions in regard to how much overselling they can do before upgrades need to be made.  When done correctly, they can safely offer these unlimited bundles and still remain highly profitable.

The truth is, most web hosting providers oversell bandwidth, proven by the saturation of unlimited packages on the market.  Fortunately, most hosts are responsible and actively monitor bandwidth usage to ensure that customers do not exceed their allotments.  This is critical because one or two bandwidth heavy-traffic sites could ultimately lead to the unavailability of all other sites relying on the pipe.  Why be angry at the busy website owner when it is actually the web host who as it fault?.  There is a chance of exceeding bandwidth usage with a fixed packages but you can generally gauge the situation better and elude many of the problems associated with overselling.

Stay in the Know

It is hard to ignore an unlimited package that comes at the right price with great support and all the features you have been looking for.  In the end, the decision is up to you.  We recommend that you do your homework and seek out the company offering the most reliable service.  By doing so, you can better assure your chance of getting a solution where your site stays up and running opposed to experiencing problems all the time.  Just take the glamorous unlimited hosting package for what it is, and if it truly suits your needs, go for it.


Considerations for Comparing Web Hosts

Upon deciding that you need a website, it is a good rule of thumb to compare web hosts in order to get the best possible service.  While such a process could take days and possibility longer, you will find that it is worth the time and effort invested.  There are so many hosts to choose from and not all are created equal.  Jumping the gun and picking the first service provider you run across is perhaps the worst thing you can do.

What are Your Requirements?

When setting out to compare hosting providers, it is important to first determine what type of hosting you actually need.  On the web you will find personal sites, information sites, small business sites and thriving e-commerce sites.  For the most part, these websites are powered by different types of web hosting.  For example, if you only desire a simple homepage, you probably will not require the features and resources provided by a professional web hosting service.  However, if you intend on starting an online business, you will need an adequate supply of disk storage space and bandwidth along with a specific set of features.  You are the only one who can determine exactly what your website needs.  Once these needs are determined, it is time to get out there, make a few comparisons and find a host able to meet those requirements.

There are many factors that must be taken into consideration when comparing services.  Here are a few to keep in mind:

Overall Costs: The price you pay for a web hosting package will always be key.  The array of different services tend to translates to varying price ranges.  Before signing up, you want to find out how much service you are required to purchase in terms of time frame and learn if any other fees apply.  This is critical as the price you see advertised isn’t always what you get.  Setup costs and other tricky fees could come back to haunt you.

Control Panel: If this is your first time with a website, the control panel will be your best friend.  This type of software allows inexperienced users to effectively manage their web hosting environment.  Because no two control panels are the same, you need a web host that provides one you feel comfortable with.  When comparing services, look for a host that offers a control panel demo you can play with.

Customer Support: Whatever the plans for your website, you need a web hosting service that offers quality support.  This is an area you want to put emphasis on as some companies are terrible at responding to issues.  Don’t just be satisfied with a host that gives you email support Monday through Friday.  Look for one that can deliver responsive assistance whenever you need it.

Comparing web hosting providers is the best way to find a good service.  Even though there are thousands of companies to choose from, there are also numerous resources that simplify the process.  You can get the answers you seek by checking out a few web hosting rating, review and comparison sites on the web.


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