How To Choose A Web Host That's Right For You	Visited: 1376 Not rated Rate: Select 1 - Terrible 2 - Poor 3 - Average 4 - Good 5 - Outstanding
by Angela Rohner November 04, 2002

One of the toughest decisions you will make for your web site is where it will be hosted. Because of the difficulties involved with transferring to a new web host should your old web host fail you, most people want to pick the right host in the beginning so that they will not have to look for another web host 3 months later.

If you will be hosting a commercial site or a site that requires optimal service, then you should not be as concerned with the price as maybe someone with a hobby or personal site would be. As the old saying goes: "You get what you pay for." That is not to say that lower priced hosting accounts are not as good as higher priced accounts, but you may receive a significantly less amount of features than you would with a hosting account that is a little more per month. You must also watch out for web hosting companies that pop up over night. Sometimes, it is better to go with a company that has been around longer and that has a proven track record of success. You must thoroughly research web hosting companies and their accounts before deciding which one to go with. You do not want to have to go through the hassle of transfering to another web host later on down the road, nor do you want bad service.

Depending on your needs and resources, it may be more beneficial to look for a single company that will provide you with total Internet Solutions, such as web design, web development, web site updates, hosting, and even internet access for your employees if it is needed. When you deal with 1 company versus 3 or 4 different companies for your Internet solutions, it will more than likely be a smoother ride if something goes wrong, and you are less likely to have the misunderstandings or confusions that you may have when dealing with different companies for your different tasks.

An example of what can happen when dealing with too many different companies: John Doe owns an online gift shop. He hired a design firm to design his site, hosted with Billy Bob's Web Hosting, and hired a web developer and programmer from a web development company to implement and FTP his web site. After the design firm finished creating the design for his site, he sends it over to the development firm to have it implemented. But the development firm says that the design was not sent in the correct format for the web and must be converted. John Doe then has to go back to his design firm to have them correct the problem. After correcting te problem, John Doe sends the graphic in the correct format and size to the development firm and the development firm implements the design. But when the development firm FTP's the web site to Billy Bob's Hosting, the e-commerce database that they created will not work on John Doe's account at Billy Bob's because there needs to be certain extensions installed on the server, and many other measures need to be taken for the e-commerce database for John Doe's web site to work correctly. By the time all of the parties involved are contacted, and until the proper measures are taken, it will be one big, confusing mess of frustration and delays before John Doe's web site works properly.

The Solution: If you need a lot of work done, and you expect to spend more than $20,000 on your web site with e-commerce, database, and other advanced solutions, you may want to go with just one company to avoid problems. If your web site does not need too many fancy databases or e-commerce solutions, you can save a lot of money by hosting with one of the hosting companies in this directory.