It seems many people today want to start a web hosting company. Just by typing in “web hosting” into a search engine such as Google, one can see that there are many people trying to break into this market. The concept of starting a web hosting company seems very simple – start with a generic template, get a reseller account, configure some things, and start making money. But things can become much more complicated than that very quickly. There are definitely some things to keep in mind before starting a new web hosting company.
The first thing that needs to be done is to get the website going. This includes getting a template, creating pages that describe the company, its plans, and its services. When that is done, a program such as WHM Autopilot needs to be configured. This is so that when someone orders the web hosting, the order will automatically be received. Not only do these things need to be done but they need to be aesthetically pleasing as well.
Then comes the more difficult part of starting a web hosting company – the selling. As mentioned earlier, this is a very competitive market. The company needs to find people who need the service and will check out the website. On top of that, they need to find the price reasonable. A marketing plan must be developed before taking this step as there are usually cheaper, more reputable companies trying to get those same customers.
Once the company has their website and has customers, customer support becomes a big issue. The first thing to keep in mind is that customers are going to want technical support available twenty-four hours a day. If the company can’t provide this, they’re more likely to look somewhere else. Also customers will usually be paying around ten dollars a month for the hosting service. This is not very much. Because of this, when customers need to be consulted or they have a problem that needs fixing, the rate of pay for the company can drop very quickly. Larger hosts usually hire technicians to deal with these sorts of issues but that may not be a possibility until the hosting company becomes a little more established.
When running larger websites, the hosting company will usually need to offer dedicated hosting services. This is due to the fact that shared hosting only provides for a certain amount of storage space and bandwidth and this is not often enough for the larger sites. The speeds are also much faster with dedicated services than they are with shared. However, there are challenges that come with dedicated servers. They require time, maintenance, and the cost is much more than that of a shared server. The lowest a dedicated server will cost is usually around one hundred dollars but quality servers will usually cost hundreds of dollars each month to own.
For companies that aren’t going to offer plans that have major requirements, a shared server will do just fine. If a company does want to offer those plans, the advantages and disadvantages of owning a dedicated server must be looked at in great detail to know if it is the right decision.
Starting a web hosting company is definitely possible. However before one takes the plunge, it’s important to look at all aspects of it. It’s also important to make sure that there is plenty of time available to run the business and to deal with customers.
There are certain drawbacks of using free web hosts. This is because there are certain limitations regarding the services they provide. Moreover, a user is not provided with customer service, and is not provided uptime guarantee. The limitations on bandwidth, advertising and edit sites may hamper the growth plans of a company. Thus, it is advisable that you pay for the web hosting service.
However, a user should take into consideration his needs before selecting a web hosting service provider. Depending on users data transfer, disk space and other necessities, the service can cost him anything between $10 to $5000 per month according to his usage is extensive. Also, the payment can be done on monthly, annually or semi-annually basis.
In addition to your needs, web hosting reviews must also be taken into account before selecting a web hosting service provider. The reviews or ratings of the service providers are available on the Internet. Various service providers can be compared on the basis of price, traffic and space. One should also take into account the bonus or additional features provided by the web hosting providers. It is advisable that one should read the blogs regarding the web hosting service providers. They help you get a realistic feedback and thereby help you in selecting the best web hosting service provider.
Some of the other points that must be considered while choosing a top web hosting service are:
1. Bandwidth
2. Server Space
3. Control Panel
4. Support
5. Script access
The bandwidth capacity should be more than of 500 MB. However, it does not make sense to pay for capacity which you will not use. For people who run small businesses, bandwidth of one gigabyte is enough. The same holds true for server space. For personal use, 50 megabyte capacity is sufficient. Select the web hosting service provider that offers a user 24/7 customer service. This is because, in case of a problem, the customer centers will solve your problem. One can also visit their site and read the FAQ’s, since they add to the knowledge of a person.
The control panel provided by the service providers should be a simple version as will be easy to use. Make sure that the web hosting service providers facilitate you with script access. It may not be required at that moment but, may be useful for future purposes.
Since the best web hosting service adds efficiency and success to the business, due consideration must be given in selecting a service provider.
Mohammad Salay Naderi is the president of www.salaalive.com and is a well established internet entrepreneur. He teaches SEO Tools and Tips. His Web Hosting Directory and Web Hosting Reviews at www.salaalive.com are proven to be helpful for web hosting searchers. Salaalive helps its visitors find the most affordable and reliable web hosting services according to their personal or business web hosting needs.
This is a two-edged sword. First, they may do something inadvertently to obscure a site they didn’t want to obscure. Second, they don’t know how to help a client achieve that rare status of being on the web but only visible to people “in the know.” Therefore, there are reasons on both sides of this divide to know about securing and obscuring your site.
In no particular order, here are five ways of securing and obscuring your site when you want a bit of privacy:
Pull-down lists:
These are a good way to indicate to the visitors who know where your site is just what it contains, without giving up the goods to search engines. You can make links to the other important pages but the search engine spiders can’t see that text in the pull-down list. In addition, they cannot follow the links and index anything else you are surreptitiously pointing to behind the menus.
If your site does not have pull-down menus, you can add them fairly quickly without having to tear down and rebuild your entire site. This is a quick fix but perhaps not so comprehensive, so you might combine it with other maneuvers.
Text in images or media
Until recently, search engines could not read the text embedded in Flash animations and video clips. They weren’t friendly to web crawlers, but they didn’t play nice with your internal search, either. Although Adobe (which owns Flash) and other companies are now adding textual metadata into the motion graphics—something Silverlight has been doing since it was introduced—this method of obscuring/securing may be going the way of the dodo.
Of course, if you are not using the latest version of Flash, the spiders won’t find the hidden content. How long you will be able to do so is unclear, since ongoing upgrades may force your hand here. Remember, too, that HTML has always been able to associate image and text with the "ALT" tag. If you want to skulk around the web, don’t add them, although you will run afoul of the Americans with Disabilities Act that “encourages” you to help vision-impaired people using web audio readers.
Custom-configured robots.txt
The robots.txt files is a de facto web standard that gives you a way to “uninvite” at least the “polite and participating” spiders and crawlers from your site. Of course, an incorrectly configured one could also make you miss things in your own internal search indexing.
Also, robots.txt is not really a globally accepted standard, and deferring to its requests is optional for each spider. The ones from Google and Yahoo! are polite, but less etiquette-oriented ones can simply ignore your requests. To resolve the internal/external problem, you can change robots.txt to assert different rules on the different spiders. With a little work you can allow your internal search engine access wherever you want, while blocking the external ones.
Dynamic URLs, JavaScript
JavaScript and ASP are widespread technologies that enable local processing and they are not, in themselves, problematic. Developers can use them in certain ways to achieve obscurity/security, though.
You could have some local code, the function of which is to create a URL for redirecting user requests. You could make it so the URL to follow is not visible as a static link, in which case spiders will not be likely to find the referenced page.
There are other methods that may work for the purpose of obscuring or securing your content, such as forms-based secure logins, etc. If you are creating a new site and do not plan ahead for this purpose, the landing page you create in most WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) website applications will, by default, set up spider-friendly pages.
You must identify the content you wish to keep “behind the scenes” and employ special methods for doing so, both by coding and cookie-cutter steps, to make sure the goods are safe from prying eyes. You should do a lot of testing, too, since you cannot improve what you cannot test and measure. Also, be certain of what you are doing, because you may face the prospect of a complete site redesign if you change your mind.
When first going into business, many people think this way. What you may not realize is that there are so many other things that you must attend to when you are running your hosting company.
50% of the time you will spend running your hosting company will be spent trying to find effective advertising solutions to bring in customers. You will also have to allocate time to making sure your site and product offerings provide customers with the most up to date products and services that they will need.
Web hosting companies
are in competition for business. The needs of today’s online real estate owner are growing. Many people have begun online businesses and take an active part in applications like web video production, email campaigns, and online accounting. So many people use the internet for so many things. Your hosting company has to support their endeavors.
People have to have the bandwidth, ecommerce features, marketing tools, site builders and scripting abilities that they’re going to need. If your hosting company cannot provide this for them, they’re going to search elsewhere. It will not take them long to find a solution.
You will have to dedicate time to making sure your web hosting company can service the customer that just wants to build a site to commemorate his wedding as well as the customer who wants to build the site that will be the next big social networking tool.
As your customer base grows, so will your need for adequate inbound and outbound technical support. Your customer base will more than likely be an international one. This means you will need to provide technical support on a 24 hour basis from well-spoken agents that will be understandable to your primary customer base. Your agents must be trained, educated and experience. In order to achieve this you can go with one of the more effective solutions that provide inbound and outbound technical support. There are a few companies that can effectively offer this type of support.
You must find a company with a good reputation and one that is willing to allow you to take them on a trial run. If a company is confident about the service they offer and the technicians that will provide the inbound and outbound technical support to your clients, they will be happy to do this for you. In addition you’re going to want to read company reviews and meet with a few different companies before you make your final decision. Your customers will base a large part of their analysis of your company on the inbound and outbound technical support you provide. You want to make sure you choose the right company.
The web host server’s reliability and zip depends on the internet connector wellborn, bandwidth, and back-up system availability. So, for the optimum quality pair, prefer a T3 shape or higher. Why? Because it’s faster! Isn’t that saneness enough? A T1 union may be ungenerous but it lacks a undeviating back-up system. So if you’re hunting to pass your money sagely, go with a T3.
Velocity and Reliability of Servers and Element Host server’s locomote and reliability depends with internet connector property and bandwidth. So, for the welfare of your commercialism, take a T3 transfer - it is 30 times faster than a T1 link! Now, T1 is much author cheaper but it lacks punt up. Would you peril swing your line in that status? If you cerebrate your friendship offers alto quality internet link, then declare if the boniface is experienced with bandwidth management. They should be fit to belt the familiar not-more-than 50% bandwidth practice ascendence. If they apply this, then you are in treatment with the tract web entertainer for your playacting.
They should also offer a healthful back-up method or UPS in any person an emergency occurs such as state failures. And it’s flush turn if your korea multitude has two net connections just in case one of their connections goes downwardly. You’ll never eff when any of these problems testament occur and, for trusty, you don’t requisite to worsen any of your information or your web site to be inaccessible, reactionary?
In connection with what’s expressed above, also puddle trusty that the set offers 99.5% uptime insure or higher! If they pay anything minify than that, don’t accept it. Try feeding for outdo offers elsewhere.
Secure the Features of the Force Satisfy Your Needs. Before subsidence on your elite entertainer, it’s good to equate the features of the diametrical web hosting providers eldest. So straighten a thorough inclination of your required features. See if you’re wagerer off with a joint or sacred computer. Study its compatibility with your existing software. And think to hitch if it’s pliable sufficiency to conciliate changes and if there’s any domicile for upgrades. Always discuss the ulterior needs of your byplay.
Does the Web Breadstuff Proffer Dimension Resource and Mate? If you impoverishment to bonk how straight the visitant is, perception for testimonials from its existing consumers. After all, they’re the ones who bed tried and reliable the organization’s services and support scheme. Also think how lank the web hosting consort has been in commerce. As a dominance of thumb, the person they get been in the byplay, the turn. And lastly, put the link staff to the endeavour. Ask them all you impoverishment to undergo and see how they act to your inquiries and how retentive they train to get back to you with the answers. If they supply your criteria, then it’s moment to snap their accommodation
A T1 remembering may be catchpenny but it lacks a sure back-up system. So if you’re hunt to drop your money sagely, go with a T3.
Travel and Reliability of Servers and Instrumentality Computer server’s quicken and reliability depends with cyberspace connector dimension and bandwidth. So, for the sake of your playing, choose a T3 transferral - it is 30 nowadays faster than a T1 connexion! Now, T1 is some many cheaper but it lacks approve up. Would you venture putting your commerce in that place? If you anticipate your organisation offers exalted caliber cyberspace link, then aver if the innkeeper is experienced with bandwidth management.
They should be competent to itinerary the wonted not-more-than 50% bandwidth usance concept. If they recitation this, then you are in dealing with the opportune web breadstuff for your job.
They should also supply a angelical back-up system or UPS in any pillowcase an crisis occurs much as land failures. And it’s yet improve if your chosen innkeeper has two net connections upright in framing one of their connections goes downbound. You’ll never cognise when any of these problems give become and, for sure, you don’t require to lose any of your accumulation or your web place to be unobtainable, alter?
In connection with what’s expressed above, also hit trusty that the lot offers 99.5% uptime pledge or higher! If they wage anything petty than that, don’t have it. Try browsing for surpass offers elsewhere.
Assure the Features of the Copulate Agree Your Needs. Before subsidence on your korea army, it’s first to study the features of the contrary web hosting providers premier. So puddle a everlasting itemise of your required features. See if you’re better off with a common or devoted computer. Ascertain its sympathy with your existing software. And name to arrest if it’s pliable enough to comply changes and if there’s any live for upgrades. E’er conceive the prox needs of your concern.
Does the Web Boniface Provide Caliber Livelihood and Assist? If you impoverishment to mate how straight the consort is, await for testimonials from its existing consumers. After all, they’re the ones who hit reliable and reliable the accompany’s services and reason scheme. Also ponder how tall the web hosting consort has been in byplay. As a process of touch, the longer they tally been in the activity, the wagerer. And finally, put the keep staff to the try. Ask them all you poverty to copulate and see how they act to your inquiries and how sesquipedalian they ask to get substantiate to you with the answers. If they fit your criteria, then it’s moment to seize their maintenance.
Free Web Hosting Advantages
One thing about free hosting is that these sites offer all the tools you need to very quickly and easily create a page. Design and layout options, page counters, guestbooks - all of these components are very simple to add and make a professional looking page in no time.
Of course the price is right, too. You are not going to get a lot of space or bandwidth, but the idea is to create a simple page that possibly showcases one or more of your products, or simply offers a listing for further information.
With free web hosting, you might gain traffic you are otherwise missing at your main site. The free hosting site works behind the scenes to drive traffic, why not capitalize on it? Your page can also be included in the host’s directory of sites, ensuring that the host will do its best to drive traffic there.
More pages with more inbound links to your website is good SEO. This is one of the best ways to increase page ranking. As long as your free sites contain good content, the links are valuable.
How To Use A Free Site
If you want to start a pay per click campaign, you can use a free site to place your banner ads on your own free page, which will generate you even more income. There is no point setting up a large number of free sites, but one or two additional pages will take little time and effort. The trick is to ensure they are updated regularly so they achieve the best page ranking.
What free host does the author recommend?
I went through a lot of free hosts when i was starting out my website, and there are the good and there are the bad. UltimateSiteHost as a free hosting provider because it has great features
The concept of free website hosting has been popular but there are several loopholes. Thought initially it sounds that it is prudent to go for he free services, later plenty of problems arise. The amount of web space remains lesser and this become a major constraint in the way of making profits through online presence. There are several issues associated to after hosting support. Again, tenure of the site remains less and the site expires early.
Cheap website hosting with facilities of free domain name and money back seems attractive but in terms of quality it is dangerous and none of the businesses can move forward to make profits when quality is compromised. It is common that free hosting providers for monthly free data transfer, in reality these services are often ignored or delayed. Foremost it is best to make a clear comparison of the rates offered. The Australian cheap website hosting companies are popular across the countries as the web based service providers offer affordable and competitive rates. The toll free customer care numbers of these companies help to get in touch.
In the city of Sydney plenty of web based companies exist and these companies have played the key role in the successful implication of electronic commerce and application across the nation. Huge companies of Asia-Pacific and reputed business houses from corners of the globe communicate with the Sydney based cheap website companies of this city. The local newsagents sell tabloids which provide detailed description of the popular cheap hosting providers. It is advisable to be cautions regarding use of the domain names. A complex domain name might be difficult to remember. On the contrary easy to use and read domain names play a part in making local businesses successful.
In case of doubts now, in this era of internet and World Wide Web anyone can visit few of the sites that contain in-depth information on cheap hosting providers. There are different online discussion forums that help a lot to know more and more. Self analysis is the right way of selecting the cheap website hosting companies. Before hunting for a web hosting company that offer affordable rates, the required web space and the level of complexity within the sites should be known.
Remember that a web host is simply a company that provides a storage area for your website. Along with this service, they usually provide a variety of obviously necessary and other nice to have add ons. Some of these include, bandwidth, disk space, a sitebuilder, free website templates, customer and technical support, MYSQL databases, POP email accounts, Fantastico, statistics like Webalizer or referrer logs, more than one hosting plan and of course other features too numerous to mention.
More specifically, we all want and need to save money and we don’t want to waste it, so, based on what is discussed on internet forums and elsewhere the most, here is what to look for when searching for the best cheap web hosting plan. However, right away, it would be advisable to ensure you are not paying more than $10 a month for hosting, because it is not necessary unless you want extra special management controls. We’ll also assume that you only want one website, but if you plan to create more in the future, best to get a plan that allows several or unlimited domains.
For the list that follows, one point should be given for each of the 5 items if the web host has these features. When researching hosting companies, a total score of 4 is very good, but 5 is excellent.
Top 5 Cheap Web Hosting Service Features
1. Customer Service and Technical Support - does the company offer email, phone and live chat (at their website) 24 hours a day and 7 days a week (24-7)? Do they reply to your questions within 24 hours or within minutes using live chat? How would you know? Try them out, even if you’re not a customer yet - send them an email or try their live chat. Or, go to business forums like the Warrior Forum and search for similar discussions. If they have these features, then add 1 point for this company.
2. How long have they been in business? At least 1 year? Go to Google and type in "Who Is" and type in the company name, like xyz.com and see when their creation date was - if it was more than a year ago, you can at least know they have been in business for a while and will hopefully be here to stay. I would give them 1 point if they have been in business for at least 2 years to be on the safe side.
3. Do they offer unlimited bandwidth? Bandwidth can be best described as gas for a car. If your website runs out of bandwidth nobody will be able to visit it. 1GB of bandwidth is equal to over 100,000 hits. The average website uses less than 2 GB of bandwidth a month. Your bandwidth number used will normally reset back to zero on the first of every month.
Similarly, do they offer unlimited disk space? The more disk space you have the more files, pages, emails, and everything else you’ll be able to use and store. Yes, unlimited sounds excessive I know, but if they offer it, better safe than sorry. If the company offers unlimited in both cases, give them one more point.
4. Guarantees - do they offer a money back guarantee, if for any reason, you want to cancel? If it is at least a 30 day guarantee and they will refund 100% of your money, that’s good. Also, do they guarantee your site’s uptime, in other words, that it will be live on the internet all the time, or over 99.9% of the time? If that doesn’t happen, will they give you a full refund for that month? If the answers are yes to both of these questions, then add 1 more point.
5. Do they have Fantastico Deluxe? This program will allow you to install over 50 scripts instantly. Examples are WordPress, Joomla, discussion boards, ecommerce, polls and so on. Most people these days build websites based on WordPress because of it’s search engine optimization features and available plugins, so using fantastico makes it easier. Give them one point if they provide fantastico at no extra charge.
And yes, there are some free web hosting plans out there, but do they place ads on your website? Do they offer 24-7 customer service? Will Google view your site the same if you are not willing to pay for hosting each month (they know which sites are free)? Frankly, are you serious about your internet site and are you treating it as a business? If so, then you should be willing to pay out a few dollars a month for an essential service. Also, if you want to build more than one domain, do they let you build them under one account? Not likely. All in all, it is advisable to skip the free webhosting for life offers out there.
So, there you have it. If you watch for these five recommended cheap web hosting features, you should be able to find one heck of a good home for your website.
Web Host Checklist
• Reliability and Uptime of Service
• Frequent Automatic Backups
• Large Storage Capacity
• Fast Data Transfers
• High level of Security
• Dedicated Email Addresses
• Ability to Add Extra Features Easily
• Knowledgeable Customer Service Available 24/7/365
• Affordable Hosting Plans
• Money Back Guarantee (at least 30 days)
• Domain Transfer and Multiple Add-ons
• PHP/MYSQL Support
• Website Stats
• Virus and Spam Protection
• User Friendly
• Tutorials
• FTP Access
• Webmail
• CGI
• CPanel
Think About the Future
This seems like quite a long list and you may be wondering if all of this is necessary. The answer is yes. Do not neglect to research each area that is mentioned. As a beginner you might not think that you will need all of the above items to get started. Think about the future. You will only be a "newbie" for a short time. However, you will want your website to be long lasting and sustainable. Having the availability of the appropriate services from the beginning that your website will need for the long haul is much better to have upfront rather than having to begin a new search all over again as your website grows. You and your site will be grateful that you were able to Make a Checklist Before Buying a Web Host in the long run.