Are you thinking of creating a website? Do you want to go with the tide and take your business online? Are you looking forward to interacting with an audience throughout the world? If you are going for a website, if you are thinking of making a mark online, you need a web hosting service. A web hosting service is a platform on which all the websites are run. These are dedicated hardware and software elements that are designed to run and maintain your website.
When you are looking for a web hosting company, you will first come across lots of options for web hosting and also a lot of options for companies. The web hosting services range from shared server hosting to dedicated server hosting. The former one is the most basic plan that you can tap into to while the latter one is the type wherein you own all the hardware and software required to support your website. There are other choices too such as VPS hosting, Linux Dedicated Server, and cloud hosting which is a clever mix of the shared and dedicated plans- you exist on a shared server but your plan is optimized for your use only.
The many web hosting solutions available to you comes with different specifications. You need to understand what you are getting when you are selecting a plan to get the maximum out of your chosen plan. This is the most vital step to choose an optimum plan that will not cost you a lot but will give you all the necessary hardware components and software applications required for the smooth running of your website. The plan you choose depends on what you will be doing with your website. Here are some tips to keep in mind when you are going to choose a plan to make the maximum out of it.
5 Best Tips to Choose a Web Hosting Company
- Understanding the Requirements of Your Site
Different kinds of websites require different kinds of hardware setup. If your site is static and not likely to take much load, then you can do well with even a shared plan. If your site collects information from your users such as personal details like credit card information, then you need a highly secure plan such as a dedicated server or reseller hosting. You can check reseller hosting with ssd plans from Supporthost.com. This understanding of the needs of your website is highly crucial to make a choice that supports it. Even if the website is not likely to collect information but face a lot of traffic. Then going for a high-end plan such as VPS hosting is recommended.
- Choosing the Proper Hardware
The hardware is the founding stone of your website. If you are going for a high-end website loaded with all kinds of functions, then you need to go for a plan with high-end hardware specifications. Plans having a high RAM and more CPU cores are the most likely solutions. If you want your website to be fast loading, then a high bandwidth is required. If you are likely to collect and store information of your clients, customers, and users then going for a plan with high storage is required. Your need determines the kind of server hosting plan you should go for. Thus carefully understanding the function of your website and choosing the hardware accordingly is very necessary.
- Upgrades
When you are running your website for a long time, there will come a time when you need to upgrade your plan. Upgrading the plan implies upgrading the hardware setup to match the increasing demands of your website for resources. Shared hosting plans are great for personal sites and those who are just starting their business. These are least likely to be upgraded and at higher traffic load may even crash. So if the mean number of visitors is less, then these are the plans to go for.
VPS servers are much like shared plans but the hardware is segmented and you have a dedicated environment curated to cater to your needs. Since the hardware exists as a virtual emulation you can also upgrade this hardware easily but there will be limits to which you can upgrade. A dedicated server is such that you own the hardware resources and have unrestricted access to the hardware. Thus you can upgrade this hardware any time you need to and anyway you want to.
- Policies
When you are initially looking for web hosting services you will find that most of the plans are exceptionally cheap for beginners. Even dedicated server plans are available at very cheap rates. However, this is a strategy by the server hosting plans to get you as a customer. The renewal plans are quite expensive compared to the initial package. Thus it will do you well if you look for the renewal charges early in. going through the terms and conditions of the hosting company will give you a fair idea about what you are tapping in to.
The same goes for the refund policy and the trial period. Most web hosting companies will give you a trial period of 7 to 30 days to check how it goes with the requirements of your website. However, the trial period and refund policies are also subject to certain terms and conditions. Carefully going through all the points mentioned in the term and conditions will give you a fair idea about the functioning of your site and aid you to make a wise and well-informed decision.
- Backup
When you go online with a website, it will inevitably face problems at some time. The hardware may crash or your site may be attacked by malicious programs, viruses, or even hackers thus compromising its security. When you face such a problem you may have to take down your website for a while. But that may lead to loss of data that you have collected over all that time. The only way to ensure that there is no or minimal data loss at such times is to ensure that all your data is carefully backed up and stored elsewhere. Regular backup of data comes as part of many web hosting plans. All you need to do is check carefully what the plan is offering to understand the backup policies.
