Choosing a company to host your site can be overwhelming; especially when you consider
that there are so many website hosting providers in the industry. You will find that web hosting
plans are competitive from company to company in the way of price and features. Some are very affordable while others are on the pricey side and may cost you over
$100 per month. If you are looking to build a professional website, and save money
while doing so, budget web hosting is the best solution for you.
At First Glance
In general, budget web hosting refers to any provider that offers service for less
than $10 per month. When evaluating a hosting company, you should take into consideration
how well they explain their features in their website and how professional the website
looks(Yes! it does count). Are the features listed and clearly defined?
You are trying to establish a professional
online presence so their website should
reflect the professionalism you are looking for. Is all the information you need
easily accessible from the homepage? How will you
contact them with questions? By
email? By phone? Is there a toll-free number? Frequent calls to a web hosting provider
in Charlotte, North Carolina could get very inexpensive from your home in New York.
These answers are critical as a company that does not carry themselves in a professional
manner probably will not provide professional service. Lack of support should raise
an immediate red flag.
The Guarantee
When shopping for a budget web hosting company it is always best to choose one offering a reliable guarantee. Some providers do not openly advertise satisfaction guarantees
while others will offer a full refund over a given period of time. You will have
to look deep within the terms and conditions of a company that does not openly publish
this information. If you find their guarantee to be unreasonable or if there is
none at all, it is better to take your search somewhere else.
Aside from satisfactory guarantees, you should also keep an eye out for uptime guarantees.
A web hosting provider’s uptime guarantee refers to how long the server is active
and serving your pages to the web. Almost every company will offer an uptime guarantee
of 99%, meaning they are essentially guaranteeing that your site will be functional
99% of the time. That downtime of 1% would represent an estimated 8 hours of downtime
for the entire year.
The best way to ensure an uptime guarantee is to find out what kind of servers a
particular company uses and how they go about protecting them. Some will publish
this information in the “About Us” or “Support” section of their site. A reliable
company should have no problem giving this information via email or telephone.
Reliable and Continuous Support
Even a budget host should give you several features that enable your site to succeed.
You will likely require multiple email accounts and domains, scripts for e-commerce
purposes and database access. Do they offer marketing tools that will give your
site that big push? How about the setup of your site in general? It is important
to learn what type of after-sale support is offered for setting up the account and
publishing your site on the web. Nothing is more frustrating than being stuck with
no guidance.
You should not have to sacrifice on features or overall quality just because you
are seeking web hosting on a budget. By doing your homework you will find that both
can be achieved with a web hosting company that is just right for your business.
Reliable Servers:
Some hosts will oversell their plans to make a profit. For this reason, you should
take that “unlimited” offer into consideration and weigh your options carefully.
Make sure the host offers a decent uptime Guarantee(usually 99.9%).
Money back Guarantee
Most of the reliable hosting companies provide a good 30 day money back Guarantee. Good examples are Arvixe(60 Day Money Back Guarantee) and
Hostgator((45 Day Money Back Guarantee). A good money back Guarantee shows confidence of the website hosting company.
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