Business Opportunities Weblog

November 11, 2007 by Dane Carlson | 5 Comments

Do you find yourself in the middle of a highly frustrating Web hosting guessing game? The blood pressure-raising process of selecting the right Web hosting plan for your company can leave you with more questions than answers.

Will you need 200 GB of bandwidth a month — or 500? A hundred email addresses should be plenty — but what if that’s not enough? How do you compare one hosting plan or provider to another? Will anyone help you sort through the conflicting claims and often-confusing terms?

Here’s an overview of the basics of Web hosting, with tips on how you can maneuver the hostile waters of hosting solutions.

What is Web hosting?

To have a Website, you must first have a Web server. But owning a Web server can be costly and requires technical expertise most businesses don’t have. This is where Web hosts come in. Web hosting companies provide the equipment and other technical resources you need without the headaches that come when you have to do it yourself.

Think of a Web host as the landlord of a building. A landlord rents out storefronts to various businesses. Each business decorates and runs its store differently, without worrying about the maintenance of the building. In a similar way, a Web host rents out space on a Web server (or an entire Web server) to various businesses. Each business builds its own Web site without worrying about the maintenance of the Web server.

The Web host provides the place on the Internet where your Web site lives. It’s a lot cheaper than buying you own server, and you don’t have to hire the technical staff to take care of it.

What kind of server should I choose?

Most businesses looking for an entry-level solution will want a shared server. Designed to host small-scale Websites or online stores, shared servers are cost-effective, and they offer novice Webmasters a reliable Web presence without requiring advanced technical skills. These servers are professionally managed and host sites from multiple clients, making them available at a fraction of the cost of a dedicated server.

For businesses with more substantial hosting needs, the following solutions are available:

Virtual Private Servers (VPS) combine the flexibility of a dedicated server with the economical costs of shared server hosting. Each VPS is a private and protected area that operates as an independent server, but allows you to share the expense of the server with the other clients on the server.

Managed Private Servers are perfect for businesses with high-traffic, resource-intensive Websites. An MPS is a dedicated server — yours is the only site hosted on it — but by outsourcing your technical needs to the Web host, you eliminate costly expenditures and have the freedom to concentrate on the success of your business.

Dedicated servers are single servers fully devoted to your needs. They allow faster access to information and provide you with greater flexibility to add your own advanced applications. (Advanced technical knowledge is recommended for clients who need dedicated servers.)

What should I look for in a Web host?

The three most important qualities you should evaluate when shopping for a Web host are experience, service, and capacity. Here are some questions to help determine if a Web host has what it takes to effectively host your Web presence.

Experience: How long has the Web host been in operation? Will they know how to ensure that a traffic spike on your server doesn’t take down your site? Who are their other clients?

Service: When are their customer service representatives available? Can you talk to them directly, by phone, if you need to, or is emailing the only option?

Capacity: Is the Web host on a Tier-1 network? (Tier-1 networks ensure seamless, secure data transit.) Is the Web host independent — or is it part of a larger corporation or network of companies?

Finally: Don’t be oversold on a Web hosting solution. There’s a Web host with the solution that’s right for your business, for where your business stands right now. Based on the growth of your company, it might not be the hosting solution you’ll need in five years or even six months, but a qualified Web host should be able to assess your hosting needs, get a sense of your business goals, and steer you to the correct solution.

This advertorial was written by Kirsten Kirlin, a member of the Verio Shared Hosting Team. Verio is a Web hosting pioneer with more than a decade of trusted service and over 500,000 business customers. For more information about Verio’s hosting plans, visit here or call 800-438-8374.

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