Web Hosting Reviews and Tips

It’s difficult to chose right web hosting service for your web site at the time when there are numerous of web hosting providers all assuring for identical web hosting packages. So its necessary to take care of 3 aspects before starting a web hosting search which are given below. Features required for web hosting Technical requirements for a web site is the most important point to be taken into consideration which includes-

a) Hardware requirements and platform for server

According to your need such as if you want to set up a website that uses programming environments such as Active Server Pages (ASP), Visual Basic scripts, Cold Fusion or Microsoft Access or Microsoft SQL database, then a need for a web hosting service will arise that supports Windows platform such as Windows NT or Windows 2000 servers.

Similarly as for programming languages such as Perl, CGI, SSI, PHP or mySQL database, then any web hosting plans that support Unix/Linux platform can be helpful. After having these types of requirements in mind one can decide for the best web hosting plan.

b) Disk space & Bandwidth requirement

Next technical requirement to be taken care of is disk space and bandwidth requirement, however disk space requirement may not be a big deal if you want to publish website with very less contents. Generally 200 MB to 500MB disk space will be quite enough as hosting requirements. Further for hosting a website with enormous amount of graphic pictures, mp3 or video files, a web hosting providing huge disk space example 500 to 1000 MB will be crucial. In the same manner site traffic estimation can be held responsible for bandwidth requirement .A website that attracts high traffic will tend to consume monthly bandwidth allowance very fast, then in that case one web hosting service that offers huge bandwidth with 40GB to 100 GB per month is needed.

Web hosting service that provides sufficient amount of disk space and bandwidth can be opted as per website requirement and that consideration will help not only to reduce costs but also tend to proper disk management.

c) Some other hosting features

Apart from above there are many other hosting features that are to taken into consideration such as Is web hosting provider supports video clips on the website? Is there any plan for setting a virtual store online? Is the host providing e-commerce facilities without charging more and top of all finding number of email accounts provided, number of FTP accounts, web statistic software etc.

Trustworthiness and scalability

If the web-hosting provider is offering reliable server uptime and fast Internet connection then it can be considered as a good host. For selecting an appropriate provider one must look for a web hosting service that guarantee 99% server uptime with high speed internet using at least OC3 (Optical Carrier) lines (155 Megabits per second) or above instead of T1 or T3 lines. A trustworthy hosting provider invests hugely on high performance servers, high speed multiple backbones providers with fail-over redundancy, backup power generators and firewall software protection in place so as to ensure they fulfill the uptime guarantee specified in the terms of service.

In the same manner selection would depend upon the hosting service that can ensure hardware facilities that are designed for scalability, so that they can also expand with user’s business. For example if requirement emerges for increasing disk space, bandwidth or number of mySQL databases, there should not emerge any problem and that all can be upgraded easily.

Customer service and support

Last but not the least excellent customer service and support is also important while selecting appropriate host provider. A web hosting provider must provide 24 hours a day, 7 days a week technical support with highly experienced technicians, so as to ensure timely resolution of any problem. Checking must be made by sending inquiry emails to the web-hosting provider so as to check the responsiveness of the customer support. Generally if a response comes within 24 hours can be considered as indication of acceptance but if no response comes then it is taken as a poor customer service. In world of competition, a web hosting provider must be also equipped with multiple support like Toll-free phone support, 24/7 email support, live chat, FAQ etc.

Apart of above important factors some other minor factors must also brew taken care of while selecting an appropriate web hosting provider like since how long that provider is in business and quantity of customers they hold as these shows the credibility and stability of the company. Cost of web hosting is an important factor also but due to growing competition now their charges have come to as low as US$10 per month and so this major factor needs to be ignored. Thus besides of all most important is that the website hosting requirements are met, website is always accessible with good speed, there is scalability in provider to grow and expand the website and that it also offers best customer support.

There are a number of ways that you can attract traffic to your blog. One of the fastest ways is link exchanging or for blogging it is sometimes called friending. This means that basically you link your blog as being friends with other related blogs. Joining communities with like interests is also a great way to attract readers to your blog. Most of the time if they like what you have to say on a particular topic they are willing to head over and see what you have to say on other topics.

This is just one way there are plenty of others such as posting videos on your blog. Funny clips or political clips especially if they are being hosted by larger video sites can provide you with an excellent source of traffic. Friends and family can also be a primary source of traffic. While this is primarily true of personal blogs you can easily create business blogs that are also word of mouth based.

Social networking is a great way to bring traffic to your blog. You start of with a small friends list, this list is expanded by the friends your friends have on their list and so forth. You could easily gain traffic from these lists and thanks to Web 2.0 technology you can post to several social networking sites all at the same time.

If you have a website that already generates traffic make use of the traffic that is already on your site. Simply post the links and menu option to your blog and put excerpts on your website. This is especially useful in business applications where you can simply put a link to the blog post detailing updates to your business and future plans.

These are the biggest ways that you are going to be able to drive traffic to your website. There are other ways such as used email marketing and press releases and other forms of article directory submissions. Basically you use your blog as the link in for the articles. This is again, usually done for business purposes since driving this type of traffic is strictly for the purpose of increasing income.

For the most part if you are blogging for fun you are not really going to be worrying about how many people view your blog. You are going to want to however keep people interested in reading which means you are going to need to come up with topics that are going to have people returning to your blog. This is the second portion of generating traffic and that is the process of keeping the traffic you have already generated returning to your site.

In order to do this your content must be interesting, up to date and written in a manner that is going to make people want to come back and read what you have to say. This is the most important aspect to not only generating but maintaining website traffic on your site.

You are selling a great product or set of products. Maybe you offer a great service online that if people knew about it, you know they would like it.

Ok so step one for you is complete, and that is finding your niche as to what your business is all about. Step 2 is getting the word out there, and to do so in a cost effective manner.

Welcome to the Internet. The place where anything is possible and the medium that levels the playing field, or so you would think, to the point where the super stars such as Walmart look no bigger online then you.

Obviously being a startup business and on a tight budget you want to be able to reach as many people in your target market as possible, and at the least amount of cost.

So how about getting your advetising in front of 112 million people and more? How about exposing what it is you sell and offer to nearly a billion people world wide and do so for just pennies?

Sounds crazy and unrealistic right? Well it is not. With the formation of Web 2.0, which is really just a fancy tech term describing the way the Internet has evolved into a medium where people connect, the estimated, according to Technorati, 112 million bloggers may be the best way to go these days.

There are literally thousands of blog hosting companies out there. These companies have customers who do nothing more than post their reviews and opinions on a subject, in what they call their Blogs.

Our company has written dozens of articles on blogging to educate, not only our customers, but the Internet community in general. If you would like to learn more about blogging, check out our articles on our website. For now, in this multi-part series, we are going to concentrate on how to use bloggers as your means of advertising.

Bloggers are always looking for ways to fill up that “white” space they have on their blogs. A great way to do that is to place some type of advertising there. It fills a need they are looking for. It also allows them to make some extra money, and you as the advertiser, get to put your product or service in front of literally millions, for pennies.

There are two ways you can go about this. You can contact every blog related to what you are offering and ask them to advertise. With 112 million blogs to choose from, you should start immediately right? Well option two is signing on with a company whose main focus is handling advertising on Blogs. These companies, such as ours, focus in on having bloggers post small snippets of code on their blogs that will display a series of different advertisements that their blog readers can look further into by clicking on the link.

Your advertisement will appear on blog websites and when a reader clicks on your ad, will be taken to further information on what you are offering. What you need to look for in an ad program such as this is hidden costs.

You want to stay away from programs that charge you a fee each time someone clicks your ad. When you participate in, what is called, a pay per click program, that then leads into bidding for the ad space. Basically, whoever is willing to pay more, will appear more often. That concept basically defeates the entire purpose of the level playing field, now doesn`t it?

We will continue this discussion in part two of our article segments on how to maximize your advertising spending with minimal output and at the same time reach your target market.

By: Bruce A. Tucker