Web hosting reviews

In order to choose the best web hosting for beginners, we identified several factors for you to first consider about your website. Some of the factors considered in Part 1 of this article were website complexity, the type of content it is going to contain, and your level of technical expertise in setting it up and getting it online. In this example, you want to get off to a quick start, so you’re just going to publish a basic personal website. (We’re also assuming that you’ve already registered your new website’s domain name with GoDaddy.com or some other Internet registrar.)

Since it’s a basic site, we learned that all the best web hosting packages for beginners provide enough online resources and tools to satisfy your site’s basic requirements. An easy-to-use web design program, file manager, and email system are always provisioned, along with enough storage space and monthly network bandwidth to get your site up and running. (”Unlimited” storage and bandwidth allowances are now quickly becoming the norm.) Additional services can always be purchased later to meet more advanced requirements as you become more adventurous with your website.

Now that your website’s preliminary requirements have been determined, it’s time to move on to consider several more important topics. How long do you plan on keeping your personal site online? Monthly plans are the standard offering, some with very attractive discounts for a year or multi-year engagements. If you’re truly serious about putting up a website, I’d suggest subscribing to at least a one-year plan. This not only gives you enough time to become established online, but you’ll also be taking advantage of any special savings.

Credit cards are typically the way you pay for your hosting account. Your hosting company usually keeps your credit card number in their database to facilitate auto-renewals of your hosting account; most all send periodic renewal notices prior to your plan’s expiration. Since you don’t want your website to disappear from the internet, I’d strongly suggest having your account set up this way. You won’t run the risk, then, of having your hosting account suspended due to your forgetting to renew it.

The reliability of your hosting company and network should be important to you too, so you’ll want to surf some of their sites and do a little research. Here are a few things to look for when comparing the best web hosting for beginners providers:

- Refer to each hosting plan’s full list of features and make sure your website will be hosted on a quality server like Dell, HP, Sun, or Compaq. Generic “white boxes” are cheaper to deploy but are less reliable.

- Is toll-free technical support included in your web hosting package? Email and chat support are common, but you may want - or need - the ability to talk “live” to a technician for some support issues.

- One IP address is typically shared among the more inexpensive hosting accounts all located on the same server. If any of these “neighbors” of yours engage in disreputable behavior like spamming, that IP may be blocked. This effectively can make your own website inaccessible to others. If that happens, get your own IP address for your website; it’s typically only a couple dollars per month extra.

These tips may seem like a lot to remember, but if you do, you’ll be one of the better-informed new webmasters out there and will come out ahead. Try to take full advantage of any pricing specials being offered. Make your pick and it won’t be long before you’ll have your own unique presence on the World Wide Web. Enjoy!

Tags: affordable web hosting
Filed under: affordable web hosting