Web Hosts For Small Businesses

Finding small business web hosts which are good quality can sometimes be a challenge especially for individuals and businesses which are on a limited budget. This is due to the fact that the high-end hosting companies centre on the corporate market or on high traffic websites. They aren’t very much interested in the small and home office divisions due to the scale of operations being low, and the margins being less.

All this has led to the burgeoning of scores of web hosts that tend to offer shared hosting packages to small and medium companies. The majority of these web hosts don’t have the technical or financial muscle in order to provide services which are state-of the-art. Some of them own one or two servers whereas there are many others who offer reselling solutions.

It is therefore important to study the claims and market pitches of small web hosts thoroughly, before you decide to host your website on their servers. You must especially try to avoid resellers. The resellers might convince you of high quality service but aren’t in any position to offer those services because they don’t own hosting companies. They are in effect only acting as middlemen.

To find a host which is reliable, you will need to make a short list of potential web hosts in your city. You can then visit their offices and check if their claims are correct, especially the hardware that they own. You cannot do this cross-checking when you buy web space on the net. If at all possible, you should try to get the list of websites hosted by the web host. You will then be able to contact owners of these websites, and find out what their experience is.

You must try to find out which hosts can offer the required services, as well as their costs. Hosting companies will need to be evaluated for their knowledge and accuracy through asking questions. You will have to ensure the honesty of the host as well as the commitment towards the customers by asking them questions which are relevant.

You should choose a flexible host, scalable and who can grow along with your business. You will have to keep an eye out for signs of rudeness, impatience and unresponsiveness in a host. To start off with, don’t enter a long-term contract for hosting. If you can have more than one site, try to consider spreading them among several hosts.

As small hosts tend to understand the requirements of small businesses better, you might tend to feel more comfortable with them. Nevertheless, you mustn’t try to be carried away by hosts who offer you more than you require and skimp on support. The customer will be expected to be technically knowledgeable and self-sufficient to negotiate prices for hosting which are able to be negotiated.


J. M. Stevens is contributing editor at WebDesignArticles.net. This article may be reproduced provided that its complete content, links and author byline are kept intact and unchanged. No additional links permitted. Hyperlinks and/or URLs must remain both human clickable and search engine spiderable.

Best Options For Big Websites

Dedicated hosting services are required by large websites that tend to generate high volumes of traffic. Although these websites often start by using a shared server, after a while, they need to scale operations in order to meet the demand. Other companies also exist, which need huge storage space, and therefore prefer not to share space with smaller companies.

In both of these cases, dedicated hosting providers can be useful. They are medium-sized or large companies and are able to provide dedicated resources. In contrast, the small web hosts don’t have the financial or technical muscle able to provide dedicated hosting.

A host that can provide you with dedicated services will need to rent out the whole server, rather than just a portion of it. This can only be done if he has several servers in the first place. For this to be done, the web host will need to make large investments in hardware and software, and will also need to maintain a technical team in order to meet the client’s needs.

Further to all this, the web host should also be in a position to provide the hardware and the software that a client requires. This could signify extra investment. The hosting service will, quite obviously, recover the investment by charging expensive fees but this return will only come in later. Initially the investment will need to be made in order to attract clients.

The hosting service will also have to plan for redundancy. Indeed, this industry is very fast-moving, and what may be latest technology today may become completely outdated by the end of the year. The web host will therefore need to upgrade technology regularly in order to be able to provide the clients with state-of-the-art equipment.

Your web host must also be in a position to provide you with both managed and un-managed hosting. In the case of managed hosting, the web host should have a technical team that should take care of all troubleshooting. The client will only be responsible for content hosting. In the case of un-managed servers, the host will provide the physical security, storage space and the bandwidth. All the rest will be left to the client to take care of.

Always bear in mind that all web hosts are not the same and one therefore will need to check the level of customization and up-gradation being offered by different hosts. You will also need to check the safety and security of the data. There should be no break in and the site should be protected against mischievous hacking and attacks. This implies that the web host must build proper firewalls to keep the hackers completely away.


James Reid is contributing editor at WebDesignArticles.net. This article may be reproduced provided that its complete content, links and author byline are kept intact and unchanged. No additional links permitted. Hyperlinks and/or URLs must remain both human clickable and search engine spiderable.