Success In Selling Your Web Hosting Company

Steps owners of web hosting companies can take to increase the probability of selling their company for the highest price and under the most favorable terms. TO SELL OR NOT There are a number of reasons to sell. For most business owners their wealth is tied up in the business. People sell their companies or even divisions when they want to move on with life, want to focus on another venture, or they believe the market value is high for what they have.

Businesses are not liquid A share of Exxon stock can be sold in 5 seconds, while many businesses are not even sellable. Any interest expressed by a company in the acquisition mode is worth listening to. The only time owners are 100% ready to sell is when the business is in decline and rest assured, they don’t like the valuation when that occurs. I know too many people who regret not selling when they had the opportunity and actually wanted to, but were too tough on price.

Companies seeking growth through acquisitions will almost always find something to buy. Whether it’s your company they acquire or not, it’s sometimes actually up to you. Many times sellers do their best to run buyers off, and don’t even realize it. Buyers will acquire a company they believe is a good strategic fit. You can’t control this aspect. However, with organized, timely, honest and decisive communication sellers can create a much more appealing deal.

Seller communication * It’s ok to tell someone, “Yes, I would entertain offers for my company.” This simply implies that it would be a good use of their time and money to explore your company further. It’s not a sign of desperation. * Playing “hard to get” usually informs the buyer the opposite. * Be realistic with yourself regarding price. Potential buyers can be lost forever to unrealistic expectations of “home run” offers. * Bottom line … buyers will not beg you to sell your company. There are simply too many other companies out there which are for sale.

BEING ORGANIZED

Business plans and business sales books There should not be a significant difference between a business plan used for internal management, raising money and planning, and a business sales book used to sell a business. Both of these documents should be 90% complete at all times. They give a wonderful first impression to a buyer. Never forget the buyer is the one with the cash and who is taking most of the risk. He is looking for any reason at all to walk away from the deal. Being organized and having the ability to give the buyer information in a timely manner is the MOST IMPORTANT and easiest thing you can do to increase the chance of selling your company for the highest price. Ideally, every time the buyer asks for information, it should be delivered in a timely manner, in electronic form, accurate and up to date. Try to refrain from providing 1990’s dreamy type pro-formas. They’re not in vogue anymore. One final point; buyers do realize that the last piece of due diligence information received is usually what the seller doesn’t want anyone to focus on.

Preparing the company for sale: Run your business like you plan to keep it for the long term. When sellers attempt to prepare their company for sale, many times they avoid making needed investments in the company. If you invest cash into a project that has yet to pay off, then get credit for it in the valuation.

Other thoughts: * Would you be willing to sell parts of the company or just the whole? * Do you want to stay on with the buyer or leave after closing? And why? * It is more attractive to buyers if there is someone at your company who can run the show upon your post closing departure. * Stock vs. cash for consideration? There are way too many variables regarding stock to be covered here. However, keep in mind you may prefer $900,000 in cash and $300,000 in stock, as opposed to just $1,000,000 in cash. If treated correctly, stock deals can be beneficial in many ways. THE PROCESS

The initial communication with a prospective buyer: In the first or second communication, the seller should determine who the buyer is, what they are looking for, and basically how they value it. Don’t pin the buyer down for exact valuations initially, because he doesn’t know what you have. Every business is a little different. There is no harm in telling a prospective buyer what you have in regards to number of sites, domain names, servers, employees, etc … after all it’s not your customer list. Inquire about their business and don’t forget many times the small fish eats the big fish.

Selecting an attorney: Find an attorney who has industry specific experience in mergers and acquisitions and understands the appropriate tax implications. Ask them how many deals they have done in the industry, how much they charge, etc. Please, don’t use your brother in law who is a great divorce attorney. Deals get stalled and even cancelled because an inexperienced attorney delays the process. There is a fine line between being thorough, and taking so much time with documents the buyer walks from your deal and seeks another company to acquire.

THE DOCUMENTS

The letter of intent should be short and sweet. The purpose is not to map out every single issue, rather to come to a gentlemen’s agreement on the very basic aspects of the proposed deal … without spending too much time or money. The basics which should be covered are stock vs. asset purchase/merger, valuation, consideration, assets included or not, timelines, etc. If everyone agrees to the letter of intent then each party, at their own expense, should start working on the purchase and sale and other closing items. If both parties cannot agree on a 1-3 page letter of intent within a week they typically will never make it through the entire process.

The purchase and sale agreement will spell out every aspect of the deal. If both parties agree on the letter of intent, then they should work on the purchase and sale while all of the other aspects of the due diligence process and pre-closing issues are being handled. Most of these events can and should occur simultaneously. Don’t forget, some variables are more important to the seller, while others are more important to the buyer.

Every once in a while there is a real “tough guy” on one side of the table or the other. This guy just has to have every variable to go his way or there’s “no deal!”. These guys kill mutually beneficial deals all the time and rarely accomplish anything. Hire “tough guys” for the collections department.

On a final note, always be honest and fair. This world is becoming smaller every day.

About the Author

Presently, Eric Furlow assists individuals and corporations both acquire, merge, divest and value technology companies. He has experience in over 150 transactions in the paging, SMR, cellular, tower, local phone, long distance, software, ASP, MSP, ISP and web hosting industries. He has a Masters in Finance from Bentley Graduate School of Business in Waltham, MA. Before heading up Furlow Consulting Corporation, he was the Mergers and Acquisition M

How Much Hosting Space Do You Need?

Many web hosts try to sell you a large amount of web hosting space

that then costs you a lot each month. However, you may not need this

much space. Have you ever calculated just how much disc space (MB)

your web site uses? Do you really need an expensive hosting solution

for your web site?

For my first web site, I purchased 20mb of disc space and wondered if

this would be enough as I added pages to it. Well, recently I checked

the size of this site which had grown to over 20 pages. To my

surprise the size was only 3,269KB. This means it only uses a

little over 3Mb of disk space.

Most of my friends sites also only use 2-3Mb for their sites.

Therefore it is not necessary to purchase a large amount of space for

a small site (if 20 pages = 3Mb, then 20Mb = 140 pages approx). Are

you paying TOO much for the actual space you need?

How Do You Calculate The File Size Of Your Web Site?

1. First you need to understand how file size is measured. The

smallest unit on a computer is a bit. One bit is one electronic on or

off pulse. 8 bits strung together make one byte. One byte of

information can put a letter, such as “B” on your screen.

If you put 1024 bytes together and then you have one unit of

information called a kilobyte. Put 1024 kilobytes together and you

have a megabyte. (Most floppy disks hold around 1.4 megabytes of

information). Most of your graphics and web pages are measured in

megabytes.

2. To determine your total site file size, right click on the root

folder where your web site is housed this will not only give you

the total site size but also how many files and folders are contained

in your site.

3. If you use an editor, such as FrontPage, go to the reports view,

click on the site summary and you will get a reading of the total

site file size. In Dreamweaver, just use the method in No 2.

Prepare To Expand Your Hosting Plan

You may want to add pages, graphics, features eg scripts, databases

etc, to your site in the future. Begin with a small hosting plan at

first (even 5mb is enough to start out with), and then expand it as

you add new features.

Check with your web host, if you can easily upgrade your hosting plan

as you grow your site. You don’t want to go through the hassle of

changing hosts every few months.

Once you have determined your total site file size, check what

hosting plan you have purchased and how much disc space has been

allocated for your site. If you are only using 3mb of disc space but

are paying for 100mb, then you may want to switch hosting plans and

save yourself a ton of money each year.

Herman Drost is a Certified Internet Webmaster(CIW)

owner and author of iSiteBuild.com

Low Cost Hosting, Site Design and Promotion

(http://www.isitebuild.com/sitehosting.htm)

Cheap Internet Hosting QuickTip

Cheap Internet Hosting Provider QuickTip breaks down the process of choosing a Cheap Internet Hosting Provider into simple, easy to follow steps. You will learn how to match a Cheap Internet Hosting Provider to what your Web Hosting needs are. You would think that choosing a Cheap Internet Hosting Provider would be easy. With over thousands of Web Hosting Providers offering Cheap Internet Hosting Services to consumers and businesses, it is. But choosing a reputable, reliable, dependable Web Hosting Provider offering those Cheap Internet Hosting Services takes time, effort, research, gut instinct, and common sense.

“Did you know that you can find Cheap Internet Hosting in a few, simple steps?”

You can find Cheap Internet Hosting in just a few steps. But considering that there are several thousand Web Hosting Providers vying for your business and your money, selecting the right provider offering Cheap Internet Hosting solutions for your Web Hosting intent can take some hard work, effort, and a little bit of gut instinct.

This Quickstep Guide offers you down to earth, no nonsense information to help you understand what Web Hosting Providers do, what type of services they offer, and advice on what criteria you should use in your selection process.

Already know what you are looking for in a Cheap Internet Hosting solution? If so then Click Here for the Cheap Internet Hosting Providers that receive 5 my star ratings.

“What is a Web Hosting Provider?”

In its most basic sense, a Web Hosting Provider is a company or business entity that has typically a high speed Internet connection. The company operates and maintains various types of computer servers that can run various types of operating systems such as Linux and Microsoft Windows. These Linux and Microsoft Windows servers run as web application servers and can host from one dedicated web site per server, (higher cost), to multiple web sites per server. (typically known as virtual or shared server sites).

“How do I select a Cheap Internet Hosting Provider that’s right for my needs?”

The first thing you need to do is ask yourself and assess what your intent for a web site is. Is this web site for personal use? Are you a small business seeking to expand your advertising medium? Are you a company that will conduct e-commerce transactions with either consumers or businesses?

In selecting a Cheap Internet Hosting Provider, the first thing you should look at is the company that is offering the services.

Has the Web Hosting Provider been in business for quite some time?

Does the Web Hosting Provider offer you a “Real Person” to talk to when you need assistance? Any company that offers email only assistance, be weary of.

Does the Web Hosting Provider offer 24×7 toll free access technical support? Most established providers do.

Does the Web Hosting Provider provide 24×7 monitoring of their servers and network connections. High quality service providers do.

Does the Web Hosting Provider maintain their own “Network Operations Center or Data Center?”. Higher quality Web Hosting Providers will have their own dedicated or colocated servers in a data center.

Does the Web Hosting Provider provide up to date security on their Web application servers? Do they offer multiple levels of power protection? Do they perform daily data backups?

Does the Web Hosting Provider provide an “uptime guarantee?” In a nutshell this means the provider is stating that they maintain system availability at a certain level. If the company says that it maintains 99.9% uptime, they are telling you that they have several failsafe measures built-in to ensure that their systems continue to function.

Does the Web Hosting Provider offer a unconditional money back guarantee? Well established providers do.

Does the Web Hosting Provider offer you complete access to your files that are stored on their web servers? Does the provider offer you real time statistics about your site? Do not choose a provider that imposes restrictions.

High quality Web Hosting Providers offering Cheap Internet Hosting solutions will offer many if not all of the above service features. Review their service offerings, ask questions, and most definitely shop around and compare.

About the Author

The QuickTip to Cheap Internet Hosting breaks down the process of choosing a Cheap Internet Hosting Provider into simple, easy to follow steps. You will learn how to match a Cheap Internet Hosting Provider to what your Web Hosting needs are. For more indept information on Web Hosting, PPC, Search Engines and more visit Cheap Internet Hosting QuickTips

What to Ask For at Your Web Hosting Service

Web hosting is the backbone of your online business and it is one of the most crucial services that ensures your online presence. There are thousands of web-hosting service providers and all of them claim to be the best. Therefore, it is a difficult process to identify the right web hosting service provider.

There are a few important questions that you must ask your web-hosting service provider before you sign up. Normally, the first question people ask is about the cost involved. Though it is an important factor that will help you make your decision, cost should not be treated as the primary factor. There are other crucial factors that need to be addressed.

You must first ask your web host about their average server uptime. Most of the hosting service providers advertise 99.9% uptime, but, in reality, it may not be so. There are a number of server related problems that can keep the visitors off from your website.

Second, you must ask your web host about the connection speed. You must have fast connections to give your website users an enhanced visitor experience. If the connections are slow, your website will take a long time to load and server connection will get disconnected before people can see your website, leading to annoying “The page cannot be displayed error.”

Third, you must know how much web space you get for the package you are signing up for. Most web hosts offer flexible packages. You should be able to advise your web host on the web space depending on the nature of your requirements. There are web hosting packages that range from 10mb or less to several GBs. The greater the space the greater the price.

Along with the allotted web space, you must also be clear about the data transfer bandwidth that is allowed for your package. If you anticipate high traffic, it is better to go with packages that have higher bandwidth capabilities.

The next question will be on the number of email addresses you can configure. There are many web hosting companies that offer unlimited email addresses. If you choose a lower end package, the number of email addresses may be limited to 5 or 10 or 25, depending on the web-hosting package you choose.

You must also be clear about the nature of the database tools that are available and the database types supported by your web-hosting service provider.

If your website is intended to sell your products online, it is important that you have a reliable shopping cart. Make sure you check with your web host whether you have any built-in shopping carts installed and the procedure to customize them to your specific need.

With the advent of the open source technology, web hosting service providers offer a number of free yet useful scripts for their customers bundled with the web hosting package. Check with your web host on the available free scripts, such as forums, blogs, chat support, web statistic tools, etc.

The control panel should be highly user friendly. Your list of questions to your web host must have a question about the control panel features.

Above all, the customer support capabilities of your web host and the turn-around time to resolve server related issues and other complaints is very crucial. To stand the competition, most web hosting service providers offer 24×7 customer support service to their clients. Make sure that your complaints will be addressed during weekends as well.

About the Author

Founder and actual CEO, Ricardo d’Argence has been in the field for more than ten years. Alojate.com is now one of the biggest web hosting providers in Mexico.

http://www.alojate.com http://www.alojateextra.com

5 Common Web Hosting Mistakes

Mistakes aren’t necessarily a bad thing, but if you can learn from other people’s mistakes it can save you from having to deal with them yourself. When it comes to web hosting, there are basically two kinds of mistakes - technical and general business.

Technical mistakes usually come up because of a misunderstanding of the internet and how it actually works. The first mistake many people make when creating a website is to cram as much information, photographs, images, etc. on each page as possible.

This makes the site take longer to download, leading to many visitors just moving on and never actually looking at the site. It also makes it more difficult to find what they’re looking for if the page is unorganized.

Another common error is creating a web site that isn’t search engine friendly. If the search engines can’t determine what your site is about, they aren’t going to be able to send you people who are searching for what you offer.

A mistake that many people make when starting out is to choose a host solely based on price. This is obviously an important factor, especially in the beginning, but if you choose the cheapest host you may be limited in your scalability as the website grows in popularity and traffic.

On the business side of things, the most common mistake is trying to be everything to everyone. You should have a plan for your website - a purpose for its existence - and build according to that plan.

Choose your target market and stick with it. Advertise in places they would see. Market in ways that would be of interest to them. Resist the urge to branch out into other areas just because something catches your eye. A site that tries to do everything usually ends up achieving nothing.

Another common business mistake is following the competition’s lead. You’ll obviously want to keep an eye on them to see what they’re up to, but if you copy everything they do you’ll always be one step behind.

Use your creativity and come up with unique ways to stand out from the rest of the websites in your market.

About the Author

John Lenaghan writes about web site hosting and other related topics for the Hosting Report website. For more helpful web hosting information visit http://www.hostingreport.org

Web Hosting: Which Is The Host With The Most?

Web Hosting: Which Is The Host With The Most?

by: Marc Eberhart

So you want to publish a web site do you? Welcome to the club. These days it seems that almost everyone has a web site of some kind, and thousands more continue to be launched every day. It’s challenging enough to design a site and fill it with interesting content, but when all is said and done another challenge still remains - where to host it?

A popular choice for newbie webmasters, and even experienced ones, is to secure a free hosting plan with a company such as Yahoo! Geocities, Tripod or Angelfire. While these are easy to setup and free of charge, they do have limitations. Most free hosts don’t offer all the nice features that paid hosts do such as FTP access, CGI-BIN, or your own personal domain name. Instead youre stuck with minimal features and a generic URL such as www.freewebhost.com/marcswebsite . This somewhat limits your web sites potential. Most free hosts also require you to run banners or pop-up ads on your web site to make it worth their while - these banners and pop-ups can obstruct the view of your web page and ultimately annoy visitors and drive them away. Lastly, most free hosts have a daily bandwidth limit that is very small, so if you do get a lot of traffic you’ll most likely exceed the allotted bandwidth and your site will be temporarily disabled. Overall I would recommend free web hosts for people that are new to web hosting and want to get a feel for how it works. I’d also recommend them for web sites that are personal in nature (such as an online journal) as well as web sites that don’t plan to generate any revenue. Free web hosts are a great stepping stone to paid web hosts - I myself starting building web sites 4 years ago using free hosts, and today I run several high traffic web sites that are hosted on paid web hosting plans.

Now it’s time to get into the good stuff - paid web hosting. Web hosting companies that charge money for their services are plentiful on the Internet, and feature a wide array of hosting packages at various price points. First we begin with so called “budget” web hosts, who claim to offer you the world for only $1 per month. Having used numerous such companies I feel I must tell you to proceed with caution here, as these companies aren’t all that they are cracked up to be. Many claim to offer 24/7 e-mail support, which in my experience turned out to be 0/0 e-mail support. My e-mails were either never answered or answered a week after I sent them. Even when I got a response it was generic in nature and completely unhelpful. Also, expect frequent outages with these budget web hosts as they rarely even have their own web servers - often they are reselling space on someone else’s web servers over which they have no control. One budget web host I used went down unexpectedly for 6 days, and they didnt even bother to notify their customers. As a result, my web site was down for 6 days and I lost most of my visitors as well as my hard-earned search engine rankings. Lesson learned: if the reliability and success of your web site is important to you, budget web hosting might not be the answer. However, this is not to say that all budget web hosts are bad - 1dollarhosting.com is one of the leaders in the budget web hosting arena and has quite a good reputation.

The next type of paid web host is what I refer to as a “mid-range” web host, meaning that they offer prices and service that will satisfy the majority of web sites out there. Mid-range web hosts like PowWeb, Your-Site.com and iPowerWeb offer packages ranging from $5 to $8 per month and provide the tools that most webmasters will need to run a web site, such as: CGI-BIN, tons of e-mail addresses, FTP support, visitor statistics and more. These hosts do have monthly bandwidth limits, but the limits are quite high, and most web sites will never reach them. However, if your web site features hundreds of file downloads and gets decent traffic you may be shocked at how soon you’ll reach those bandwidth limits. When you do, your site may be temporarily shut down or you’ll have to pay bandwidth overage charges, which can get pricey. Overall though, mid-range web hosts will be satisfactory for 90% of the web sites out there, and generally offer excellent uptime/reliability. In fact, many web-based businesses are successfully run using a mid-range web host. However, as mentioned previously, web sites that offer large files for download or sites that get a huge amount of traffic may find that a mid-range host doesnt quite suit their needs. These types of web sites may require high-end web hosting solutions, the next topic in our discussion.

High-end web hosts typically service web sites that are extremely popular, have a high amount of traffic, and/or require pretty much 100% uptime. Most businesses rely on high-end web hosts to host their web sites. Rackspace.com is an example of a well known high-end web hosting company. Pricing for high-end hosts varies, but typically runs from about $50 per month to several hundred dollars per month. Many high-end hosts give you your own dedicated server (which they support) that is reserved just for you and your web site. The mid-range hosts I discussed earlier typically host many different web sites on the same server - this is known as shared hosting. High-end web hosts offer stellar reliability, bandwidth, and just about every tool youll ever need to run a successful web site. Another feature that some high-end web hosts provide is co-location hosting. In this scenario, YOU configure and provide the web server, but you get to plug it into their data center/network. This can be very nice because their data center usually has a fiber-optic connection directly to the Internet, offering blazing bandwidth and stellar reliability. People who run web-based businesses or extremely popular, high traffic web sites are good candidates for high-end web hosting.

Hopefully this brief overview gives you a good picture of the various types of web hosts that exist, and which one might be right for you. When you begin your search for a web host, always keep in mind the old adage You get what you pay for because it really does hold true in this case. Before you make the commitment to host a web site be sure to take some time and analyze what you want out of the web site, and decide which factors are most important to its success. Answering these questions will get you many steps closer to choosing the web host thats right for you.

About The Author

Marc Eberhart is an IT Project Manager, webmaster, and all-around Internet junkie. His web site http://www.webhostingdiscounts.net/ offers visitors 40% off web hosting plans with top-rated hosting companies.

marc@webhostingdiscounts.net

Virtual vs. Dedicated: Which Type of Web Hosting Do I Need?

The choice between the type of web hosting, virtual or dedicated, is governed by several factors that need to be taken into consideration by the site owner. The key for a site owner is to try and fulfill his requirements while staying within his budget. An understanding of the pros and cons of both forms of hosting is the first step in deciding which to choose.

Virtual hosting: This type of hosting is preferred by most small websites. Several websites are hosted on a single server in this form of hosting. Hosting providers offer packages with different combinations of disk space, domain names allowed with each hosting account, and bandwidth allotments. Small sites and blogs that do not require too many resources to run can select a smaller virtual hosting package.

With virtual hosting, the distribution of resources means that the speed of web pages loading depends upon other web sites sharing the web server. If quick download and upload are essential to a site owner’s plan, then virtual hosting which offers sufficient bandwidth should be considered. A good host will ensure that websites with similar resource requirements are hosted together so that site owners pay only for the resources and scripts that are used by them.

Virtual hosts may or may not allow access to non-public directories, these are directories used for storing files that are not meant to be accessed via the word wide web. Small sites that hold sensitive data should check for this facility. SSH/Telnet are important for site owners that wish to communicate directly with the servers and run queries on the databases.

In terms of security, websites can get compromised even when there are no lapses on their part; carelessness on part of neighboring websites on a virtual server can lead to the server getting hacked into and every website may be at risk. However, choosing a good host with solid security will mitigate this risk.

Dedicated hosting: With dedicated hosting, all the resources of a server are made available to the site owner exclusively. Dedicated hosting is best suited for sites that attract a lot of visitors and have a high bandwidth requirement, ecommerce sites that may need special software, or web sites that hold sensitive information and therefore need greater security.

Dedicated servers allow unlimited domain names and greater freedom in managing the website. Dedicated hosting is divided into managed and unmanaged hosting. Managed hosting implies greater support from a technical team that performs regular technical updates and routine maintenance without the site owner having to look into it. Unmanaged dedicated hosting is cheaper than managed dedicated hosting but additional support can be an added cost.

Dedicated servers are accessible only by the host and the site owners; by using features such as secure FTP and encrypted terminal sessions, site owners can be assured of greater security. Webmasters who run multiple sites can also host all their sites on a dedicated server; this enables better management and may work out cheaper than hosting the sites separately on different virtual servers.

About the Author

Paul Hanson recommends Net Explorers for reliable UK web hosting .

Points To Consider Before Selecting A Web Hosting Service

Today with the ever growing number of web hosting companies to choose from, everybody should be able to find the perfect package to fit their needs. But if you are new to the internet, the vast array of choices out there may be rather confusing.

What features do you really need and what can you do without? Why should you pick a particular web hosting company over another? These are just a couple of several web hosting issues that may be confusing if you are new to the web hosting scene. Hopefully this article will help you make an informed decision when you are ready to select your dream web host.

STORAGE: Your storage requirements are going to be determined by the type of website you have. For example, if your website is nothing more than a personal online jotting pad, then server space issues should not be a major concern. If however you have something a little more grandiose in mind–say a business or eCommerce website that will grow with time–then make sure that your web host has a package that not only covers your current space requirements, but is also adequate for future growth or can be easily upgraded.

BANDWIDTH: This is a measure of the amount of data permitted to flow between your site and the rest of the internet. Once again if your site is commercial in nature or generates a substantial stream of traffic then you need a web hosting company that provides ample bandwidth. Also be aware that a lot of web hosting services claim to provide “unlimited bandwidth” but in fact rarely do. And if you do exceed your allotted bandwidth most web hosting providers will slap you with a penalty fee.

SUPPORT: There’s a saying that a web hosting service is only as good as its support. If you conduct your search for a web host with this in mind you really can’t go far wrong. Consider for example, most web hosting companies claim 24/7 technical support. But how true is this? After all, as is so often the case these days, it’s hard to tell where the truth lies and where the lies, well…lie. However one way to get round this is to test run the support team of the web hosting service you have in mind. The value of this trial-test is to measure the response time of the web host’s support department, as well as their degree of competence. Bear in mind that a support team with an indifferent attitude to new business (you) is highly unlikely to become any better once they’ve got you onboard.

SERVER PARAMETERS: Any web hosting service worth its salt should have a server uptime of 97% and above; this simply means that your web host’s server is up and running at least 97% of the time. I mean can you imagine what would happen to your business if your hosting company’s server is down 20% of the time. Your clients–with the merest flick of the mouse button–will turn to your competition to satisfy their needs. Other important server issues to bear in mind are how many servers does the company actually have and what kind of sites are hosted on a particular server.

Why should you concern yourself about the kind of sites being hosted? Well you wouldn’t want to compete for bandwidth with adult websites. This isn’t a question of morality…it is just that adult sites are well-known bandwidth hogs. Sharing servers with them will significantly slow down your websites’ loading speed (another great way to lose customers).

Again, with respect to slowdowns, you should ask how many websites are hosted on a given server and when the web hosting company considers a server to be full (i.e., cannot host any more sites without impairing functionality). Over hosting actually happens quite often because many web hosting services commonly oversell their servers. Most of them get away with it until the day a sufficient number of websites actually make good on their full allotment of bandwidth/storage and then…Ouch! That’s how your website is going to feel if it’s hosted on one such server.

Another aspect to consider about your hosting company is…where are the servers physically located? Though it rarely ever happens, if the web hosting company lacks redundancy or backup, if any drastic event occurs at the site of the servers, there goes your online presence. (This scenario really happened: At the World Trade Center when 9/11 occurred).

WEBSTATS: Traffic is the lifeblood of any internet business. Being able to track and analyze where traffic is coming from is a great advantage. Having such a tool at your disposal would enable you to make accurate and informed changes to your website to better position it for even more traffic. Plenty of web hosting companies provide such tracking and analysis tools with their various packages…even those 4-dollar-a-month or less, hosting services. So there really is no reason for you to settle for a web host that lacks this feature.

SCRIPTS/LANGUAGES: What script types does the web hosting company support: PHP, ASP, CGI, MySQL? The web script you use will of course depend on the type of website you have in mind.

UPGRADING: Does the web hosting company give you the option of upgrading your current package to a more advanced one if the need ever arises? And can you upgrade seamlessly, with minimal fuss and interruption to your business? (After all, the whole point of the upgrade is because your business is expanding. No point upgrading if you are going to lose a substantial portion of your business because of it.

E-MAILS: A lot of web hosting services offer unlimited POP3 e-mail as a big selling point. Don’t be seduced by this, especially if the web host is using it as a factor for charging you increased monthly fees. Truth is, most web hosting services today offer (as standard) more e-mail addresses than you’ll probably ever need.

More web hosting tips

About the Author

Ba Kiwanuka is the webmaster of http://www.internetbusinessmart.com

Hosting Hints

To succeed in today’s world of e-commerce, it is absolutely essential that you have a website. The host you choose can have a profound impact on the success or failure of your business.

One thing you need to consider is whether to use a professional host or a free host. I understand the desire to keeps expenses down, especially in the critical start-up phase of your business. You’ll be tempted to cut corners, but there are some corners you just shouldn’t cut, and deciding on your web host is one of them.

On the Internet, image is everything. Do you want your visitors to see a professional business they can trust, or a business that’s too cheap to pay a professional service? Or worse, to be dismissed as an amateur. That’s the image a free web host conveys. When you weigh in the cost of buying software and the time involved to do it all yourself, you really aren’t saving anything.

On the other end of the spectrum, there are some web hosts who try to justify charging higher than average prices by offering a vast assortment of extra features. Most people don’t have the computing skills required to take advantage of all the features they offer, and they know it. By offering tons of extras that almost no one will use, they can jack up their rates and gouge their customers. Keep your future needs in mind, but don’t pay for services you don’t need.

Look for price and volume flexibility. Your host should have the ability to expand your services as your business grows. Most good hosts offer different pricing packages and let you upgrade to a larger package as your needs expand. Pricing varies widely, from inexpensive to unaffordable. Remember, you get what you pay for.

Make sure they offer a full range of hosting services. Even though you may not need advanced features now, it’s probably a good idea to go with a host who offers them. By the time your business expands to the point where you need to upgrade to the deluxe package, you’ll have more than enough money to pay the extra costs to incorporate them into your site. Most hosts will even do it for you.

You probably won’t need all these features when you are just starting out, but the most common ones to look for are:

* 24/7 support

* 24/7 FTP access

* Guaranteed uptime

* Regular daily backup

* Personal CGI-bin

* Java, Perl, and PHP enabled * Browser-compliant

* Web based email

* Autoresponders

* High bandwidth & connection speed * Compatible with your software and skills * Microsoft Front Page compatible

A quality host must have the ability to properly manage its available bandwidth. If your host is not managing its bandwidth correctly, or using more than it can handle, the results could be disastrous. Hundreds of websites could suddenly go down, including yours, disrupting your sales and costing you money. As a rule, a host shouldn’t be using more than 50% of its bandwidth. That’s a big enough cushion if the extra bandwidth is ever needed.

Additionally, your host should offer you protection from any attacks by hackers. You should be able to rely on your host to keep a constant vigil over your website. You want the security of knowing your livelihood is being watched over by competent, trustworthy people. That is, after all, part of what you’re paying them for.

One factor that cannot be stressed enough is stability. In my opinion, a good host should boast at least 98% uptime. Obviously higher is better, but a minimum of 98% should be guaranteed. If a visitor tries to access your site and it’s down, you’ve lost a potential customer for life.

Make sure your host has regular, and reliable back-up systems. Crashes do happen, though thankfully not very often. In the unforeseen event of a crash, it’s imperative that your host has up-to-date backups of your data, so it can be easily reinstalled when the system is back online. It may never happen to you, but it’s best to choose a host that is prepared.

This is your livelihood, so always be vigilant. Don’t be afraid to treat your web host as you would any other supplier. It’s up to you to see to it that your host is providing you with the services you’re paying for. Research your potential host well and make sure they not only offer everything you need, for today and in the future, but are also reliable and trustworthy.

It can often take years to build the kind of reputation you need to truly be successful. Don’t postpone starting your business any longer or you could lose momentum. Haven’t you deprived yourself of real financial freedom long enough?

Copyright (c) 2002 eMoney Enterprises ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Dave Barrett is editor of eMoney Monthly, official ezine of the eMoney Enterprises family of websites, including: http://HostOnTheRange.com

Get a website with all the bells & whistles, without the usual high-cost of “business” packages. Host On The Range offers full- service quality web hosting and great value. When choosing a web host, choose http://HostOnTheRange.com

Web Hosting Benefits of a Dedicated Server

Hosting your web sites on your own dedicated server may seem a little expensive in comparison to shared web hosting, but the end result is more advantageous. Shared web hosting, no matter how well managed, cannot be 100% reliable and stable. However if you have your own dedicated server you can manage to avoid most of the variables affecting the reliability and stability of a server, commonly experienced by shared hosting accounts; variables such as: overload, bad codes and scripts from other users (especially beginners); and, too many applications and components uploaded, and so on.

On a dedicated server you will install only software and applications you want to use, while on a shared hosting server you will find a host of other softwares and applications installed for other users.

By the very nature of the account, a dedicated server: reduces your dependency on the web host; and bypasses time delays and possible expenses incurred from these. With dedicated server hosting you can provide instant support to your own clients whenever required, which is not possible if you are on a shared server. A reliable, and fast support service is vital for your own business growth just like the stability and reliability you wish for your own website. In business, reliability is reflected through word-of-mouth as one of the most effective promotional activities.

For people with clients, such as Graphic Designers and Web Designers a dedicated server is invaluable. A dedicated server will bring extra income into the studio, not just as a hosting facility, but, as a designer knows only too well, for the extra bread and butter income value. If you have 24hour access to your own dedicated server then you can adjust, correct or update a clients website in minutes, allowing you to keep the dollar back in your studio and not in someone elses. Ready availability results in reduced labour costs for the client, but higher studio-income frequency for the designer. Hence you will see the return of all your regular offline clients, bringing their web work with them.

The need for a dedicated server to your average shared server user is realised when stats tell you: how quickly people left your site because it was taking too much time to download; or how many daily visitors you are down by, because your site was not up. The true negative is the worry of how many lost visitors could have been your future paying-customers. The loss could easily equal the value of the upgrade to a Dedicated Server!

For a business, a website that is quickly downloadable and up all the time gives the visitor encouragement that your service is just as reliable, hence you will be more likely to make a sale. It will also enhance the companys image and encourage existing customers to refer your service to others. This will result in more sales for less promotion.

If you are serious about your online presence you need to get a Dedicated Server.

M6.net http://www.m6.net/dedicated_table.asp

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