What To Look For While Choosing Web Hosting Provider
Taking a decision about a web hosting company is very tough as there are many companies making promises for better performance, uptime, unlimited resources, knowledge support, and other features. Therefore, there should be an informed decision on choosing the best web hosting company and for that; this article is really going to help you in your decision about selecting best web hosting provider.
Image Credit: Pexels
Hosting Plans:
Web hosting plan also plays an important part in selecting web hosting provider. Many host providers offer different plans starting from startup plan to business and a premium plan. If you are a beginner in business, then you should go with startup plan. Such plan starts at nominal price and allows you a chance to go through the hosting service in a better way. If your business is already an established business, then you should go for premium or business plan as such plans come with additional features (unlimited bandwidth, unlimited disk space, email accounts) to fit the business requirements.
Business Continuity:
It is essential to check business continuity while choosing a web hosting company because the experience makes the difference. A well experienced company knows very well about the customer’s requirement, hence a customer gets required features in a selected plan. Customers would like to tie with an experienced company that can better understand their necessities. When a customer selects reputed company in the web host market, it automatically ensures about better customer support, robust security, reasonable price with quality service. A web hosting seeker has to check about its ownership and management side of a company. On the contrary, if a customer is dealing with a new company, he/she can ask for a free trial period to get an idea about the promised features for a web host plan.
Customer Support:
Customer support or tech support is a backbone of any business, especially in web hosting. If the site is down for some reason, a customer always expects favorable and quick response from a hosting provider. It is important to know that are experts try to fix the problem and restore the site in a normal condition or not? Because sometimes experts offer guidance to customers to fix the problem. Before selecting a host, a host seeker has to look for different options of contact like live chat, email access, toll-free phone, and so on.
Uptime Guarantee:
For better uptime, the host must have stable network connections and powerful server. 24/7 availability of the website is an expected feature that every customer expects and many providers claim for 99% uptime guarantee. If the provider bets for 100% uptime guarantee, then it may be a fake commitment. The host should provide refund if he fails to deliver aforesaid uptime. Even 99% uptime is lower than 99.5%, so always prefer the highest uptime.
Renewal Terms and Fees:
Once you opt for a free trial or startup plan, you should check renewal terms and fee structure. Many host providers offer discounts when a customer subscribes service for the first time, which seems a good option to save money on your host plan, but later you have to pay in full at the time of renewal. It is obvious that renewal prices will be higher than the startup package and excludes any promotional offer, which was given in startup package. Thus, it is good for a customer to see the renewal price before taking the startup package. Many host providers offer price discount if a customer goes for two or three year option.
Price:
Most customers prefer cheap price, but it should not be deciding factor for selecting host provider. Besides price, other features matter a lot. Price should be the last feature while selecting a host provider. If the host offers additional features in a package, then always look for the additional cost too.
Tech Features:
The host package depends on the site requirement. For example, if your site is e-commerce, media related or any blogging site, you will not find additional features like extra domains, backups, more disk space, RAM at lowest price. Even you can tell provider about the site requirement and they will make an ideal package for your website with required technical features.
Space and Bandwidth:
The amount of bandwidth depends on the base of content size and the traffic that your site gets every day. Many providers claim for unlimited bandwidth, but it is found rarely actual. It is wise to know the additional cost also if a customer goes above the agreed bandwidth limit. On the other side, host providers also offer 100 GB space to entice customers but most of the website requires 20 to 30 MB for website, so unlimited or huge disk space should not be a deciding factor in selecting your host provider.
Customer Reviews:
Look for social media page for a particular company where you can easily get live reviews from customers. It will make you clear about the company, as a single positive customer review will not help you to take decision about hosting provider. It may happen that company’s marketing department post their own positive review to lure visitors therefore, it is sensible to see overall customer’s reviews.
SSL Security:
If you are in the business of selling goods and service via your website or deals with online payment, then look for a host that set up SSL on your website. SSL secures sensitive information travelling between the website and the company’s server. When a customer purchases SSL certificate from hosting provider, it will come with free installation and required features.
Conclusion:
Selecting a web hosting provider is a tough task as it covers many points. Reliability, price, and features are the main things that every hosting seeker expects from any hosting provider. Here, the above points will guide you to select the best hosting provider as per website requirement.
