How To Find A Good Web Host?

Usually when someone contacts me online, one of the most frequent questions I get asked is this: "How do I find a good web host?" or "Which web host do you use?"

This is one of those essential things you will need in order to earn that online income. You will need a web site and you will need a web host - somewhere to place that web site.

Picking a good web host is not easy. Overall quality and good 24/7 support should be your first objectives in choosing a good web host. You want a site that's fast, easy to use, rarely down and has good support that you can reach at all times, should something go wrong. You need to check exactly what features your web host is offering and for what price:

- How much storage space?

- Daily traffic limit or transfer?

- Email system? How many accounts...

- What type of server Linux or Windows?

- How many other sites will be sharing your IP address?

- Do You need SSL or a secure site?

- Are sites/files backed up? How often?

- What are the support hours?

- And of course the Price?

But don't always try to get the cheapest price hosting, keep in mind, you always get what you pay for. A cheap web host won't save you money if it's a poor service and your site is always going down. So don't always pick the cheapest web host.

Match up your hosting service with the type of site you will be running; a simple HTML site will have or make simple demands on your hosting service. So a shared hosting service may be quite adequate to meet your hosting needs. For SEO reasons, you should always check the location of your site, I have found which country your site is hosted in, plays a role in your rankings, especially in Google.

However, if you have a site that's extremely interactive with forums, discussion groups, get large bursts of traffic or you're running a lot of server-side scripts and programs - then you may need a more robust hosting service to meet your needs. In this case, you might need a dedicated server to handle just your site. Many web hosts offer this service and it's worth looking into if you have a site with extreme amounts of traffic or if you're running forums, affiliate programs, email services... from your site.

There are countless webhosts you can choose from when picking a web host. But do your homework, check around to the different forums and see how everyone is rating the web hosts they are using. First-hand experiences are the best judge of whether or not a web host is good and reliable.

Although moving a site from one web host to another can be a real pain, especially if you have a large scale site, but if you're not totally satisfied with a web host and are having serious problems - simply change your hosting. Just make sure you're not going from bad to worst.

Perhaps, in the final analysis, nothing beats checking with your friends and fellow webmasters you trust. Ask them which hosts they're using and if they're satisfied with it. Nothing beats first-hand experiences when it comes to choosing a web host. Just make sure you're comparing oranges to oranges, that is: make sure you have similar site requirements as your webmaster friends. If you both have similar type sites, then finding a good quality web host can be as easy as having a friendly chat over a cup of coffee.

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