What should I be looking for with my web hosting company?
So, everyone is offering deals on website hosting around the world and it can be quite confusing when you’re searching for the right fit for your requirements. What should you be looking for with a web hosting company?
Reliability?
The whole point of having a website is to ensure your business can be seen 24/7. You need to make sure that your website hosting provider is able to keep your website online without any downtime. It’s important that you check what the Service Level Agreement (SLA) is, but also check online for major outage reports. Whilst most web hosting providers offer at least 99.9% uptime, many of them have experienced major outages over the past couple of years that have taken days to resolve. That’s a long time to wait for business critical services to be restored.
UK Support?
How do you want to get in touch with your web hosting company if something goes wrong? If you call them will they be in the UK, or would you prefer to email or raise a support ticket? These are all considerations worth noting when selecting a web hosting provider. Cloud Heroes offer UK based telephone support as well as direct emails, but other companies only offer support via remote ticketing systems. We recommend you pick a solution that suits your business and communication preferences.
Technical?
This goes hand-in-hand with support, but does your web hosting company employ coders? Often the first thing that happens when a website stops working is the web hosting company suggests that nothing has changed on the server so the code should be checked. Some provider, such as Cloud Heroes, have coders and hardware experts to hand to get to the problem quickly.
SSL or no SSL?
With the world becoming more interested in security, and search engines like Google giving preference to websites with an SSL certificate (the padlock in your address bar), Cloud Heroes are implementing a free basic SSL certificate to all of its new hosting packages.
Managed or Un-managed?
Is the service you are purchasing a managed service, or un-managed? Managed hosting means all you need to worry about is the code that is hosted on the server. This means that all server updates and software patches are applied and checked, and your site is monitored by engineers. With un-managed servers, you are expected to keep the operating system up to date along with any other software, which is a great solution providing you have the time and skills to do this yourself.
Shared or VPS/Dedicated?
In most cases, shared web hosting is suitable for your business. Shared hosting solutions run many websites on one server and allow the cost of hosting to be reduced. If all of the websites do not use a lot of the server’s power or do not receive a lot of web traffic then this is certainly the solution for you.
If you need specific software to be installed on the web server, or expect to receive higher web traffic than normal sites and therefore need more power then a VPS or dedicated server would be the preferred route for you.
Any Questions?
If you have any questions about anything mentioned above, please get in touch by calling 01225 776 555 or emailing us at saveme@cloudheroes.com.
