Low cost hosting

What exactly is web hosting? What features will you need from a web host? Questions like these often overwhelm would-be web publishers that are just starting out. But we are here to help. After reading this article you will not know everything there is to know about web hosting, but you will understand enough to get you started.

To start off with – what is web hosting? A web host is a company that manage computers that are part of the Internet, and web hosting is leasing disk space on those computers to store the files that make up your website. This means that there is a computer in a data center on which your files are stored, and the computer will present the web pages of your website to visitors. It should be clear to you that if you want to have a website, you will need web hosting.

What are the most important features to look for in a web host? Different web hosting companies offer different sets of features, and usually at various price points. Two of the most important things for you to look at is the amount of disk space you get and the amount of bandwidth they offer you. The more disk space you have the larger you can make your website. Some web hosts will even let you host more than one website on a single web hosting account, and in this case the amount of disk space will play a large role. Bandwidth refers to the amount of data that is transferred to and from your website. You want to make sure you have enough bandwidth to display your website to all the visitors you expect to get. Sometime a web hosting company will offer unlimited bandwidth, but read the fine print carefully because there is usually a catch, often the terms of service restricts the kind of data you transfer. For example you may not be allowed to use audio or video on your website.

Other features to look for in a web hosting account include: is the web host Windows, Unix or Linux based, script compatibility, the number and type of databases, the type of control panel and number and type of email accounts. The operating system of the server will determine what software you can use on your website. The software programs you use on your website is often referred to as scripts. Not all web hosts are compatible to all scripting languages, like Perl, PHP and others. The scripts you want to use on your website often needs a database to manage the operation of the script, so you will need a compatible database. You will usually be able to create one or more email addresses using your own domain name.

Before choosing a web hosting company, decide what you want to accomplish with your website and choose a company that offers you the features and options you need.

Choosing a budget web hosting company can be overwhelming. In fact, choosing any web hosting company can be a challenge due, in large part, to the fact that there are so many of them. Do a search for “web hosting” with the quotes around the keywords on Google, and it’ll return over 5 million documents! That doesn’t mean there are 5 million web hosting providers but there very well could be at least 1 million! That’s a lot of web hosts. How can you choose one that meets your need?

What is Budget web hosting anyway?

Budget web hosting is generally defined as any hosting service that is below $10 per month. The budget comes from the low price. Now, most companies in the budget web hosting category only offer one year plans. Most budget web hosting companies however, will quote you the monthly fee you would pay if you divided the annual fee by 12 months. Keep that in mind when you are comparing one company with another. The other thing to look out for is the setup fee. Do they charge you a setup fee to get started?

Evaluate your general impression of the company.

The first place to start evaluating budget web hosting companies is their front page. Does their website give you a sense that they are professional? Is it easy to find all of the information you need? Take a look at their contact information. Do they list a physical address, an email address and a phone number to contact them? If they don’t provide any contact details, that has to throw up a red flag. If you run into problems setting up your website, and you have no proper contact information, how are you going to get service from that company?

Do they have a toll free support number?

Does the budget web hosting company provide a toll free number for you to contact them? If they are based in Atlanta, Georgia and you are in Seattle, Washington, you don’t want to be paying long distance to them if you need to get them on the phone about a concern you have. A toll free number also speaks to their willingness to deal openly and honestly with their customers.

What kind of guarantee do they offer?

Choose a budget web hosting company that offers a good guarantee. Most budget web hosting companies don’t openly publish their satisfaction guarantees. If you have to look in their terms and services agreement to find out where they stand with regard to giving you back your money if you are not satisfied, you should look elsewhere.

What is the uptime guarantee of the site in question?

Uptime guarantee refers to the amount of time the server is live and serving your web pages. An uptime guarantee of 99% means that the host guarantees that their servers will be up and operational 99% of the time. Over the course of one year, 99% uptime would represent a downtime (the one percent) of around 87 hours in a year or an average of 7 hours per month. An uptime of 99.9% would involve only 8 hours of downtime for the entire year.

What kind of after sale support can you expect?

While there are many other factors you could consider, the final one I will deal with is after sale support. What kind of resources do they make available for you. Find out if the budget web hosting company offers free scripts. Do they have any marketing tools they can make available to you? What kind of support for setting up your account can you expect from the budget web hosting company? All of these factors must be taken into consideration.

Just because a company offers a budget web hosting service, doesn’t mean you necessarily have to compromise on features, quality or service. All three will only be found, however, if you make sure to do your homework to find a budget web hosting company that is a good fit for you.

Finding a web hosting in Kenya took me more than days. I should say it took me weeks. I started off with some local providers like the Africa online and Kenya web. But soon found that the Bandwidth I required was not provided. I also came to know that some of my friends and clients in the America were not able to see my website due to the Bandwidth limits. After a lot of procrastination, I came to the conclusion that I should use a provider who is global and not a local provider. At the end of the day it does not matter where I host my website as long as every one around can access it.

So what’s all about the Web hosting in Kenya which makes it so bad?

Poor infrastructure. Very bad customer service Poor Turn Around time Google Hardly recognizes my website. That was enough to tell me that I had to move forward with a decent web hosting provider. But who can give me a decent hosting for a limited budget? I had to pick some Funny Indian company which would probably rip my money off and not provide anything.

I tried a few, some went off the Roof. It was worse than that of Kenya. It was nearly when I gave up that I found a decent web hosting company. The rates they gave were quite decent and payment was accepted through credit cards. Service was Excellent. And for a money back guarantee, I was taking the risk of not losing anything at all.

It worked at last. Today, Kenyan Hosting companies charge a bomb of money for hosting and I get it at a fraction of the amount. 99% up time and much more than anything the Kenyan local company can provide. So why go for a web hosting company in Kenya. Shoot out for someone who will charge you lesser and will of course be worth your while and money.

In the world of internet, hosting is one of the most competitive markets. A hosting plan could cost from $1 but could even cost $100. However, research has shown that the average cost for a host is around $20. This cost is rather cheap if you only have 1 website. If you have more than one, the cost is going to multiply. Say you have 100 websites, the cost is going to have a large difference. Therefore, many internet marketers are looking for alternative to get free hosting.

One of the top free hosting providers around is Squidoo. Squidoo is a 2.0 website that is great for those who wants to create blogs. Their service is free and you can create as many blogs as you like. Another added value of using Squidoo is the AdSense revenue-sharing. You will be able to keep a percentage of the revenue from AdSense.

So, making money with Squidoo blogs is a very interesting idea. However, what is the best way to do it? The answer is simple. Build you blog with articles which surrounds the topic of your affiliate program. It is very important that you don’t simply post any advertisement which may have nothing in common at all. Your website visitors might not click those ads. The better way to do it is to build up the interest on your product and services by providing valuable information.

You just have to be clear of your main business and the secondary business, which is AdSense. If you visitors do not click on your AdSense ads, you need to try more incorporate keywords for the AdSense bots to pick up. For better results, you can try the more popular keywords or even purchase the AdSense keyword list. Utilize these keywords in your text and you should be able to gain more revenue from AdSense in your blog.

With Squidoo, your blogs are more likely to appear on peoples search because of their high page rank in search engines. This is a very good way for beginners to find their way into this field. Therefore, Squidoo not only is the best solution for a free website hosting, it also provides more chances of profiting from your blog with the shared revenue in AdSense. Although the revenue is shared, the popularity of Squidoo in search engines definitely can help a beginner in internet marketing.