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Finding a Reliable
Web Host
The first thing
to do when looking for a web host is to read everything
on the Internet with a great deal of skepticism. Most
of the "web hosting review sites" are nothing
more than paid ads. The people who write the reviews often
get a commission by the hosting companies, and the hosts
with the highest commissions get the best reviews. Even
on third party review or opinion sites, many of the posts
are made by employees of the hosting companies to either
talk up their own sites or trash a competitor. Just read
some of the posts on popular review sites and ask yourself
if these sound like normal reviews made by webmasters, or
if they sound more like ads made by professional copywriters.
A good way to
find a reliable host is to ask other webmasters you know
and trust which hosts they recommend. If you don't know
anyone to ask for questions like this, then you might have
to check the buzz on the Internet forums, albeit with a
very large grain of salt. Avoid the web hosting recommendation
sites at all costs - remember the people who write these
sites usually work on commission for the web hosting companies,
that is if the sites aren't created by the web hosting companies
themselves.
Avoid buying
web hosting space through a resellers program. Many
people who sell web space actually don't host the sites
themselves - they just resell the space for other web hosts.
If there is a problem, is it best to have a host you can
contact directly rather than working through a third party
web designer who might be on vacation when your site goes
down.
Personally, I
like to work with only the larger hosting companies.
I had a site with a smaller company at one time, and one
of my main sites was hacked into. One day I looked at the
code and there was stuff in there I'd never seen before
which was kind of a freaky feeling - almost like a virtual
way of having your home broken into.
I think a larger
company is going to be more careful with security than some
small place, so from now on I only go with the larger hosting
companies. Plus, in general I find that they tend to have
better customer service and less downtime. One way to
indirectly check the reputation of a hosting company is
to check the page rank of the hosting company using the
Google toolbar. This is not an absolute guarantee that
the host is good, but you can usually eliminate the rinky-dink
type companies this way. I would look for a Google toolbar
rank of at least 6, and preferably higher, for your web
host. A hosting company can easily fake forum posts about
their services, but it is a lot harder to artificially fake
page rank. If a web hosting company has a page rank of 4
or less, this tells you they are most likely a pretty small
time operation.
Cnet.com offers
a list of web hosts, often with promotional coupons
to use. The last time I checked, though, there were no detailed
reviews and all of the hosts had identical (3 star) ratings.
This site
and some of my others sites are hosted by Pair.net. I
have had sites hosted with pair for several years and have
been happy with their service. I would also recommend Futurequest,
Earthlink and Dreamhost. They are three of the larger
hosts that have been around awhile and usually have good
reputations with most webmasters. The popular Internet webmaster
forum www.webmasterworld.com is hosted by Westhost. That
sites seems to always be up and running smooth, so Westhost
is another host I'd take a look at if I was in the market
for a new host.
When looking
for a new host, send a couple of emails to their sales
staff questions to see how politely and quickly they respond.
Whenever I've done this, a few companies never have even
responded at all, which made them easy to eliminate from
my potential candidate list. Also check to see how you contact
their support group.
When checking
into hosts, find out what kind of customer support they
offer. Do they have 24 X 7 support? Online chat? A telephone
number you can call for help? Usually sites with telephone
support costs a little more than email only support plans,
but if your livelihood depends upon your site, then paying
extra for immediate support is certainly worth the price.
I would also
recommend checking the hosting recommendations at niche
groups like the forum for San Francisco Women of the Web
(www.sfwow.com). Since it is more of a niche group of women
writers and web designers, not as many professional forum
spammers hang out there. Many of the recommendations for
hosts there seem genuine, especially the ones made by long
time SFWoW forum posters.
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