Buying web hosting can be a daunting task for newbies. There are a ton of choices out there and seemingly more web hosting companies starting up every day. Since the hardest part of shopping for a web host is knowing how to start out and wade through all the choices to find the right hosting for your website, I thought I’d give you my tip to get a jump start on your search.
Although everyone’s situation may be a little different, you can really group web hosting companies into several distinct categories and from there decide which group best fits your website. Basically, you have web hosts that offer one general purpose hosting plan, some that specialize in packages for business hosting, and those that offer advanced options such as dedicated web hosting. You will find companies that do overlap in these areas, but for simplicity, let’s consider them separate for now.
General purpose web hosting plans are great for bloggers and those who may want to create multiple sites. You usually get unlimited storage and bandwidth along with the ability to host multiple domains. With these plans, you are provided with all the necessary tools to create any type of site you may need (WordPress, eCommerce, portfolio, etc.).
Those companies offering business hosting plans are not surprisingly the best choice for those who want to create a site for their small to medium size business or professional organization. With a business hosting package, you’ll get added features such as site security, data backup and restore, and business promotion options. In addition, business hosting plans often provide better network/server performance.
For high traffic sites, dedicated or VPS hosting is often a must. It is also a good choice if your website will contain a lot of downloadable multimedia files. While the cost can be significantly higher, the performance and security you can get is superior.
Once you decide which type of hosting plan best suits your needs, you can begin to look at the various hosting companies that fill that niche. To help get started, here are some of the better web hosts I’ve encountered that are listed under the appropriate category.
General Purpose – All-in-One Hosting Plans
iPage
Web Hosting Hub
Bluehost
Business Hosting
InMotion Hosting
IX WebHosting
Yahoo!
Dedicated and VPS Hosting
MyHosting.com
InMotion Hosting
1&1 Hosting
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