1. - Before buying web hosting, you ought to research all the companies available. You might instinctively desire to get the most inexpensive or free plan, but you ought to keep in mind that it might not have all the options you need. You want a reliable host, so your web-site can attract visitors and you can make money. The types available are free, image, shared, reseller, dedicated, co-located, clustered and file web hosting.

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2. - The price of web-hosting can range from a couple of dollars up to hundreds. Personal internet sites don’t usually come with the full package of tools and have a smaller bandwidth, in anticipation that the site will be simple and will not attract a lot of visitors. Free hosts will often advertise with banner ads to make up the cost.

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3. - Ecommerce hosting is usually paid. You ought to check how much bandwidth you are given. You might run out if you have good surfer numbers, a high business rate or a large number of customers downloading content. As a result, your site will be unavailable and your enterprise will suffer.

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4. - You should figure out which programming languages you need your web-server to run. For instance, your web-site might need Active Server Pages (ASP), Visual Basic scripts, Cold Fusion, Microsoft Access, or an SQL database; these would require a server that runs Windows. Or if your site needs PERL, CGI, SSI, PHP or mySQL, then you would need a web server that can run Unix or Linux.

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5. - Too high surfer numbers can sink a web site financially. A web-site heavy on media will run out faster than one coded properly. It should also be noted that Google will not index any media (music, flash, video), which means any info stored in them will be ignored by search engines. Text is the best way to present data.

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6. - A small enterprise owner or webmaster that is concerned about cost ought to look at shared web-hosting. This means that a web-server will host several web-sites, being shared by several users. Assuming the server is reliable, this should not be problematic and your site will run smoothly.

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7. - You can tell a good web-host from a bad one if they let you upload files, manage accounts, view your web site’s statistics and have management over your FTP accounts. The control panel is key, so examine each host’s panel before choosing a host. You want to be able to monitor traffic so you can plan your marketing campaigns properly. A good host will also offer 24/7 technical support via email, phone and possibly live support.

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8. - Shared web-hosting, also known as virtual hosting, the same physical web web server provides space for many different web sites. Depending on the domain web-hosting service, the same web-server can host hundreds or even thousands of web sites. Consider: Is the processor on the web web-server powerful enough to provide reasonable response times. Does the domain web-hosting service have a solid backup plan in place to keep the web-sites up in the event of an emergency? Is the price reasonable? Most shared domain web-hosting can be purchased from $5 to $20 per month.

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9. - Dedicated web-hosting. The opposite of shared domain hosting is dedicated domain web hosting. With a dedicated domain hosting arrangement, the consumer is assigned a specific web-server that is used only for that internet site.

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10. - Does your agreement offer you the ability to web host multiple web sites and domain names? Even those companies with a single domain-name ought to opt for the multiple hosting option. This will allow your enterprise to grow and change over time without changing the location of your domain web hosting service.

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11. - Ecommerce hosting companies are very similar to small enterprise hosting companies with a few unique requirements. Running a company online requires features such as a shopping cart and a secure socket layer (SSL). Ecommerce web-hosting companies may also offer online store templates that you would need to investigate before choosing a host. Additionally, it is important to carefully research web server redundancy and technical support availability.

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12. - Storage space is an important factor to consider when choosing a web-hosting outfit. The web-hosting company will usually offer you storage space in megabyte (Mb) increments. Depending on the amount and type of content available on your web page you’ll need to choose a web-hosting firm that can supply you with an adequate amount of storage space for a reasonable price. Text files are relatively small, image files are larger and multi-media files are still bigger.

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13. - System redundancy is important when choosing an ecommerce hosting firm. It’s important to look for an ecommerce web hosting firm that offers a high level of redundancy such as multiple lines into their web-server facility, redundant power lines to the web server and a routinely tested backup-generator on-site.

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14. - Technical support is another key feature to look for before choosing a web-hosting outfit. If you have an online store your ability to make a profit is correlated to your web site’s availability. If your web-hosting outfit does not provide 24-hour-a-day technical support it is possible that your internet site could be experiencing difficulties and costing you cash in terms of lost sales for several hours before you are able to contact technical support to resolve the issue.

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15. - Bandwidth limitations are also important factors in choosing a web-hosting outfit. This refers to the amount of data transfer that your hosting agreement allows. You might have a web page with a relatively small amount of data but the amount of data transferred is multiplied by the number of times your web page is viewed. While your web hosting firm will most probably not stop your page from being viewed if you exceed your bandwidth limitations, they’ll probably charge additional fees.

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16. - Many companies offer web-hosting for free but these web-hosting companies often insert advertisements on your web-pages and have a higher rate of failure. If your web-pages are for personal use, you likely wouldn’t be bothered. However, if your web-page is for business and you plan to have a lot of traffic to your internet site and cannot afford lengthy web-server failures, then it is wise to invest in a web hosting outfit that will provide you with more reliability than a free web hosting firm offers.

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17. - Many people often change their email address when they change jobs or when they switch internet providers but if you use hosting you’ll have a unique email address and site address that you can retain indefinitely. If you invest in web hosting you will no longer have to send out updates with a new email address every time you move or change jobs because web-hosting allows you to have your own unique domain-name.

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18. - Another benefit to hosting is that you are often entitled to web mail which will enable you to check your email from any pc that is connected to the internet. Hosting will eliminate the problem of not being able to check your email while you’re away from your home computer. By allowing you to access your email account remotely, hosting can prevent you from missing important messages just because you are out of town.

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19. - You might realise that some services are apparently superior to others in both cost and features offered. Keep in mind that there could always be hidden conditions, unforeseen downsides, or the outfit could even be lying about what each package offers. The term “unlimited” is a good indication you should find another company.

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20. - Free web hosting services usually offer a domain that is the services name followed by a long number or random string of letters. Your potential clients might be turned off by this because it looks unprofessional and odd. It shows that you have chosen not to pay for web-hosting, and they might worry about other corners you cut. It might also suggest that your enterprise is a scam and untrustworthy. Even a small enterprise can afford the cheapest paid plan. It offers security and credibility that free hosting will not.

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21. - When looking for a host, you need to strike a balance between an inexpensive service and a good quality service. It’s no good if you get an inexpensive web-host but you end up with lousy service. Ensure that your plan comes with CPanel. You ought to also check that you can upgrade your web-host later on if you need to expand your internet site.

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22. - You should choose a reliable web-hosting vendor with few timeouts, or else you’ll spend hours trying to upload a small amount of content to your web site. A fast web server is also important so files will download quickly. You ought to choose a monthly bandwidth that will reflect your visitor’s use, as well as a storage space to fit all your files. These are very important to ensure your web-site will succeed.

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23. - Find a potential web hosting firm, and search for reviews. These ratings reflect the customer feedback, so you want to find a web-hosting service with high ratings that deliver exactly what they promise. You need to find out uptime, because that is when your web-site is online. This is very important if you are running an internet company. Businesses stand or fall based on what the client thinks.

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24. - Most hosting companies offer free applications to their customers, such as a phpMyAdmin database, hit counters, message boards, blogging softwares, shopping cart softwares, personal email address, FTP tools, and other features. Ensure that your web-host has what you need before hiring them.

I hope these few beginner ideas will assist you in seeking good quality web hosting.

1. Use a popular web host.

That cheapo one might be an uncommitted reseller. I used one a few years ago. Very cheap, and very helpful. Then my site went ‘missing’. By the Grace Of God I was able to get in contact with the owner, and make a backup, before the service was closed down. I found out later he had only about six customers.

Use a popular web host. Avoid ones that are trying to attract customers by undercutting rates to silly levels. If a deal seems too good to be true, it probably is.

2. Their Google PageRank gives a clue as to how popular they are.

This will irk the smaller hosts, but if your site is a serious one, put it on a serious host. Web hosting costs peanuts these days. People can be funny about spending an extra $5 a month. You’ll wish you’d paid $500 when your site goes skew-whiff, and you can’t get a reply from their technical support.

3. Send them an email or two. See how long it takes to get a reply.

This can be very revealing. If they take two days to get back to a potential customer, how long do they take to answer their _existing_ customers?

4. Check out their forums; how busy are they? They don’t have a forum? Next!

They should have enough customers to run a forum, and care enough to have one. Reading it can give you a clue as to what their support is like. Likewise, see when they had the last news update on their site. If it was long ago, they may be moribund.

5. Technical Support.

This is as important as the features they supply. It’s no good having a Virtual Private Server for $10.00 a month if there’s no one there to answer your emails when the hard-disk fails.

6. Features.

Most geeks favour Unix. It’s been around longer, and is more stable. Web hosts offering Unix variants like Linux have always been cheaper. They also seem to offer a wider range of toys. I need SSI (Server Side Includes), SSH (secure Telnet), 10 MySQL databases, Cpanel, PHPMyAdmin and a UK IP number. And you can get this for $15 a month.

Things like MySQL databases, Cpanel and SSH access are real sticking points for a lot of web hosts. If they’re generous with these, you’ve found a rare jewel.

7. Word Of Mouth.

Webmasters are always asking about web hosts on webmaster forums. Find a few recent threads, and note who gets the most votes. Search engines, on the other hand, have been spammed by some hosts. If you do a search on ‘the best web hosts’ or ‘top 10 web hosts’ you’ll get puff pages. Recent opinions from professional webmasters are the best.

About the author: T. O’ Donnell runs web sites about web hosting packages, personal web hosting and web hosting services in London UK.