Choosing the wrong web host impact opportunity cost. Having a website down can be a rough pill to swallow and WILL cost you money and time, a “double whammie”.

Choosing the right web hosting company depends on your needs.

If you plan on running a full blown ecommerce site, it will get costly. If you are running a simple ecommerce site (shopping cart included) or running a simple 1-3 page site, you should be able to get by with $25-$30 a month easily for web hosting.

The biggest thing to remember is you get what you pay for. You will likely need to start small and as you gain a revenue stream, re-invest into beefing up your web infrastructure.

The 99.999% uptime sales pitch

First off, don’t believe it, it really means nothing. ALL web hosting companies have disclaimers in their fine print that get them off the hook if there is downtime. There is no way they can guarantee anything and you will most likely not be afforded any compensation for downtime.

Even if you assess your income per minute and can prove it to the web hosting company, it won’t matter…they won’t compensate you for downtime.

The reason they won’t really guarantee you 99.999% uptime?

They can’t, there’s too many outside influences that can cause technical issues…a hacker could run a security slam (DDoS-Distributed Denial of Service) on the URL or infrastructure, another site that you mare share web server space with may have unforeseen traffic increases that crash the servers, etc.

Web hosting is a tough business and the technical infrastructure and customer support costs are substantial.

You will never get a guaranteed 99.999% uptime for the $49.95 a month price or whatever price a potential company will list to try to “upsell” you (or 99% for that matter).

These kinds of uptime numbers require multiple, dedicated servers (web and database), and sophisticated load balancing hardware and techniques. Lots of $.

Rule #1.

"You get what you pay for."

Rule #2.

"Refer to rule #1"

Things to look for, questions to ask, things to remember

Remember that bigger does NOT always mean better. Some larger web hosting companies have slow moving technical integrations, and they get by with selling customers on their size and stability while they slowly integrate new infrastructure to support new technology.

I personally have lived through this nightmare when I was with one of the largest and well known web hosting companies out there. I couldn't believe the problems we had...crashed servers, poor technical support, etc. BIGGER does not always = “better”…this company is in the top 5 web hosts (size, # of customers) in the country.

• Look for a company that is “multi-homed”. This means they have multiple connections to multiple upstream bandwidth providers. It is also important that they have relationships with Tier-1 providers. These are the big boys like AT&T, Worldcom, Level-3, Cable & Wireless, Time Warner, Genuity, Qwest, Uunet. The Tier-1 classification is not hard and fast…

• One way hosting companies make extra money is by customer bandwidth utilization. Ask any prospective web hosting company what they charge if you oversubscribe your monthly transfer…shouldn't be more than $2.50 per gig at max.

• Make sure their servers are stacked, air conditioned, and monitored 24X7. The building should also have some disaster planning built into it … generators for power and earthquake safety precautions. The best thing is if they have multiple, geographically diverse locations. This can increase your uptime immensely but be prepared to pay extra.

• Make sure you have instant and easy access to the database.
• Make sure the company can support the latest technology if you need it...If the web host doesn't support new technology, go elsewhere.
• It is imperative (and more important) that the company follows best practices and applies patches regularly to their operating systems and applications (Web and database servers). Ask for details on how they do this.
• The web hosting company needs to be vigilant or you will suffer downtime.
• Make sure the email accounts are pop3 so you aren’t forced to use the web hosts own email software…this way you’ll be be able to forward directly to your personal email client (Outlook, Eudora, etc.)

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  CGI bin-necessary for affiliate or add tracking and Perl scripts

  If you have a simple site like www.9mistakes-online.com, use web hosts with Unix based servers, the CGI bin will work much better than it would with Windows based servers.

  "So, what web host should you use?"

  For simple sites that have a few products or one product, Host4Profit has it all. All the information about web hosts is just to help you choose the right one if you don't go with Host4Profit..

  Host4Profit has reasonably priced packages and they make logging in, using, and navigating very easy.

  Host4Profit has deep bandwidth and they get their access from tier 1 providers…I’ve been very pleased with their level of service.

  If you have a simple site, web hosting shouldn't be a pain and Host4Profit makes it very easy...they have great customer service also. My questions have been answered within 2 hours by their support staff and they also fixed a Perl script I had running, which they did not have to do. They went the extra step to help me...when I was with that large web host company I talked about earlier, it took forever to get problems fixed!

  Host4Profit has an easy to use interface, easy access to the MySQL Database, web logs, mail manager, re-direct manager, great security built in, etc. And, you don't have to sign up for a year if you don't want to...

  I've been happy with everything I've encountered with Host4Profit...you can't go wrong...and, they've got deep bandwidth. One last thing, if you need 2 domains hosted, you can get your 2nd one at $5 a month!

  Click here for Host4Profit

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  What Does That Error Message Really Mean?

  - by Jim Edwards

  (c) Jim Edwards - All Rights reserved
  
  

  ---

  
  Surf the 'Net for about 10 minutes and chances rate very
  high that you'll encounter an error of one kind or another.

  Whether the error message pops up on your own computer or
  on a website loaded in your browser, knowing what the error
  means can help you solve the problem much faster and avoid
  hours of frustration (especially in a situation where
  nothing you do will solve the problem).

  The following represent some of the more common error
  messages you may encounter while surfing the Internet and
  what (if anything) you can do to correct the situation.

  Error: 404 File Not Found

  This means the web server cannot find the file or web page you tried to pull up in your web browser.

  Almost nothing you can do will correct this situation. Try hitting your web browser's "Refresh" button to see if the page will load. If not, email the website operator to let them know of the problem and then move on.

  Error: 500 Internal Error

  This error usually occurs when you fill in a form on a web page (contact form, shopping cart, feedback form) and click the submit button.

  This means the server or the script handling the form on the server has a major problem. Again, there's nothing you can do so just email the website owner and move on.

  By the way, resubmitting the form a dozen times, banging your hand on the keyboard, and yelling at your monitor won't fix the problem!

  Error: 408 Request Timeout

  This error usually occurs when you try to download a huge file or large web page and, for whatever reason, the connection times out.

  Simply hit your browser's "Refresh" button and it should pick up the download again where you left off.

  If not, contact the website owner and inform them of the problem or check back later.

  Error: Host Unavailable

  Grab a cup of coffee on this one and fall back to reading the newspaper.

  You can try hitting your "Refresh" button a couple of times, but, for all intents and purposes, this means the server has gone down.

  Try again in a few minutes on the off-chance you tried to access the website just as the owners were restarting the server or temporarily disconnected it from the Web.

  If this doesn't work, the phone rates your best course of action to contact the website owner since it's a safe bet their email won't work either.

  Error: Unable to Locate Host

  This message usually means one of three things: the web server is down; your Internet connection is dead; you typed in the web address incorrectly.

  To correct the problem, first try retyping the web address into your browser's address bar. If that doesn't work, try surfing over to another website to make sure your connection is live.

  If you can't load any websites, contact your Internet service provider (ISP) for technical assistance.

  As a general rule, if you encounter an error while surfing
  the web, try these steps in order to fix the problem:

  1. Click your Web browser's "Refresh" button.

  2. Verify that you typed in the correct URL (web address)

  3. Close down and restart your Web browser completely.

  4. Contact the website owner to alert them to the problem or request help.

  5. Contact your ISP for help.

  -- Jim Edwards is a syndicated newspaper columnist and the co-author of an amazing new ebook that will teach you how to use fr-e articles to quickly drive thousands of targeted
  visitors to your website or affiliate links...

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