Best Cheap Affordable Web Hosting

Archive for the ‘Web Hosting’ Category

With the economy hitting not only the individual but also businesses, many are looking toward free web hosting services to house their online site. For monetary reasons, this looks great on the surface. But going free is not always the best choice and may, in fact, cost your business money in the long run.

For one thing, when you use free web hosting, you have very little control over the appearance and functionality of your website. Free hosts rarely offer the ability to FTP or access to a control panel, so you can’t really admin your site.

You are not able to quickly make page changes or install programs that your business might need. If you are selling products or services online, you won’t be able to add a shopping cart or inventory control software to your web site.

Putting a bit of tracking coding is not an option unless you can have access to the page coding. Even attempting to change the look of your web site can be an issue. Some free hosting sites will give you access to templates and a few will even allow some minor changes made to backgrounds. But, all said, you are very limited to what you can do within your own site.

Free web hosting sites must make money somehow; they can’t afford to let people use their bandwidth for free. Since they do not charge you a hosting fee, they make money by placing ads on your webpages. The revenue from these ads goes to the hosting company, not you. Even worse, you have no control over the type of ads your visitors are subjected to.

The ads might be offensive to your site visitors or unrelated to the topic of your site. What’s even worse, you might have ads on all of your pages that promote a direct competitor of yours. For this reason, free web hosting can wind up costing you money.

You can avoid all of these pitfalls by searching around for budget web hosting that won’t break your bank. It is easy today to find web hosting for around $5 per month that offers enough services to host an average website.

Plus, when you use paid web hosting, you get many added benefits. You get access to a control panel with a wide range of easy to install programs that help you set up your site in no time. This includes things like forums, blogs, and picture galleries.

Support. Support is another problem with free web hosting. You’ll be limited to perhaps some online forum areas to ask your questions but you won’t have numbers to call, ticket support systems or one of many options offered by paid hosting. If your business site isn’t working, this can end up costing you a lot of money.

There are many ways you can pinch your pennies to save money, but when it comes to web hosting, it is best to pay for quality service. Free web hosting sounds appealing but it just can’t deliver when it comes to support and giving you the tools you need to fully develop your site. You are much better off if you find a reliable hosting company you can use that has a price you can afford.

If you need a dedicated server, Alojate.com is the premier web hosting company in Mexico, offering a lot of solutions for every business needs. Dedicated servers, factura electronica, web hosting & registro de dominios. Visit us to readWeb Hosting Articles.

If you are a big business and lease a dedicated server you have something in common with an individual on a basic web hosting plan. You both need a web host that offers top-notch support for everything from simple customer service to highly complex technical issues. When you run into problems with your site, you need help right away.

This article will explain why support is so critical and give you a few key factors to consider when evaluating service.

Evaluating Response Times. When evaluating the hosting provider’s support staff, there are few things you want to consider but most importantly, the time frame in which it takes to receive a response to your initial inquiry. This applies for addressing matters via phone as well as email and support ticket.

If you have access to the support team, call them on the phone and see how long it takes to get hold of someone who can help you. Some web hosts provide this service yet the wait time is way too long. You definitely want to know up front if you are going to have a hard time getting help in an emergency no matter what time of day it is. Having to wait on the phone for twenty minutes is very inconvenient and a sign of less than stellar support.

Putting the Support Staff to the Test. Before entering a service agreement with any web host, it is highly recommended that you test their level of support first. You can do this by contacting the support staff with basic questions regarding uploading your files to the server or whatever concerns you the most.

Ask them basic questions before closing the sale and that way you can test the effectiveness, competency, and friendliness of the support staff. This will give you an indication of how you will be treated in the future should the need ever arise or if you have problems with your web site. Of course, things can always change but a good first impression can go a long way in helping you select a host for your sites.

Peace of Mind. Just because you sign up with a reliable hosting provider, doesn’t necessarily mean that you will enjoy a flawless service. Whether it is a power outage or a corrupt hard drive, anything can go wrong behind the scenes and for the most part, these problems are out of your hands.

When your site goes down, you want to know all you have to do is pick up the phone and a tech person will get to work on what is wrong and fix it as quickly as they can. If your web host can’t give you speedy support then you will run into all kinds of problems that can drive your visitors away and cost you money.

Expect The Unexpected. When something goes wrong with your website, and sooner or later it will, there is no need to panic. Always expect something can go wrong so when it does, you won’t be shocked. Just choose a web host that has stellar support so you can rest assured that your problems will be fixed as fast as humanly possible.

It isn’t necessarily the problems that should turn you away as long as support is speedy with a remedy. If the site has excessive problems or is slow to respond to your calls for help, then you should look for another web host. There are good choices available that pride themselves on their percentage of uptime and their first-rate customer service and technical support. After all, a web hosting company depends on its customers to stay in business, so taking care of your needs should be a top priority. If it is not, it is time to find a new web host.

Founder and actual CEO, Ricardo d’Argence has been in the field for more than twenty years. Alojate.com is now one of the biggest web hosting providers in Mexico, offering a range of services for all business needs. Servidores dedicados, Search Engine Optimization, factura electronica, web hosting & registro de dominios.

What Does Being “Green” Mean?

Within the context of web hosting, it generally means that hosting equipment in the data center is powered by some type of renewable energy, usually wind and/or solar.  At times, that also includes business offices. 

I used to imagine a wind turbine or two out behind the building, but that’s not how it works.  Sometimes carbon offsets are purchased from energy companies that generate renewable power.  Other times, the data center itself generates its own green energy. 

According to Information Week, data centers in the U.S. in 2000 had approximately 5.6 million servers installed.  By 2005 that number had jumped to 10.3 million.  Worldwide during the same time period, the number of servers increased from 14.1 million to 26 million.  In a mere five years, energy consumption doubled.

The report also stated, when you throw in the power consumed by data center’s auxiliary infrastructure equipment, including network and cooling gear, that figure jumps to 1.2% of all electricity consumed in the United States. That’s about equivalent to all color televisions in the United States.

On December 2, 2009, IBM helped launch a green data center with New York’s Syracuse University that boasts of being one of the world’s greenest, designed to reduce power consumption and emissions.  The 12,000 square-foot facility generates its own power and is expected to use 50% less energy than a comparably sized data center using traditional power sources and hardware.

On October 5, 2009, President Obama signed Executive Order 31514 which sets sustainability goals for the U.S. government. Within 90 days, agencies are required to set a target for reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by the year 2020 and to recycle or otherwise divert 50% of their waste by 2015.  The order also touches on the energy impact of federal data centers.  Federal agencies must now implement best practices for energy-efficient servers and data center management. That includes implementing power management policies, double-sided printing, and “other environmentally preferable” features on computer equipment.

My first experience with green web hosting was in 2007.  Green hosting wasn’t new, but not many companies embraced it as it was still an expensive and customers weren’t always willing to spend the extra money.  Especially since web hosting companies often limited disk space and bandwidth on their green hosting plans.

In 2009 there was an explosion of web hosting companies offering unlimited cheap green hosting plans for only a few dollars a month and more are converting each month.  iPage web hosting was one of those companies, however, they went the extra mile for their customers by offering an “anytime guarantee”.  iPage takes the standard 30-day money back guarantee burn-in period and stretches it to anytime.  If at anytime during your stay you don’t want to continue with your web hosting account, they’ll pro-rate and refund the unused portion.

Free websites and blogs can only take a serious entrepreneur so far.  They’re a great sandbox for getting your feet wet and figuring things out, but they’re full of advertisements, gaudy templates and themes that reek of “free”.  It’s like doing business out of the back seat of your car – with a Hannah Montana sticker on the bumper.  Few people, if anyone, will take you seriously.

If you build your business on free sites, you risk losing everything because you do not own the site and it can be taken away from you for any reason.

In May 2009, Facebook disabled accounts with, what it “assumed”, were fictitious names.  People with legitimate accounts that have spent years building personal or business relationships had everything disappear in the blink of an eye.

When I first started using free blogs, Blogger shut down one of my blogs and to this day I don’t know the exact reason why.  It could have been because I was using it to pre-sell affiliate products.  It could also be because I hyperlinked every occurrence of my main keyword to my main website and they considered that spammy.  What did I know, I was a noob.  I couldn’t get back into the blog to fix it.  No amount of contacting them ever got an answer and I was forced to abandon it.  Can you imagine if I had built an entire business around that blog? 

I also know that using free WordPress.com blogs for business purposes is a violation of their terms and they will shut you down, too.

Many people starting out don’t know that because they never read the terms of service.  Stay away from free blogs.  You need to own your own blog or website.  Always remain in control of your business.

Before you can run your own website or blog you need your own domain name and web hosting.  The good news is, it’s cheap to get started and I’m going to give you my personal tips for doing it.

Warning:  Do not take advantage of “free domain names for life” when you buy web hosting.  They are only free if you keep your hosting account with them.  Plus, you will not own the name, the web hosting company will.  Always remain in control of your business.

Domain Registration

I’m not going to get real deep into selecting a domain name because that’s beyond the scope of this material.  However, I will leave you with a few guidelines. 

If you want to be found in the search engines, it only makes sense to include a keyword or two that people are using to find what it is you’re selling.  So if you’re an affiliate selling outdoor furniture, incorporating “outdoor furniture” into your domain name is nothing but beneficial.  BestOutdoorFurniture.com beats TomsDeals.com.  No one is going to be searching for outdoor furniture using the words “toms deals”, but they will be searching with “outdoor furniture”, even “best outdoor furniture”.

Only use a .com name.  Stay away from .net, .biz, .info and all the other dots if you can help it.  People don’t remember extensions so when they type in your domain name they will be typing your domain name and automatically adding .com to it.  So get found.  Don’t be invisible. 

Make a list of several domain names because the chances of finding something that isn’t already taken is going to be slim.  Oh, and to stay out of legal hot water, do not use trademarked names in your domain name. 

A great example of that is new businesses that come on board at Commission Junction or other affiliate networks frequently have no restrictions on their name.  Then affiliates will go hog wild snapping up domain names with the vendor’s name in them and spend weeks or months promoting and establishing an online presence.  Then sooner or later the vendor modifies its terms and suddenly bans the use of trademarked names.  It’s happened to me more than once.  It’s a knife to the core of your business.   

Hot Buying Tip

• Get your domain name at NameCheap.com. 
• $9.69 for a .com name, but use the coupon code and get it for $8.81.
• They don’t sneak stuff into the shopping cart during checkout like other registrars.
• They have a very easy to use Domain Manager interface.
• NameCheap is a great domain registrar, but don’t buy web hosting there because you pay too much.  Just get a domain name.
• Be sure to enable the free privacy manager on the domain.  It will hide your personal details from spammers.  goDaddy charges $8.99/year for privacy protection.  At NameCheap, it’s free for the first year and renews at only $2.88/year after that. 

Web Hosting

In order for your new domain name to be seen online, you need to have it hosted by a web hosting company.  It pains me to see web hosting companies take advantage of their customers, so I will only recommend companies with outstanding customer service and reliability.  I also wouldn’t recommend something I don’t use myself.

Hot Buying Tip

I have accounts at both of these places and both are very reliable. 

iPage Hosting- Unlimited green hosting with an easy-to-use control panel.  Their “anytime guarantee” is the best in the business.  Customer service is outstanding.  Server response time is super.  Free Carbonite PC backups.  Easy blog installation.

SuperGreen Hosting- Unlimited green hosting with cPanel.  Very reliable.  My WordPress blogs run at lightning speed and customer service is quick and courteous.  Easy blog setup.

I hope you found these tips helpful for getting your business off on the right foot.

It’s standard in the web hosting industry to offer a 30-day money-back guarantee, less any setup or domain name fees, but SuperGreen web hosting has recently joined the ranks of hosts offering what’s called an “Anytime Guarantee”.  Here’s how it works.

During the first 30 days, it’s a money-back guarantee on the cost of hosting.  (Some  restrictions apply with regard to any setup fees you might have paid on the smaller plans.)  After 30-days, if at anytime you request a cancellation of your account, SuperGreen will pro-rate the unused portion.

Why that’s a good thing

Things don’t always go as planned, especially with online businesses.  Perhaps you’ve started a new business and it didn’t pan out.  Instead of being stuck with a web hosting plan you no longer need, you can cancel and get the unsed portion back.

But keep in mind that all SuperGreen accounts allow you to host unlimited domain names.  So even if you close down operation on one domain, you can still add unlimited addon domains and try something else, or setup up blogs for each of your family members. 

SuperGreen is green hosting

SuperGreen is eco-friendly green hosting powered by renewable energy.  Find out what it means to have a green data center.

As more people become aware of the increasing need to adapt to a smaller carbon footprint in the wake of global warming, perhaps you’ve asked yourself, “What can I do to help?” Let’s find out.

More and more people are coming online and using social services like Facebook and Twitter or starting their own websites and blogs. However, free services have their limitations and if they don’t like the content you post, they can pull your online presence. 

You can still effectively communicate with friends, family and others around the world and post the content you like when you have your own domain for running a website or blog, but before you jump on board and buy your first or next web hosting account, here is something to consider.

The data centers that are needed to run a web hosting company consume enormous amounts of electricity. In October 2009, US Infrastructure magazine did a study on data centers and compiled some interesting facts.

• Between 2000 and 2005, the energy consumed by large data centers doubled worldwide.
• In 2006, online data centers in the US accounted for 1.5 percent of the entire country’s electricity use.
• 25% of the power needed to operate a data center goes towards air conditioning to keep the servers from over-heating.

The good news is, more data centers are turning to green energy, mainly wind and solar, to power their operations.

A few years ago when eco-friendly web hosting was becoming popular, the pricing structure was at a premium, often more than double that of non-green hosting and with significant limitations on disk space and bandwidth.

In recent months, prices have been drastically reduced and web hosting companies like iPage and SuperGreen can now offer green hosting accounts with unlimited disk space and bandwidth for under $4/month, under pricing most of their competitors.

If you are considering purchasing hosting, take a look at carbon neutral web hosting from iPage or SuperGreen.

I have both an iPage a SuperGreen account and the speed of my websites and blogs are considerably faster than that of other hosts I’ve tried.

-AJ

The first web hosting plan I ever bought back in 1997 was $40/month for only 100 megabytes of disk space.  Back then it was a luxury to have your own domain, especially for internet marketers.  There was no such thing as hosting multiple domain names on a single web hosting account.

Fast forward to today and I now pay only $1.30/month for unlimited disk space and I can host multiple domains on one account.  Cheap web hosting has become very competitive over the years.  But is it wise to host all of your domains on one web hosting account?  Let’s find out.

Advantages:

Multi-domain hosting gives the web hosting account holder the ability to host multiple domains on a single web hosting account.

The biggest advantage is the money to be saved. You don’t have to incur additional hosting costs when you get the bug to start another website. This is especially advantageous if you’re an avid blogger, an internet marketer, need an online presence for your brick and mortar business, want to post your family’s activities and summer vacation photos, or maybe you want your own personal email address with a spiffy domain name.

Disadvantages:

All web hosting companies have infrequent “burps” in service, but no doubt you’ll select a reputable web host that knows how to limit these. However, if a web host does suffer an unfortunate prolonged outage and all of your domains are on a single account, then all of your sites will be inaccessible during the down time. It’s something you’ll need to take into consideration if you plan on hosting sites that are generating an income. No visitors means no money coming in.

All of your domains will resolve to the same IP address. If your sites are giving back links to each other in hopes of boosting your position on the search engines, having the same IP address won’t help a lot because the search engines can see you’re basically linking to yourself. However, any additional traffic you gain is always welcome.

In Summary:

Multi-domain hosting is very economical, but if you’re running several mission critical businesses, spreading them out across different hosting companies may be advantageous in the long run. The good news is, there are many reputable web hosting companies offering quality hosting at very low competitive prices.

I think Matt’s new buzz is HOT! 

Q:  I’ve been using free blogs like Blogger and Wordpress.com, but they don’t allow selling. I participate in some affiliate programs to make some extra money and already got one of my Blogger blogs shutdown because of it. I need my own web hosting account to run my own WordPress blog, but I don’t know where to start.  Can you help me?

A:  Setting up your own hosting account and blog is easy.  Here are instructions for doing it as cheaply as possible.

1. Buy a domain name from NameCheap.  Use the coupon code on that page to get it even cheaper.
2. Then get 3 years of web hosting for less than the price of 1 year from WebHostingPad.  There is a coupon code on that page, too.  Don’t accept the free domain offer.  You won’t own the domain name if you do.  Just like with the free blog problems you’re having now, you don’t want free domain problems down the road.  During the order process, tick the radio button that says you already have a domain name and enter the name you bought in step #1.
3. Log into your NameCheap account and go to the Domain Manager.  In the left menu, click on “Transfer DNS to Webhost”.  In fields 1 and 2 enter the following server names to point your new domain name to the WebHostingPad servers:
   1. NS1.WEBHOSTINGPAD.COM
   2. NS2.WEBHOSTINGPAD.COM
4. Then log into the cPanel control panel on your WebHostingPad account like this:
   1. http://YourNewDomainName.com/cpanel  (You might have to wait for up to about 1 hr for step #3 to kick in before your domain name will resolve to WebHostingPad’s server.)
5. Once in cPanel, find the Software section and click on the Fantastico icon.
6. In Fantastico locate WordPress and install it onto your new domain name.

And there you have it!  If you’re already familiar with the free WordPress.com interface, you’ll already know how to run the full blown WordPress.  Plus, you can do so much more with it like install plugins and most importantly, make money with your affiliate programs!