Hosting
Choosing the right hosting company is important. Support and reliability are the most important factors you should look for when looking for a hosting service.
I've tried different hosts and had problems with hosting companies in the past. I wrote this review and recommendations to help you make the right hosting choices.
Some hosting companies have outdated systems, some are down too often and many cheap hosting companies don't provide phone support.
If you're serious about your online business, then you shouldn't use crappy, discount web hosting – especially since good web hosting is very inexpensive anyway. Choosing the right host will prevent headaches and problems.
Tips on how to choose a web hosting company:
- Choose a hosting company you can contact by phone.
- Choose a hosting company that is established.
- Don't buy hosting through eBay or other auctions. Those are mostly resellers. When buying from a reseller, you depend on them to provide support and they often will be unavailable when you need them and will provide little or no support.
- Choose a large company. (A long time ago, I had bought hosting from a reseller who died and there was nobody I could contact to get help. I didn't even know when the hosting would be suspended).
I only recommend the following hosting company. I am using this hosting company for my sites and my clients' sites and am happy with their service. They have a great control panel and provide excellent customer service.
Why I recommend BlueHost
- Bluehost provides excellent 24/7 support. You can reach them by phone and get help from their technical staff anytime. They really do their best to help you. If often call them or use Live Chat Help.
- They are reliable. Sites go down very rarely. It's very important that your site doesn't go down when you're making money or are offering a special promotion.
- They provide a state-of-the-art control panel.
- They provide the tools to easily set up WordPress blogs (most hosting companies do today).
- They also provide great free tutorials.
Choose from different hosting plans to fit your needs.
Plans start around $2.99/month. and for around $6.96-$7.95/month you can add an unlimited number of domains and have unlimited bandwidth and unlimited space. You can start with their “baby” plan or “business” plan and upgrade later as needed. You can also upgrade from a shared account to a dedicated account.
Click here to check out BlueHost.
DOMAIN NAME TIP:
I recommend GoDaddy or Namecheap for domain name registration and am using both. I like to order the domain name before ordering hosting. If you wait until you're ready to set up your site, the domain name might be gone.
You can also order the domain name through the hosting company you plan on using but you'll often pay a little more. The benefit is that you'll have the domain and hosting in one place and only have one login.