Cheap Host
Are Free or Cheap Web Hosting Companies really a Good deal?
Executive summary about cheap host by Jack S. Pooley Tampa
If you can afford to spend even a few dollars a month, a paid host is a better deal, even for a personal web site. If you really can’t afford to pay anything, and you want a “free” website, my best recommendation is to get a blog at either Blogger.com or WordPress.com. Both of these platforms are stable and easy to use, and as long as your purpose is simply to have a personal website. If you want to make a few bucks, you can set up adsense accounts on these sites, or put links on them that lead to your affiliate sales pages. If you’re looking to make a commercial web site, Blogger.com is a little friendlier to these kinds of things than WordPress.com. Plus, the search engines like these sites and you may find your blog is much more popular than you thought it could be.
Most other free web hosts come with one or more of the following problems, and really limit your ability to conduct business online.
1. Long urls, with the free web hosts name in them. This doesn’t instill much confidence in prospective buyers or clients.
2. Free web host sponsored links and advertising. People who click on these ads make money for them, not you, and leave your website.
3. Space and bandwidth given to web sites by free hosting companies are normally quite small.
4. Most free hosts restrict your ability to advertise or run a business web site that processes purchases.
5. No ability to obtain SSL certificates or handle transactions securely, even if they are allowed.
6. Technology used at these sites is not state of the art, and they are often slow to load.
7. Pearl, CGI and scripts are often not updated to current versions, and requests for updates are usually denied.
8. Support is, at best, not very good or quick to respond. At some free web hosts, it is virtually non-existent.
9. Most do not give you the tools you need to build a web site, like an online site builder and templates, or a free script library to install blogs, galleries, or other features.
10. Cron jobs, necessary to run certain scripts and other features, are often not provided or allowed. Databases may not be provided or allowed.
If you just want a personal web site to put your thoughts or opinions online, get a free blog and start writing. As with free web hosts, if you’re just setting up a small personal site, but want to build the site yourself, and want more flexibility as to the template you use, and want to be able to add pictures, video and audio, then a real dirt cheap host may be a good deal for you. But for a business or e-commerce web site, cheaper is not always a bargain.
If your intention is to make a living online, or at least to have a professional online business presence, you’re going to have to pay for a real domain name and your web hosting.
Really cheap web hosting plans usually have one or more of the same problems as free hosting. Slow speed, small space and bandwidth, overselling of both space and bandwidth, lack of service and tech support, and less than state of the art security and equipment, etc.
A good premium hosting company will help make the process easier by giving you an online Site Builder and templates to make building the web site easier, and will also have a script library to make installing a blog, photo gallery, forum, or online store much easier and simpler to do. Having a good, quick tech support system in place is the biggest benefit of going with a premium hosting company.
The primary complaints that most people have with the really large cheap hosts have to do with their lack of support. If you never need to use tech support, then one of these web hosts may work just fine for you, just make sure you understand how some of their advertising “low balls” their actual costs.
Really cheap web hosts advertise prices from $2.95 to $4.95 a month, and some also advertise month to month payments. Some web hosting companies also offer great specials for the first month or first year, to get you to sign up, but then the price to continue hosting with them is much higher than you would pay for a good premium hosting plan.
The final major problem with really cheap web hosting (and also free web hosting), especially from sites that offer month to month payment plans, is that they attract spammers, phishers, hackers and other internet bottom feeders. The problem for your business web site, is that your may wind up sharing an IP address with one of these sites. If you use email to send newsletters or sales flyers to your clients, you may find your emails blocked by one or more of the major mail servers, simply because a spammer who shares your IP address has broken the rules. Eventually, your web host will confirm to the email service that they have removed the offending account, and eventually your IP will be unblocked, but in the meantime, you can’t communicate with your customers. Meanwhile, the spammer or phisher knew their account would be shut down in a matter of days or weeks, and they don’t care.
You may be unfairly accused of spamming, simply because a few of your clients click your email into their spam folder, rather than clicking on your unsubscribe link. Many people simply don’t realize that doing that can lodge a spam complaint against you with their email provider; they just didn’t want to receive your emails anymore. When they receive the spam complaint from the email provider, most premium hosts will give you a chance to provide documentation that you aren’t a spammer, before they close down your account. You may find your website shut down, and your domain name locked up for weeks, while you prove your innocence to your hosting company.
In fact, the difference in price between a good premium web host and a dirt cheap one is only a few dollars a month. Of course, you can pay a lot more, and some premium hosts charge up to $39.95 a month or more to host one website. But you don’t have to pay anywhere near that amount to get great, full featured web hosting.
Read our article about dedicated web hosting.
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11 Comments on “Cheap Host”
For some bloggers, the ones that post their blogs just for pleasure and not for business reasons, free hosts are the perfect choice.
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Hi, very nice post. I have been wonder’n bout this issue,so thanks for posting
Hi, very nice post. I have been wonder’n bout this issue,so thanks for posting
You know so many interesting infomation. You might be very wise. I like such people. Don’t top writing.
Some of us even don’t realize the importance of this information. What a pity.
65% of people never click on paid or sponsored results