Web site hosting

[HoldenMcCrank]

Looking for some info on web site hosting. I am looking to set up a simple website. Nothing fancy mainly for family and friends. Possibly a little on line selling via pay pal but nothing major.

What do I need to know? What do I need to aviod. What should I expect to pay?

Thanks in advance.

Holden

 

[M's girl]

Here in NL your provider allows you to build a homepage for free and you'll have limited storage-space for it, but large enough to build a site with a view pictures, some text etc. If you want to extend you can usualy buy more space.

I'm not sure about the pay-pal thing; could be they will consider your site to be for business and I can imagine (not sure) that will have (financial) consequences.

Also, MSN Groups is a good idea if you want a place where you can store some pictures, documents and have a forumlike feature where people YOU give access can come together to discuss things. More storage space can be bought there too, but the initial space is free and anyone can create a group!

If this is not what you were looking for, Weird Harold is the one here that knows ....

 

[HoldenMcCrank]

Thanks for the reply M's Girl. I am hoping the WeirdHarold does reply. I want to know what I should know before I buy. I know that there are plenty out there that offer this service but I don't know what things I should be looking for and what are irrellavent. I know that I don't need 200 email addresses! But beyond that I dont' know what I need to be an informed shopper/consumer.

Thanks
Holden

 

[Ezzy]

If it is going to be clean non-adult content then look at Bluehost.com they were providing the best package I found about 3 months ago $6.95 / month.

If you are wanting to put together an Adult content site, then you need to consider a whole different set of costs. You can get Adult hosting from around $140.00 a year but it is poorly supported and not really worth the effort better to lok at a package around $69.00 / month if you are trying to do adult content hosting to make money.

The things you will need: -

1) A Domain name.
This can be picked up on the cheap $6.00 or $7.00 from somewhere like GoDaddy.com, try and pick a name that describes what your sites are about.

2) Webhost.
See above.

3) Time to learn a little design or research website templates.
This is a big area if you want it to be, or a really small area. It depends on what you are looking for and are willing to either work at or pay for.

Other things to consider: -

Most free webhosts are worth exactly what you paid for them... Nothing in other words!

A great number of ISP (Internet Service Providers) provide a "free" hosting service if you are paying for their service, these often have 30 - 40 website templates and are a quick and easy way for a non-HTMLcoder to put something together that looks ok if not actually brilliant.

Think about paying a little bit more and buying a second or even a third domain name and keep things seperate. If I come to buy widgets from you, I don't want to have to wade through 30 pages of your family photo album, you can seperate two different ways, 1) buy a second domain name or 2) buy webhosting that allows subdomains.

IE
1)
Domain 1) fredbloggs.com
Domain 2) joebloggs.com

2)
Domain 1) fredbloggs.com
SubDom 1) joebloggs.fredbloggs.com

If you go the multiple route, look for a host that allows you to split you web space up as you want to put multiple domains in one webhosting account. This works out cheaper in the long run, you can buy resellers space and sublet to yourself and your friends and family.

I use a reseller account and it pays for itself and covers the cost of my own webhosting, and I have only 4 clients currently on it, and it shows me a profit on the books every year. Effectively each client pays fees of about 75% of the real cost of the total hosting package, the total package costs me around $200 / year and the cleints are charged $150 / year / client so I get $600.00 coming in and I take care of any service question as they arrive. This is a "money for old rope" situation for the most part, but when things do go wrong, you have to be willing to work long and hard to get things set right, before it costs the cleints sales etc.

This is just the tip of the iceberg, if you have further questions ask and I will pop in and out for a while.