I’ve had the good fortune to work with many authors and small business people using my (somewhat) technical knowledge about websites. I’ve also experienced hosts — good and bad — and the way that those companies and individuals impacted on my website. For the most part, I’d have to say that my hosting experience has been good. However, having experienced the bad, I’d like to help others avoid it.

The good news is that for most authors who want a simple website, perhaps just a WordPress blog, the majority of the hosting out there is more than sufficient. If your blog receives a lot of traffic, or you have extensive content, you may want to make sure your host can handle it. But what do you really need to know?

First, you need a host you can contact. Ask a pre-sales question or two, even if you know the answer. Better yet, if the answer is on their website — ask anyway. The speed of the reply, as well as the tone, can tell you a lot about the host. Tech support people get asked a lot of routine, obvious (to us) questions on a daily basis. Does the reply sound like the person is professional? Or does it have a “look on the website, you moron” tone to it?

If the host offers a list of their clients, ask for referrals. Is the host there when people have questions? Can you reach the person and do they respond within twenty-four hours or less? If the host appears to be a large company (like GoDaddy, Hostgator, or 1and1), google their name plus the word reviews. (i.e. Hostgator reviews). Understand that no one company can please everyone, but are the majority of the posts negative? Does the company reasonably refute any bad reviews? Is everything glowing?

You can check forums such as webhostingtalk.com to see if there are any posts about a particular host.

Once you’ve checked out their business and customer service skills, THEN see what kind of space you will receive. In the majority of cases, most plans will be suitable for a blog-type website. Again, if you have special needs, anticipate a lot of traffic, or will be running other applications such as an online store or lots of videos, you may want to look for extra space, storage, or bandwidth.

Finally, check the price. I’ll be honest, you really do get what you pay for. I was with a lovely company that had excellent prices and super reviews. They were sold and the whole thing went downhill. I went with another host who had excellent prices, but she was a single person operation and when she didn’t pay her bills ALL our sites were down (I communicated with several of her clients.) (Luckily in that scenario I was easily able to find out who she hosted with and went with that company directly instead of through her.)

That said, for most blog-type sites, you should be able to find a pretty good deal for $5 a month or less, and you’ll probably be perfectly happy with them.

If you do have special needs, such as an online store, then you’ll probably need a few more things. If your store just takes paypal, then a blog-type hosting package may be sufficient. However, if you have a merchant account to directly accept credit cards, you’ll need a SSL certificate. This is what secures your site to prevent your data from being stolen. (Author Lex Valentine had a superb article about it here: http://www.lexvalentine.com/2010/03/publishers-without-protection/). So find out, do you have to buy a SSL cert from the company you’re hosting from, or can you purchase one from a third-party provider (perhaps who you get your domain names through) and use it there. This is a very important question to ask. Not doing so, made me cancel hosting with a company to move it elsewhere.

Secondly, will the hosting company allow PCI scans? These are scans done by vendors for the credit card company to make sure your information is secure. Will the company allow the scans, and should vulnerabilities be found, will the company help you fix them? There can be some hefty fines for not having PCI scans, so this is really important.

Yes, hosting plans that allow SSL certs (they need a dedicated IP address, which usually costs up to $2.50 extra month, if it’s not included) will cost more. But if you’re a business person looking to grow your business, then you’ll probably want something more than a basic hosting package anyway.

If you’re not sure what the acronyms in this post mean — google them! I’m a firm believer that if you have a website, you should at least know where your files are, where your backup is, and what type of software you’re using. (Are you using Wordpress? Typepad? Joomla? Drupal?) This way, if something happens, you can say to someone “Hey, I have a wordpress site, can you help me get up and running?” If you’re going to “outsource” your website maintenance to someone, you still need to know the basics of what it is and how it works. Because you should always plan for worst case scenarios.

I’m currently using three different hosting companies for my various projects, and have worked with a lot more over the years. Know what to ask. Find out about their service and then what do they offer. Because when you’re hosting your author website, it’s your brand. And you want a company that will stand by you, even if they’re not the biggest kid on the block.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, April 27th, 2010 at 1:53 am and is filed under rambling thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.