If you’re looking for a matching web host provider for your small business it can be a very challenging task to determine what requirements you really need and what web hosting company you can trust. Therefore watch out for this 10 baseline requirements reputable web host providers should meet as they are vital for the success of your small business website.
1. Upgradeable Business Hosting Plan
An upgradeable business hosting plan is a plan that grows with your business. That holds your web hosting cost as low as possible and provides you with all features needed in the current situation.
2. 24/7 Live Support By Phone and by Email
24 hours a day, seven days a week live support by phone and by email is another vital feature you have to watch out for. Sometimes you’ll simply need support in any way but to wait a month of sundays especially in business is not exactly brilliant.
3. 99.99% Uptime Guarantee
That means that your business website is running without a drop out in 99.99% of the time. This can only be guaranteed if the web host company relies on high end server infrastructure maintained by well trained technical staff.
4. A Free Domain Name
In simple terms a domain name is the unique web address of your website like e.g. “yoursmallbusinessname.com” or something like that. It has to be registered to your name before it is accessible over the internet. Usually every good web host provider will register you at least one domain name for free.
5. Website and Web Statistic tool
A website and web statistic tool like e.g. AWStats or Webalizer is needed to collect detailed information about the visitors of your website. To analyze your visitors is crucial for your success and so this feature must be included in a good web hosting plan.
6. Spam- and Virus Blockers for email accounts
Spam and virus blockers are filter programs that run on the servers of your web hoster. Nowadays this feature became standard and should be included in your hosting plan without extra charge.
7. Web based control panel
A web based control panel like e.g. cPanel is a program that runs in your favorite internet browser. With a control panel program you’re able to manage and adjust all your web hosting tasks like e.g. setting up your email and ftp-accounts, performing security settings, organizing your databases, performing backups etc. The most popular control panel today is cPanel which is included in a good web hosting plan.
8. Web based email
Web based email means that you have access to your emails both with your email client and over the internet with your internet browser. That gives you the possibility to access your emails from any computer with an internet connection.
9. Minimum 30 Day Money Back guarantee
A solid money back guarantee gives you confidence that the company keeps their promises not only on the day that you’ve signed in. Of not, don’t hesitate to cancel your hosting plan and get your your money back before you invest to much time in your website development.
10. Instant Backup Option
An instant Backup Option gives you the possibility to backup your entire hosting account and download it to your own computer. This includes everything that is setup with the account. The backup file can be used to restore your account on their server if needed and gives you more control over the security aspects of your web hosting account.
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