With all the Web Hosting providers out there choosing a web hosting account can be a difficult decision. How do you know that the host you’re speaking to is who they say they are? Do you actually know what to ask when you’re shopping around? Here are 7 things to look for that will help you with your decision.

Location

The location of your web hosting account is important for a  number of reasons. If you’re in the Oceanic region web hosting in Australia is highly recommended as if will provide you with the fasted page load times, however you may want to consider hosting your website in the region that the most of your traffic comes from, one example of this is if you had a popular blog where your traffic was mostly from the the USAI would look for a hosting account in America. If you’re unsure about where your traffic is coming from I’d suggest using Google Analytics to look up this data. Additionally you can also gain SEO benefits from hosting your content locally.

Support

Support is probably the most important factor when choosing your web hosting plan. Look for a host that offers at minimum 24x7x365 email support and business hours phone support. While it is nice being able to call and speak to someone 24 hours a day keep this in your nice to have list as most issues do get resolved a lot quicker within a support ticket.

Resources

Over the last few years there has been an increase in web hosting providers offering ‘unlimited’ plans, don’t get caught up in the marketing hype as there is no such thing as ‘unlimited’, the terms of use will point this out. Be realistic and look at what your actual requirements are and if you have an existing site look at your current usage. Most websites use minimal disk space and bandwidth so the majority of the plans out there will be more than suitable for your needs.

Extras

There are a number of great addons on offer these days so look for a hosting account that includes at least some of the following. Fantastico which offers one click installs of a number of popular scripts, RV Site Builder which is a free website builder and a new one name Attracta which is a cPanel plugin that offers self-service SEO services to end users.

Control Panel

An easy to use control panel is essential for you to manage your web hosting account. One of the most popular control panels on offer is cPanel. cPanel allows you to add and remove domains, manage email and view your website statistics, additionally all the extras I have mentioned above come as add ons to cPanel.  At Crucial we offer cPanel with all our Web Hosting accounts and by keeping to an popular control panel it also makes it easier to move web hosting providers in the future.

Backups

Backups, backups and backups. Find a package that has multiple backups on offer and if it’s not advertised make sure you  ASK. A good backup strategy should include RAID and at least an enterprise backup solution such as R1Soft CDP.

Price

Don’t go buy the cheapest package, shop around and find a host that offers you good value through their support, management and infrastructure. and if you’re purchasing for your business I would spend a little more on a business web hosting package.

Read the Terms

It’s disturbing how many people actually buy something without reading the terms. I Always read the TOS and AUP before making any purchase no matter how long it takes me. Make sure you know what you’re getting yourself into, what are the terms of service, what about the cancellation policy and so on.

Thanks for reading and if you’re in the market for web hosting I hope that these basic tips help make the decision that little bit easier for you.