his section is designed to help you determine what
you will need from a hosting provider.
These are the questions you need to be able to answer for your self.
You may find it useful to refer to other pages in this section, listed
on the right.
- Is this a business or personal site?
- Does the site need to be found on the search engines and are you
prepared to expend money and time to get it positioned properly?
More on Search Engines
- How many email addresses do you need? Do you need forwarders or
auto responders on any or all of these addresses?
- Will you be traveling a lot without a computer? Would web mail be
a help?
- Once your site is designed, how big is it exactly? How much
storage will you need? Do you intend to add-on in the future? 50 mb
will hold about 175 text and graphic based pages depending on the
content
- How many visitors is it realistic to expect to your site? Don't
trick yourself into thinking you are Microsoft or Google. If you are
you will need an array of private servers. 1000mb (1 gig) is good
for about 100,000 visitors per month depending on the content
delivered.
- Do you need a database? If so, what kind?
- Do you need to use CGI scripts?
- What kind of support do you think you might need? (Support is a
very subjective issue. Most host providers offer support only if
there is a problem with the server. They will not help you develop
scripts or author your web site. Read the fine print with any
provider you may be considering.)
- What is your primary spoken language? Make sure your provider can
communicate with you and you with them.
- How would you like to pay; monthly, quarterly, every 6 months or
yearly? Would you like to pay by cheque, wire transfer, credit card
or by some other means?
- Do you need some of the more esoteric services like ASP, SSI, or
SSL. If you don't know what this means, you don't need them.
- Are website statistics important to you?
Once you have answered these questions, you are in a much better
position to select your hosting provider. Of course, we would like you
to consider our services.
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