Web Hosting

Host Gator asked:


It’s quite difficult and confusing to start any type of online marketing or Internet business.

There are many aspects to be taking care of such as domain name registration and purchase, purchasing of Web site host and “construction” of the Web site by own. Generally users don’t want to follow this difficult path rather chooses the easy way of getting everything from one place.

This results in growth of “total packages” by many hosting and Internet development companies, in which domain-name registration, software for design of a site or an online method of building a site, professional design of the site, and of course, the hosting are included. The users commonly use this, as it looks quite easy especially to the beginners.

But the story is different which brings problems afterwards. There is no road as paved “with gold” and this type of registration, hosting and design package deal is no exception.

The real problems emerge afterwards which are discussed below: -

1.On the popularity of a website, most of the host providers use to increase the prices. With increasing traffic there is no other option for a user than to pay more. Thus it forms a very big problem for larger business sites than for smaller business sites or “personal” or “theme” sites.

2. In the beginning some providers provide some “specials” but they are only for a limited amount of time, and rises with popularity of website.

3. Another major problem faced by a Web site owner is that his/her needs changes with passage of time and there arises need to change the package and then the user is confronted with problem of inability to change the pages on his/her own, another problem which puzzles is the inability to effectively track traffic, as some come with traffic statistics packages.

4.Another problem, which occurs after wards, is the Downtime i.e. when a site is down and can’t be viewed. This asks for change of host or change of domain name registrars.

5.Often situation comes when a Web site, registration, and web hosting package company suddenly disappears, leaving a client with no way to contact them. This not only causes loss of the registered domain name, but even the loss of revenues while the site is “down”.

6. The hosting companies make contracts which states that the “special” prices are only offered conditional i.e. which are applicable on remaining with a certain company and for a specified amount of time only.

7. The actual “name” of one’s site may not be even actually registered to “him” but to the hosting and registrar company that initiated the purchase through the package deal. By this way the Web site hosting, design and registrar packages “save” money several times for consumers, as they advantage of buying in bulk, registering hundreds of sites on a monthly basis.

The above problems can be easily resolved by simply switching to other Web site hosting and domain name registrar.

But wait! Wait! Wait! It’s not so easy as some hosting and domain name registrars don’t allow to “handing over” a site to any other company, as it means loss of customer or more interesting loss of money. The current hosting company tries all to create problem in the form of delays in transfer, by refusing to provide sufficient information to a new host or registrar to effectively conclude a transfer. Most worse is, if the name of a site has been registered to them.

At this point of time a real “nightmare” for the user starts. He tries all to get the response but all is vain.

There are several incidences, which shows that it’s really hard to shift to another provider.

One of the users named Rahul after much downtime wrote to the initial hosting company, and domain name registrar, stating his disappointment in the service. The response was quite annoying it was that he should either “like it or lump it” and that nothing is in their hands, as a contract was in place that could not be “broken” by any means. The language of the e-mail correspondence was quite harsh and uncalled for with no phone number for personal contact; even the name of the support person that wrote the e-mail was missing.

The site remained down consistently, as well, over the next few weeks, forcing Rahul to sign up for a different hosting plan with a different host, and also re-register the domain with another registrar. Thus it was just waste of time and money but still he was fortunate as the registration of the site was in his name and there was no need to purchase a new name. However at the time of transfer, old host refused to initiate a transfer, claiming that the contract remained intact, and therefore the site could not be transferred. Thus forcing the new hosting company to “maneuver” the site onto it’s own servers without the cooperation of the previous company and putting the unnecessary money burden on the user.

Chapter was not yet over, few months later Rahul was billed repeatedly by the previous hosting company for monthly hosting, even though a site no longer existed on their servers. In order to stop all the Copies of all correspondence had to be sent to the billing service to “dismiss” this recurrent billing, which was the only option left to Rahul at this point.

Thus it is not just one incidence but also one out of the many.

The following are some of the ways to avoid trap of these companies-:

1. One must read all paperwork and contracts thoroughly. The copy of the contract should be clearly visible and each word of the contract should be read thoroughly as this will help in saving from frustration and misunderstandings later on.

Not only this, one must make sure that the registration will be done in “his/her name”, as the loss of a popular name, at that moment when there is large amount of traffic, is a great loss for any user. Most preferable is that one should register his/her domain name him/her self. Registering domain is not a big deal with so many online domain registrars. The only thing one is supposed to do is that after buying a hosting package immediately he/she should change the “name servers” through the control panel provided by the domain registrar.

The best advantage of doing so is that if one is not satisfied with his/her hosting company and would like to shift to a different company, simply he/she is required to change the name servers to point to the new company.

2.In order to avoid problems afterwards one must sure there is a contact phone number and physical address for correspondence with the companies. As most of the times the both are missing and user is left with no option than to feel harassment as well as time and money loss as seen in above example.

3. One must do his homework properly before finalizing any hosting company. He/she must do proper research on different plans and different companies. One must check through references the image of the company and also must ask from their current customers about the support being offered at the time of crisis.

4. One must take time to correctly ascertain his/her own needs and the needs of any site he/she is planning to build. The package must be “as per requirement”.

5.It is most advisable to use different providers for each stage of a Web site: hosting, domain-name registrar, site building. As everything is online it does take longer to get a site up and running with this method, but the best part is by doing so the overall control remains with the user. If one is disappointed with the service of his/her provide simply he/she is required to shift to new provider and that is quite easy as to replace one is easier than to replace everything.

Thus it can be seen that sometimes “time saving” strategies are not really fruitful and they can lead to heartbreak and headaches afterwards. The moral of the story is “slow but steady” wins the race. So act wisely.