For you to have an efficient web presence,
you need to have a reliable and efficient web hosting service. But efficiency
and reliability come at a price that may not fit your budget.
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| Image courtesy Pexels |
Cheap web hosting seems to be something for the faint at heart; for those who want a web presence, but on a very, very limited budget. The cheaper the better, you would say.
And yet even then, you still want the service to be fast, reliable and efficient.
How does that work, and is it even possible?
Welcome to the world of cheap web hosting, or hosting on a budget. This is what this post will talk about. Why?
Because believe it or not, hosting for those who are still new to the game can be a struggle. It's hard to understand just what you are being sold as a web hosting package. And definitely it is hard to comprehend if the price you are paying for the package is worth it.
It's why you have to have some knowledge of what web hosting is,and what it comprises before you decide on a hosting package fit for your web presence.
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Table of content What is web hosting What to look for in a hosting plan Conclusion |
So you want to come out with a professional looking web presence, after using the many free blogging platforms that are available. And while they helped you get started, you now think that you are worth more than just staying on "free" level.
What's the next step to take? Upgrade!
Yes, you need to upgrade your web experience by opting for a web hosting service. With a decent hosting plan,you will have full control of your website and site content.
This is interesting because a web hosting service gives you a packaged product, that includes both essential and advance services needed to run, manage, and control your website.
This packaged product is called a hosting plan, and could come at a price that may or may not be within your budget. if you are starting out for the first time, to know the hosting plan that is a good fit for you pocket, you need to first know what web hosting is.
What is web hosting
The internet is used by millions of people all over the world in various ways. Through social media you can communicate with one another. If you have a website, you can share information, sell products, and get people to buy them.
Information is one thing that makes the
web interesting. This is because it is shared as content for blogs,
websites, video content sites, social media and so many other digital
outlets.
All of this information however, is stored as files somewhere, so they can be retrieved by anyone who has access to the internet.The question is, where are they stored?
Web hosting is the service that allows you to store your files online, so people can retrive those files when they do an online search. File can be images, text, html, etc.
How web hosting works
For a web hosting service to work, information must be stored on special computers called host computers or servers. These computers are run or managed by companies, also know as, web hosting service providers. Essentially they rent out storage spaces on these servers, where you can store your files.
This means that the company gives you a space on the computer-server, to store your files. Think of web hosting this way. For example, an area in your town or city has lots of garages or storage depots.
These garages are rented out to people, so they can keep their personal belongings in them. But to use the garages, they will have to take out a monthly or yearly payment plan.
Web hosting works in a similar fashion. But unlike the physical garage which you can use to store personal belongings, when you store your files on servers, it is available on the World Wide Web, so anyone with an internet connection, can get access to them by doing a web search.
Web hosting services are provided by companies that specialize in providing online internet services. Some of these companies provide more than hosting, to also providing internet connectivity, and other web services.
Web hosting itself is packaged into different formats with varying service that caters to different needs, both for individuals and businesses. In general you mostly hear about two types of hosting which are self-hosting and free hosting.
However, there are more than the two mentioned above such as,
1. Shared Hosting
2. Virtual Private Server (VPS) Hosting
3. Dedicated Server Hosting
4. Cloud Hosting
5. Managed WordPress Hosting
6. Reseller Hosting
7. Colocation Web Hosting
8. eCommerce Hosting
9. WordPress hosting
While it is important to know which hosting service is right for you, this post will make mention of free hosting. This is because the main focus of this post is about cheap hosting. But first let's take a look at what free-hosting is all about.
a) Free hosting services
Free hosting as the name implies is in essence, a free hosting service. It simply means that you can store your files for free on the host server, and you won’t be charged a dime.
To be able to use this free service however, you must go to the host's website to register for a free account. This is where you create an account on say, WordPress.com or Wix.com. With Google blogger, you first sign up for a Google account.
This one Google account, gives you access to a wide variety of tools and services offered by Google, one of them being the Blogger platform. When you have created an account and finished the sign up process, by clicking the send button, you have created your Google account.
Once you've opened your account, you can now go to Google Blogger and use it to create your first website, add content, and then click publish and your website is up and running.
Every other aspect of how the website functions that you do not see, will all be taken care of by the service provider. The most important one being, uptime.
What is uptime
Uptime in web hosting service, refers to the amount of time a web hosting server or website is up and running without interruption. Uptime is expressed in percentage and is a very important factor when considering a web hosting plan.
Uptimes must always be in the range of 99.9% to guarantee all round website visibility because otherwise, if your website is getting a serious amount of traffic, any disruption in uptime could cause considerable loss of that traffic.
And so when considering a web hosting service put into consideration this one factor when choosing.
Limitations of free hosting
Freehosting for most people, is what you use when you are first starting out in the blogging world. And so any site you create using a Wordpress.com or Blogger, is considered a learning curve.
Since it is free, you get some essential free services such as, free customization, free themes and definitely you do not pay for hosting.The problem with free hosting however, is that it has limitations which may hinder you from taking full control of how you want your website to look.
if you want to know what you get with free hosting, here are some of them.
-Limited number of themes: With free-hosting you are limited in the amount of themes available for you to use for your website. Themes are pre-designed templates or layouts which you can choose for your website appearance.They are mostly limited to not more than five in number.
- Limited customization:Customization is limited and so you are limited in how you can adjust layouts, functionalities, to your specific needs.
-You can only use a subdomain: With freehosting you are limited to a sudbdomain name, for your site. This means that any name you choose to give your site, will have the host's domain name attached to it.
For example, yoursite.blogspot.com is your subdomain name, where yoursite is the name you have given to your site.
-Ad display is prevalent: With free web hosting,expect to see ads displayed on your site pages. This is because, ads are one way free web hosting services are able to generate revenue to keep giving you the service free.
However once you feel you've made enough progress and want to up your game, try out a paid hosting plan. What does it mean to take out a paid hosting plan? It simply means that from now on,
-you will be paying an annual subscription fee to keep your site up and running.
-you will have access to a back office or CPanel area
-you will have more themes at your disposal to choose from.
-you will also have more customization options.
-plugins are available for you to add extra functionalities.
What is a good hosting plan
-disk space should be enough for you to store your files.
-enough bandwidth
-ability to host 1or more websites
-uptime for your website must be 99.9%
-domain registration and transfer options should be available.
-custom email address options must be available.
-SSL Certificate for secure connections, should be available.
-CPanel or any other control panel must be included for you to mange your website.
The cost for cheap web hosting
Cheap web hosting as the name implies, means that for you to get your site up and running, you will not have to spend too much money. This is because the minute you start spending money for hosting, know that you are running a business. Paying for hosting, is considered an operational cost.
As someone who has started a business, you're aim is to make money from the business to the point where money generated by the business is used to pay for expenditures such as web hosting.
Have this in mind before choosing to go for a hosting plan. And if you want to choose one on a limited budget, then check out the following five hosting providers.
Dreamhost- Hosting plan starts from $2.59/month if you take out a yearly plan.
Hostgator-Currently offers hosting plan at $3.75/month if you take out a yearly plan
Bluehost-Currently offers a hosting plan at $2.49/month if you take out a yearly plan.
Namecheap-Currently Namecheap offers Stellar hosting plan at €1.84/month if you take out a yearly plan.
Hostinger-Currently offers a Premium plan at $2.99/month if you take out a yearly plan.
What to look for in a hosting plan
The idea that you want to take out a cheap and inexpensive hosting service is good. But as with all things, before you invest your hard-earned money, pay close attention to the details of the particular plan you intend to take out.
So the plan is good and cheap because it is within your budget. However look beyond the details you see, and find out if
-the price is an offer and how long the offer lasts
The price you see could reflect a current hosting deals and offers package on the original price. This means that you might pay for hosting at the current offer for a particular period of time, say 1 year. After the 1-year period, you may start paying the original price which might be slightly higher.
-what type of hosting is offered within the plan
Understand the hosting plan you are signing up for as this will determine how much disk space and bandwith that will be allocated to you. If you take on for example, a cheap shared hosting plan, while it might be super cheap, just know that you are sharing disk space with others.
Conclusion
Whatever your plans are, for getting affordable web hosting, know that you will definitely find low-cost and reliable web hosting services readily available to meet your hosting needs. But no matter what is being offered and how cheap they are packaged, it is best to do your due diligence before investing in a web hosting plan.
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