A Lifelong Learning Process

When you are ready to create a website, one of the most important decisions you will make is deciding on the right hosting company and package for your website. There are several factors that can help you make an appropriate decision that will continue to meet the needs of your website for many years.

Expected Traffic

The amount of traffic you expect should influence your decision. Website traffic includes the amount of visitors to your website and their level of engagement. For example, a simple website or blog with thousands of visitors each day may not require the same amount of bandwidth, processing and storage as a website that has hundreds of visitors who will perform resource-demanding tasks on your website, such as shopping, watching videos or any activity where you expect your visitors to be active on your website for longer periods of time.

Most small websites that do not expect high traffic or significant visitor engagement can do well with shared hosting plans. If you have bigger plans for your website, the next step is to consider a virtual private server (VPS), which can handle higher amounts of bandwidth and storage of information for your site, with less chance of lagging or server crashes.

Type Of Content

Different types of content on your website will have unique resource demands. You can crash your own website if your hosting is not adequate for the resource demands of your content. If you plan to have content on your website that quickly consumes storage, bandwidth and processing, such as graphics, music, videos or chat groups, you will need a VPS or dedicated server with the help of places like http://www.dedimonster.com. Both VPS and dedicated servers are able to handle more sophisticated content on your website because there is little or no sharing of resources between your website and other users.

A dedicated server may be a better choice for a news website, websites that run software or applications, or a large online store that relies on real-time updating. For example, if your website is a store, you want visitors to be able to see the number of items that are in stock and current prices in real time. This can prevent issues with price adjustments or visitors unknowingly placing orders for items that are no longer available.

Allocation Of Resources

Once you reach the level of a medium or large business, the two options that are available for resource-intensive websites are a VPS or dedicated server. Although many shared hosting plans are geared toward e-commerce websites, larger businesses are unlikely to find shared hosting that will adequately meet their website demands. In general, a VPS is less expensive than a dedicated server and you may find that subtle differences between the two types of hosting are not enough to warrant the extra prices. Unlike a dedicated server, with a VPS you are not the only one using the server.

Although your VPS plan will allocate a specified amount of resources, such as memory and bandwidth, there is the chance that your website can be adversely affected by other websites on the same VPS. Other users who have too much traffic at a given time can cause your website to run slower or crash. If your business cannot afford any lagging or the chance of downtime, you may want to spend the extra money for a dedicated server.

Flexibility

There is no way to accurately predict how popular your website will become or how fast your website will grow. Choosing a plan is important, but having the flexibility to change plans as needed is equally as important. Ideally, you should pay monthly or pay for the shortest contract available until you have a reasonable idea of how your hosting will perform. Many companies will allow you to upgrade your service or even change the type of hosting as the need arises.

If your hosting company allows changes, you need to determine if the money from the unused portion of your current contract can be applied to a new contract. Having a sufficient understanding of the financial impact of changing your plan before you commit to a long-term contract can prevent you from either forfeiting any money already paid, or choosing to keep a hosting plan that does not meet your needs for the remainder of your contract.

All types of website hosting have their benefits depending on the current and future needs of your website. When deciding on hosting, consider your long-term goals and make your decision based on the amount of traffic you want and the function of your website.