Why Do I Need Web Hosting?
You may not realize it, but you probably already have a little web hosting. If you have a Facebook page, it is hosted on Facebook's own server. If you need to publish your own web pages you need your own hosting service. Other reasons to pay for your own hosting account:
1. To Publish your own web pages for business or personal use..
2. To start your own blog.
3. To learn how to become a Webmaster for fun and/or profit.
1. To Publish your own web pages for business or personal use..
2. To start your own blog.
3. To learn how to become a Webmaster for fun and/or profit.
How Do I Get Web Hosting?
Web hosting is a service that many companies provide. Basically what these companies do is rent hard disk space on computers that are known as servers. All websites reside on these servers. If you want to have your own space for your own web pages and websites you must rent some space on one of these servers. Then you configure your web space (known as your hosting service) and upload your website to the proper place. You must have a domain name as an address for your web site. Please see Jimbo's Big Domain Page for more info on owning a domain.
Jimbo's Hosting Tips
When you start your search to buy web hosting services you will notice right away you can actually do it for free. If your web site is for any type of business, free web site hosting isn't going to work well. Cheap discount web hosting isn't much better but may be OK for you to start out. Keep in mind changing hosting providers after you've established your web presence is always time consuming and expensive. 
Many business hosting packages include free domain names. This is great, but I don't recommend getting your business domain name as a freebie as you may have problems if you decide to change hosting companies in the future. If you have decided on a web hosting provider and your package includes a free domain, I recommend you buy your domain name first (even from a different company) and then purchase a hosting package. The free domain can be used for another website or parked.
Buy hosting from reputable companies (hint - not the one that rhymes with "slow bady" ) and spend time comparing different options. This has become much easier these days because every company now offers pretty much the same limits for usage - unlimited. Beware of "discount" hosting. There's a reason their plan costs 1.95 a month. These companies can be great for a personal website but will be missing some functions. MySql & PHP being two important ones. The bigger companies are also somewhat more secure. The really good news is you can now get quality web hosting for what certainly isn't a lot of money.
Most of the bigger companies have specials all the time. You may find offers for free add ons or free months. Go with free months. There is no usually reason to sign a contract for a certain length of time or get "security features" for more money. If you practice good password management you will be secure enough with the basics. See if your business web hosting company offers a choice between Windows and Linux servers. Get Linux if you can.
Registering a domain and hosting a web page are two different and separate things. Most companies do both - don't confuse the two. You can register your domain with any company and host any web pages for it with a different company if you so choose. I recommend to all of my clients that they buy their primary domain and hosting from separate companies. This can make it easier to move things if you ever have to in the future.
Most of the larger companies use cPanel for managing your account. This is the interface between you and your server space. I think cPanel has a large learning curve for most people. If your web host offers a choice of control panels other than cPanel, you may find these beneficial.
Where Do I Get Web Hosting?
I use and recommend 1&1. Something we all need in a web host is Great Support. When problems arise and you can't get a response to a question for three days, you won't care how cheap or expensive your hosting plan is. It is absolutely crazy how many companies there are right now selling web hosting and even crazier how many "comparison sites" that purport to tell you the truth about each one. Doing your due diligence on the different companies can take days and you may still end up unsure about it all if you are newer at some of this.
Personal or Business? This is the first question you should ask yourself before shopping for a web host. Once you decide that you can start to narrow down what you are looking for. Pretty much everyone offers unlimited everything these days. Unlimited disk space, bandwidth, email accounts, domains, and more. Technically these accounts aren't really 'unlimited', but the vast majority of users will never have to worry about this. If you are thinking about using your hosting account for a home based business make sure to look at your prospective hosting company's affiliate program. A great hosting company with a decent affiliate program is hard to beat.
1&1 has gained my trust over a few years and I host all my clients' websites here. They use a proprietary control panel for managing your account that is easy to learn. The tools and goodies included in your control panel are somewhat basic which is good when you are new at all this. I have used both the email and telephone support here a few times over the years and although it is not the best in the world, it certainly was good enough for me and those who pay me to keep their websites up. 1&1 has a huge customer base worldwide and really good technical FAQs that make figuring your own glitches out easier.
1&1 MyBusiness Site:
• Disk Space ------------- Unlimited
• Bandwidth ------------- Unlimited
• Subdomains ------------ Unlimited
• Parked Domains -------- Unlimited
• Add On Domains ------- Unlimited
• Email Accounts --------- Unlimited
• FTP Accounts ----------- Unlimited
• SQL Databases ---------- Unlimited
• Site Creator ---- Yes, 400 Business Templates
• Auto-Responder --------- Yes, no email marketing
• Administration ---------- Proprietary Interface
• Free Domain Name ------- One
• Free Trial --------------- 30 Days
• Affiliate Program ---
Remember: All web hosting companies pretty much offer the same services. Make sure you get just the basics to start out. Don't worry about all the extras and upgrades you will be offered. I like 1&1 because they have great sales and I've never really had any technical problems with them. I also don't care for cPanel which is the control panel most business web hosting companies use. 1&1 uses their own proprietary interface that I find much more user friendly.
Any links on this site may be my affiliate links. I can honestly say I use, am very happy with and recommend all the products or services linked here. This also allows me to intelligently answer questions about them. ~Jimbo
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