Who has the Best Webhosting Service?

By Jonathan Baldwin

Picking a webhost is a lot like picking apples. On the outside, an apple may look delicious, but be rotten inside. Or reversely, a webhost service may look unprofessional on the outside, but be a great webhost on the inside. The key is in user experiences, and I have compiled my own and other’’s experiences to help determine which webhosts deliver the best services.

First, we will list the contenders who have made it into my top five: 1&1 Hosting, Yahoo Hosting, iPowerWeb, LunarPages, and DreamHost. In order to make the list, the companies had to be competitively priced, provide 24/7 support, and have atleast a 99% uptime. Any webhosting company that doesn”t have those three things doesn”t deserve a look. That said, this list has been significantly reduced for your convenience, highlighting five companies that I believe deserve a look for different reasons.

Our first webhost review involves 1&1 Hosting, the largest webhost by customers, and for a long time with number of domains as well. The 1&1 hosting price is what is so lucrative: $2.99 a month for webhosting is amazing then to top it off the $2.99 1&1 hosting plan offers 1 free domain name, 5 GB space with 250 GB bandwidth. For budget webhosting, 1&1 hosting is definitely the way to go.

Next up, Yahoo Hosting, a company that was conceived for the Internet is now hosting it. Yahoo has many smart features including one that will install WordPress for you! WordPress it the most famous blogging software, and Yahoo Hosting will setup the process for you. Yahoo Hosting also comes with a free Akismet license, which is an anti-spam filter for your blog. If you host with someone else you”ll have to pay the $5/mo fee! That’’s just the tip of the iceberg, my favorite feature is the “site snapshots” which backup the changes to your website every 4 hours. You can restore back to any of the site snapshots easily.

Our third webhost, iPowerWeb, is a large small webhost. By that, we mean they haven”t received quite the large publicity of the other webhosting companies, but are a relatively large in the webhosting industry, and certainly deserving of big-name recognition. iPowerweb offers one of the best domain name deals around. At $2.99 for the first year, domains have never been so inexpensive. iPowerWeb is also very personal with their customers; you will have an account executive assigned to you, who will take care of your every need, just like a good waiter.

LunarPages won my attention in 2001, with the Los Angeles blackout during which they maintained operability. While perhaps server uptime during a national disaster may not be a high priority for you; for many, including myself it’’s an insurance policy all into itself. That said, it speaks well for uptime when there isn”t a blackout or disaster. LunarPages also has been one of the first of the support-driven smaller companies to take a price dive, from the industry standard of $7.95 to $6.95 a month.

Then finally there is DreamHost, who while lacking a competitive price makes the list because of their offering VPN service, and Ruby on Rails support. Those two services are a must for many small businesses, and the DreamHost webhosting plans are still a fraction of the normal cost for those webhost services.

Conclusion: For those on a budget 1&1 defeats all. 6-month pay cycles, free domains, and no setup fees at incredible rates, can”t be beat. For VPN, DreamHost delivers a great service. For those looking for great service with powerful hosting: Yahoo, iPowerweb, and LunarPages are the way to go.

About The Author

Jonathan Baldwin is the owner of a Webhosting Review website, you can find this article here: Best Webhosting

Help My Web-Guy Has Gone AWOL

By Tim Goodwin

A fellow fitness professional, lets call him Paul, called me up the other day and was in a bit of a panic. He said:

”My website is not appearing on Google anymore and my web guy has gone AWOL, what am I going to do!”

The statement my ”web-guy” has gone AWOL is one I hear so much!

Are they really that unreliable?

Fitness professionals are not geeks (generally), so when stuff goes wrong and your web-guy is not answering your calls you end up being really stuck. These guys have you over a barrel too because they know you are stuck. Being at the mercy of some nerd behind their thick rimmed glasses is not your idea of good business, when your business relies on the internet.

In 2009, your web presence is essential, your clients expect more than just a shoddy web page thrown together using FrontPage or your brothers mates idea of what looks good. Website visitors ARE looking for sites look clean, professional and have the answers to the questions that they have. If your site doesn”t have these elements and cannot be picked out in just a few short seconds the visitor will quickly click the back button

To be honest you really don”t want to be wasting inordinate amounts of time creating and editing you own web site, however you still want to obtain some level of control over the content on your web page, so you are not at the mercy of the geeks.

Fortunately the technology is moving in your favour, I am seeing tools that are much more accessible to the normal human being! All this is good, but you do still need to get a handle on a little HTML.

There are some great books out there that will help out. I have put a list of my books that I recommend on my BLOG. The Visual QuickStart HTML book is one that is on my desk next to my monitor permanently. It”ll get you started in less than a few hours, and act as a reference you can come back to time and time again. Even as a geek I still need to refresh my memory at times on how to do some things.

I know what its like to be held to ransom by a geek who knew more about my site than I did. I will never get in that position again, hopefully the information in this article will stop you getting in to this situation as well! You really don”t need to become a mega nerd, however it does pay to get you head in to the odd bit of code so you can do at least the basics and save you from being held ransom by your web-guy!

About The Author

Read more great articles for personal trainers wanting to learn about getting the most out of their websites and internet technology. Go to http://www.MyFitGeek.com/blog

Tim Goodwin is a Fitness Professional, Entrepreneur and Geek.

Types of Web Hosting Platforms

By Art Gib

There are four web hosting platforms that you can choose from depending on the needs, status, and profile of your business. Each type is best suited for particular type of business, hence, it is already your choice which among the four definitely suits your standard and your business needs.

1. Free web hosting platform is the most popular and is the best suited hosting service for small sites. More often than not, small sites have low traffic and example of which are family sites and sites for hobbies. So, if your business has high traffic, this is not the recommended web hosting platform for you because the technical support service is given on a limited basis.

More so, free web hosting platform doesn”t allow you to get your own name because they provide you the domain name. This doesn”t sound good because of its unprofessionalism. Other drawbacks are: you only get limited or sometimes no software options and limited or no technical support for your database.

2. Shared (virtual) web hosting platform is the most common platform and is definitely cost effective. The web hosting platform uses a powerful server host together with other 100 websites. If you are on a shared host, you get the chance to get your own domain name.

However, in shared solutions you frequently provide software solutions that are multiple such as database, email, and editing options. The technical care support is offered and is manageable though.

Shared web hosting is perfect for those who run small business which have standard traffic. However, the drawbacks are: restricted support for software, database, and traffic volume. Also, the security level is somewhat reduced because the server is shared.

3. Dedicated web hosting platform is primarily hosted using dedicated server. This kind of web hosting platform is the most expensive though. Therefore, if you have large business with high traffic, dedicated web hosting platform is the best suited platform for you. Its websites use special software as well. With such platform you are assured of unlimited and unrestricted software solutions.

You can also have multiple domain names with dedicated web hosting platform. However, the drawback for such platform is the higher skill requirements.

4. Collocated web hosting platform which means “co-location” allows you to locate your personal web server on the foundation of the web service provider. To make it more simple, collocated web hosting platform is almost the same with running a site that uses your own server which you can locate in a much better place that is specially designed for it.

What happens if you choose collocated web hosting platform are: you gain high-maintained security level against vandalism and fire; dedicated web connection; and backup power that is regulated.

About The Author

The Revere Group (http://www.reveregroup.com/services/enterprise-platforms/microsoft-consulting.aspx) are your Microsoft consulting experts. Art Gib is a freelance writer.

Data Center Outsourcing

By Amy Nutt

Data center outsourcing is something that has grown in popularity for a number of reasons. Many find that maintaining a data center in-house is not something they can do. They may not be able to do it because of money reasons or because of manpower reasons. Many times, the reason why the manpower isn”t there is because the cash isn”t there to maintain that manpower.

Due to financial and other restrictions, many businesses have turned to data center outsourcing. There are quite a few advantages to it. Although there are advantages to having an in-house data center, you may be quite surprised at the fact outsourcing can reduce overhead, therefore reduces cost.

Where did it come from?

Private data centers started springing up as a way to tell businesses, ”Hey, we have something affordable that you can use.” Basically, they let the business know that they had a service that the business needed. They showed how outsourcing a data center was more practical than the business having to maintain the equipment on their own. It also keeps the business from having to maintain a staff to take care of the data center. It is definitely a full-time job and it takes more than one person to manage a data center. That also adds to the responsibilities and worries of the business. In other words, that is just that much more that can go wrong.

Any business that is already managing their own data center can tell you how much stress is involved. If the data center fails, then their business will fail. That is unless they have some sort of disaster recovery plan that allows them to carry out their business functions. However, any data center meltdown can be quite stressful. Just imagine having to run around, trying to figure out what to do about a data center situation. Because your data center is a large part of your business, it needs to be in good hands when disaster strikes.

When you outsource, the company managing the data center will most likely have more backup methods than what you can imagine. If there is a power outage, they”re going to use generators to keep you up and running. If one generator fails, then they have another one to back that one up. They also have individuals constantly maintaining, monitoring, and fixing any issues with the data center. That means you”re going to experience a seamless feed of data as you need it. The data center could be experiencing issues, but you would never know it because they have enough back up methods to ensure you will have no major issues.

The overall advantages

The advantages are pretty evident. In-house data centers just do not have the reliability and the economic feasibility as off-site data centers. There is already too much going on under the roof of the business. The business must focus on the overall function of the business. Having an in-house data center just adds too much to the plate.

So by having an off-site data center where there is a whole other staff that takes care of its operations, you”re able to focus all of your resources on your business. You don”t have to waste any of your resources on something that others can take care of for you for a good price. There is no getting bogged down with details. It all makes financial sense for your business. If it doesn”t make financial sense to you right now, think about having to purchase the equipment, maintain it, and hire a staff to take care of it. That in itself is something that you shouldn”t do if you don”t have to.

About The Author

SAS 70 certified data centre provides solutions that will keep your data safe through managed security, disaster recovery solutions, managed services, managed hosting and other business continuity services.

The Best Kept Secret in Online Business

By Debbie Ray

Want to know the best kept secret in online business? Read on to find out what it is. A lot of people want a website of their own. The problem is that most people have no idea what needs to be done to get a website up and running - not to mention how to develop and maintain an online business that is successful and brings in a monthly income as well.

This is exactly where knowing the answer to the secret above will put you ahead of the game. Let’’s break it down in a simpler, easy to follow process. First, you need to decide what you want your website to be about. Sounds simple doesn”t it? You”ll be surprised just how many people skip this very important step. “And how do I do this”, you may ask yourself. One way is to make a list of things you like. Planning in the beginning stage is not very glamorous but it is very important.

You don”t have to be an expert in the topic that you create your website about but I would suggest it be something that you”re really interested in. For your website to grow you”ll have to write articles and other kinds of content so if you”re not really a fan of the topic you”ve chosen you”ll never follow through. So, look at the list you created earlier and chose the best topic for you. Cost - $0, but some of your time.

It is possible to get a free website but I would not recommend this if you want to be taken seriously online. For one thing no one will ever remember your domain name and customers will not feel you to be a real business without a “real” URL. This simply boils down to an issue of credibility. Think of it this way, would you rather buy that name brand handbag from a brick and mortar store or a guy selling them out of a van? The perception of businesses online is very similar.

Concerning online web building tools, web hosts, domain names and the like, cheaper is not always better. Let me repeat that: cheaper is not always better. Research a few web hosts before making your decision - compare plans, ask plenty of questions ahead of time and see what kinds of responses you get. Good customer service and technical help is tremendously important and should not be overlooked. This is a big decision. You want to pick a company that you can have a good and long lasting relationship with right from the start because it can be a hassle to make changes later and can cost you money if you have a business website - so choose very, very carefully.

You”ll want to choose a company that offers more than just hosting and maybe a domain name. If this is all they do then where do you turn when you have a question about traffic building techniques, where to find images at, the best place to find affiliate product sales, etc? The truth is - most web hosts offer you nothing more than space for your site and maybe a domain name. And if you have questions about anything other than that - well, too bad, you”re on your own.

This selection of web host is one of the most basic and most important you”ll be making in connection with your online success. What would you think if you could find a web partner site that offered a versatile suite of tools to help you build your own successful online business every step of the way? What would you like the host to offer you as a paying customer? I don”t know about you but I would love to have at least the following:

* domain name registration
* web site hosting
* private forums
* brainstorming tools
* content management system
* social media marketing
* web page analyzer
* search engine optimization
* blogging
* sitemap creation
* traffic exchange tools
* complete video instruction
* point-and-click page creation
* newsletter management
* market research
* traffic stats
* auto-responders
* form builder
* RSS feeds
* spam checker
* web mail
* graphic manager
* customizable templates
* unlimited customer support
* money back guarantee

Too much to ask you might think. Well, you”d be right in 99.9% of the available web hosts online. There is one exception however, and it is the secret to my online success. Each and every aspect of this solution is focused on one thing - on enabling its members to build a successful business of their own. Most other services focus on the instant gratification of putting up a site, cheap and quick, but not good and probably not successful. However they do nothing to help you build your own profitable business, which is the ultimate goal of most people online.

In case you”re wondering, the secret I”m about to reveal is not a get-rich-quick scheme, and you won”t be able to quit your day job overnight, but it is an effective way to create a good deal of supplemental income as you go, over time. Effectively, it is an entire course in creating an online business providing you with all the online help, answers to your questions, as well as all the tools you”ll need to get your website up and running and successful over time and with work from you.

So, what is the answer to my secret? I highly encourage you to look into this program called Site Build It! to see if it makes sense for you. Basically, it is an all-in-one solution to help you build a truly successful online business. Curious? I also encourage you to check out the short video tour and the other in-depth case studies to learn even more in my bio box below. You can even test drive the program for 30 days and get a full refund if you don”t like it - so what have you got to lose but a few minutes of your time?

About The Author

People love SBI! Here’’s proof! It’’s not just ease of use, powerful tools or traffic-building success. Learn more now

Are You A Chef? Check This Out!

By Kristi Ambrose

I like to appreciate the finer things in life, especially food which is one of the main reasons I became a Chef in the first place. Well that and because my mom cooks and she is the most awesome Chef over and I was trying to make her proud! A few years back I decided to get a few foodie sites going, this was really fun and easy for me, mainly because I know a lot of different things about food that the regular (normal) person wouldn”t you and I like sharing in my knowledge and my recipes. The only problem with websites such as wordpress is I don”t find a lot of interaction or communal conversing going on. I thought it would be a little different than this. I mean, I get comments and can reply to them but it’’s just not the same interpersonal process I thought I would be.

Well, recently I decided to try something new out; a forum. Forums are really awesome because you can customize them, add your own categories and subcategories, domain names, information, etc. And you can also communicate with people directly on the website through threads, comments/posts and private messaging if available. I tried getting my first one going but found it to be a little too complicated for me, and frankly I didn”t want to waste hiring a designer just so he could overcharge me for a small job like a forum. Hey I”m not saying designing is easy, but designing for a designer is. So instead I started searching online for free phpBB forums, and you would be surprised what I found! Ready?

You can actually “hire” someone to develop a forum for you for free! Yep, you heard me right! I said FREE! Every Last forum will be produced automatically, and you just need to affirm your verification e-mail, and it’’s up. It will only take a 2 minutes! Plus as said above they will utilize the very popular phpBB 3 board to attain the highest security measures and flexibility. You can select from more than 200 templates to custom-make your own forum. I like this option because I love to customize sites and make them “mine.”

This is awesome! Not only did I get my forum for free but, they also offered free hosting! So now I have a rockin” forum that looks like I paid a lot of money for it but doesn”t weigh down on my bank account or my conscience. These forums really are awesome not only because they are free or customizable or even because they are phpBB styling, but because they are yours 100%. Now you can do whatever you want, however you want, wherever you want.

Post threads on piccata, post articles with photos on your favorite pasta dishes, invite people, share your enthusiasm and get people excited! This will become a major hub for you and your friends and for your friends to be! Bon Appetit!

About The Author

This author is a HUGE fan of Freeforumtoday.com

How to Create a Website the Smart and Easy Way

By Ryan Gutierrez

Don”t let college professors, web developers and other professionals fool you: creating a web site in this day and age is easy! These people are perpetrating the myth that not only is creating a web site hard, it requires technical knowledge such as HTML, CSS and PHP. While it is useful to some extent to know these things, if you”re just trying to put together a web site for your club/organization, family or event, learning these skills is not only overkill, it’’s a waste of time.

Creating A Web Site The Smart Way

The smart way to create a web site in this day and age is by using an existing content management system (CMS). A CMS allows you to quickly and easily add, change and remove content to your site such as articles, images and videos. A good CMS lets you do this without having to know any HTML whatsoever. Why reinvent the wheel when you can harness the power of an already existing system.

Which CMS is best?

I”ve used many CMS” to create many web sites and they all have their pros and cons. Some are better suited for small blogs, others are better suited for running huge sites with lots of content. The one that I like best for all of the sites I create is Wordpress because it is free and open source.

Why Wordpress is a great CMS

Although it started as a blogging platform, Wordpress has evolved over the years into a a bonafide CMS, capable of running small blogs, static business sites and huge magazine-style sites. It’’s also free and open-source which means that it is constantly being worked on by developers around the world who contribute their time and effort to improving Wordpress by fixing bugs and creating innovating new features.

Wordpress is easy to use

For being so powerful, Wordpress is surprisingly easy to use. You never have to edit any code manually (although you can if you want to!) and everything from installing a new template to adding features to your sidebar is done using a graphical user interface (GUI). Publishing new content is easy as well and if you”re computer literate enough to use Microsoft Word, you will be able to use Wordpress.

The days of having to learn all about HTML before building a web site are over. By using a CMS such as Wordpress, you can dramatically decrease the time between conception of an idea for a web site and actually putting it online. This is truly the smart and easy way to build web sites.

About The Author

Ryan Gutierrez is a web developer with a passion for teaching people how to create a web site for the first time using Wordpress without having to learn complex HTML. To learn how to create a web site go to http://www.learnhowtocreateawebsite.com.

Affordable Web Hosting Services

By Wayne Cutforth

There are many companies online that offer you their services of website hosting and domain registration. Always do some homework before parting with any money. There are some very good deals out there; all you have to do is find them. Some companies will try and rip you off and charge to the earth for their services, and at the same time, provide poor customer service, poor server management, and just end up offering bad services in general. The type you should look for is one allows you to host multiple sites first off all. Today you may only have one site but tomorrow you could have another and another. You should plan for this possibility so make sure that your plan comes with the add on domain feature.

Also make sure that it is not too expensive. Never pay over $10 per month for a plan. If you are, then you can definitely find a better deal than the one you are getting at the moment; I can guarantee it. If you have a portfolio of sites with high bandwidth then this is a different matter and you may have to consider using a dedicated server, but for a normal plan try and aim for less than $10 per month on fees.

Also, make sure that whichever one you choose has a reasonable bandwidth limit. If the plan comes with a small bandwidth limit, lets say, less than 5 GB, then you could find yourself running into problems. You could find your provider charging you heaven and earth for exceeding your bandwidth limit. Ideally, you should look for a plan that offers at least 5GB of bandwidth every month.

Another good feature, if you can get is a free domain name. Many companies will offer the chance to get a completely free domain name if you use their services. It will be free to you until the next year when it is due for renewal. While this may sound great, make sure you read the small print. Who ones the domain? There have been cases where companies have pulled dirty tricks and ended up stealing domains right under their customers noses a few months later. This was all legal as it was the company that owned the domain, not their customers. Make sure you read the terms and conditions of the service before making any commitments.

Remember to do some research before parting with any cash. Check forums, newsgroups, etc and make sure that the company that you are going to have your website is reputable, trustworthy, reliable, and affordable. These points in this article should help you along and with the things discussed here in mind you should be able to find decent hosting company that meets your individual needs. There are many available on the Internet and to get started simply go to Google and use a relevant search phrases and you will get thousands available for you to use. Just click on one and investigate using the points discussed above and you will be well away.

About The Author

The author has his own portfolio of sites on the Internet and lives in the UK. If you would like more information about cheap site hosting then please take a look. I hope you find the site helpful.

Important Ingredients That Make an Effective and Successful Website Design

By Francis Lua

Wondering what the magic ingredients are that make an effective and successful website design? Well, I should say that it would no longer be a secret. I am going to let the cat out of the bag.

It is one thing to design a highly fancy site and wait for your visitors. But, the smarter designer would opt for simple yet winning elements that keep visitors pouring in.

The best way to starting off with a good website designing plan is to chart out a site framework. This covers the complete navigation elements including tabs and widgets, levels of navigation, pages, frames, and colors. Most importantly, website designing should be done keeping in mind the content and images that would finally go in to making your site complete.

These are a few elements that make a winning design:

1. A well planned website layout that is simple and uncluttered.
2. Use of limited frames in presenting content and images.
3. An aesthetic color scheme that is soothing to the eye and makes your reading easy. These includes choosing the proper colors keeping your target audiences in mind, keep ample white space between texts, choose pale background where text is displayed and use colored text sparingly.
4. Use of less heavy images that help in faster download of pages.
5. Less scrolling of pages; vertically and horizontally.
6. Limited navigation levels and inclusion of tags, bookmarks, and RSS feeds instead.
7. Tested for screen resolution or page width so that the site appears the same in any given screen resolution. A carefully planned site ensures that site width percentages are used so that pages are automatically altered according to the screen resolutions.
8. Use of interaction forums and forms.
9. Designs created using the best available technology to showcase the best features and functionality.
10. Offer users the ultimate user experience with excellent navigation conforming to the best usability standards. The more easily navigable your site it, the more success it tastes.
11. An effective mix of web marketing components to ensure that it augments your business right away.

A well presented website with all the necessary elements to boost your business is sure to deliver the kind of results you expect. There are always newer methods and ways to get your website designing approach more effective. So, keep experimenting with the latest available tools keeping in mind the basic elements that make an effective design. A good design instantly improves your sales, brings in a lot more business, and sets your profit graphs soaring.

Hitting the jackpot is not tough when you know the right combination. So go on hit it. Blend the most effective and successful website design ingredients to boost your business.

About The Author

Web Solutions . Malaysia Website Design and Web Marketing Consultant.At i1WebSifu, we provide Superior Quality and World Class Website Design and Web Marketing Solutions for your business needs. Be it dazzling websites and portals or customized software solutions, our team is trained and ready to fulfill your every need. Visit http://www.i1websifu.com

Understand The Purpose of Your Website Design

By Francis Lua

A website contains a wealth of information for a visitor. It is usually concentrated on a specific area of interest. A website is basically a digital book, with individual web pages being the pages of that book. Each web page has a bit of information on the subject. In total, all the web pages, provides comprehensive information.

The creation process of a web site is known as the web designing. A website is for providing information online. It has a large target audience at its disposal. HTML, XML and XHTML etc are used to encode text, graphic etc information in a web page. More complicated sites include animations, vector graphics and videos, sounds etc to attract visitors. To run these media, the websites require plug-in software. Such software includes Flash, Java, and Quick Time.

Commercial and non commercial organizations build websites. Although their purpose may be different, they are used to attract visitors and seek exposure. Commercial websites have to be extra careful and design their websites according to the information content, the user friendliness, the look of the site and its visibility. They have to provide a rich content of information to the customers to inform and attract them to but the products offered by the website company. The site has to be easily navigable so that people have little trouble finding what they seek. The website has to follow one style of message delivery to maintain the relevance of the site. It has to be easily available to the visitors and this can be achieved by the search engines and advertisements.

The beginning web page to any site is known as a web page. This contains a welcome message, a disclaimer, a region or language selection panel. Each web page forms an HTML file with its own URL. All these pages are linked by a navigation menu, and all the pages are hyper linked to it.

After a web site is built, it must be uploaded in the internet so that general people can see it. The web designer has to ensure that the site gets a lot of hits every day. This can be achieved in many ways like submitting the site to search engines like Yahoo!, MSN and Google. Link exchanging with other sites, getting affiliated with other related sites etc also boost the regulars hits to a web site.

Web design in Malaysia is shaping up to be a pretty good business. This industry is seeing new players enter and rock the stage. A lot of companies are shining in website design industry. Most companies are providing all forms of web design services like e-commerce, web hosting, web applications and domain registration to make sure they deliver complete e-commerce solutions for their clients. Now a lot of website design companies are gradually taking over the market previously dominated by foreign companies.

Current growth suggests that Malaysia will be a key player in the world in terms of web design solutions. This comes as no surprise after Malaysia grand success in the other fields of information technology.

About The Author

Web Solutions . Malaysia Website Design and Web Marketing Consultant.At i1WebSifu, we provide Superior Quality and World Class Website Design and Web Marketing Solutions for your business needs. Be it dazzling websites and portals or customized software solutions, our team is trained and ready to fulfill your every need. Visit http://www.i1websifu.com