Top 5 Sales Lies of Small Web Hosting Companies

Web Hosting is one of the most competitive businesses on the Internet today. The range in services vary as much as the pricing. While some companies offer more services than their clients will ever use, others offer just enough features to enable people to put up a basic page with limited capabilities and access.

Those who offer free web Hosting are usually supported by text or banner ads on the web pages, or in the emails that their clients send. This type of web Hosting does not allow using your own domain name and screams CHEAP. Hosting accounts like this are generally not suitable for selling products or services. For someone just starting their own personal page, these free pages allow you to learn how to build a web page.

All web Hosting companies who charge monthly fees compete with each other for your business. There are several area where they differ: Monthly cost, account features and support. Most of the people I have spoken with don’t know what all the extra features are or how to access them. They will however, pay a few extra dollars each month to they get the support they need.

Since Hosting companies are so competitve, there are some areas they will exagerate in to get your business. Here are some of them:

1) 24/7 Tech Support - while this is a great benefit, it is usually not available with smaller companies who most often lease space from larger companies and resell it. It’s the parent companies who have 24 hour support teams. If your site goes down in the middle of the night, the Hosting company will most likely restore it, not the reseller. People who choose to host with resellers understand the situation and are generally patient, knowing their webmaster is probably sleeping at 3AM.2) Storage space - more than you could possibly use for a small business. One Hosting administrator admitted to me that his company offers 500-1,000 Megabytes (Mb) of space in hopes that people won’t use it. That situation is obviously shared Hosting where everyone on the server shares the space.   

3) Bandwidth - same situation as above. Small Hosting companies are allowed a limited amount of bandwidth, expressed in gigabytes (Gb), and pay extra for going over that limit. If the web host’s site is very slow to respond, ask if they are using their personal DSL or cable line at home. You should question that even before you agree to host with them.

4) Unlimited Email Accounts - sure you can create as many email accounts, whether POP or aliases that point to POP accounts, but remember that every email that you send consumes storage space. Even though it may not be saved on the server after it’s sent, it still takes up some space while being transferred. The difference here is with web-based email where you are allowed to store a certain amount of files. That amount is limited and mail will stop coming in or going out once your limit is reached because all of your email accounts share the storage space alotted to you.

5) Free Website Sofware - it’s free because in most cases, the software is freely available to anyone who knows where it can be downloaded. The question here is how that software will be installed on your website. If you have to manually install it then unless you know how, you will still need to hire someone to install it for you.

Free web hosts don’t offer database support and some don’t offer Email either. Smaller reseller web Hosting companies can be professional with the support of the parent oompany. The smaller hosts often give you more personal service than the larger companies, who most often refer to their customers as numbers, yet charge more for their services.

Bigger isn’t always better. It all depends on what your business requires.

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