Synopsis Web hosting services provide space on the Internet for your website. This page describes what to look for when choosing a web hosting company.

Chapter Contents Getting Your Website Online Domain Names Web Hosting Recommended Providers Uploading Your Website

Web hosting services

A web hosting service provides a place on the Internet for your online business. A web hosting service for an online business is comparable to a landlord for an offline business. For instance, a person who wants to open a candy store needs a place where customers can come to purchase candy. A landlord would provide the candy store owner with this location. In much the same way, you will need a place for visitors to come to purchase products through your affiliate links. A web hosting service will provide you with this location on the Internet.

There are three main things that a web hosting service will provide for your online business:

• Disk space on a computer on which your website will reside.
• Software that allows visitors to access your website.
• A very fast dedicated connection to the Internet.

How do domain names relate to web hosting services?

When you sign up for web hosting services, you will tell the web hosting company what you want your domain name to be. They will setup an account on a computer specialized for running websites, and assign your domain name to that account. This will allow people to visit your website by typing your domain name into a web browser.

What do I need?

Disk Space

There are hundreds of hosting companies offering a wide variety of hosting solutions. For most people, the only important feature is the amount of disk space provided. The files that make up your website will be saved on disk drives similar to the one in your own personal computer. Since all disk drives have limited space, hosting companies need to place a limit on the amount of space you are allowed to use. Typically 50 to 100 Megabytes of disk space is more than enough storage to begin your new online business. This will also give you plenty of space for future additions to your website.

Email Accounts

Another important feature provided by most web hosting services is an email account. An email account will allow you to receive email at your domain name. For example if your website was located at the domain name photoclicks.net, you would be able to receive email at the address yourname@photoclicks.net. Email accounts are an important feature as they allow your customers to correspond with you, if need be.

Customer Support

A good web hosting service will also provide you with customer support. You can make use of customer support if you have questions or problems with the services they offer.

Other Goodies

In addition to these basic requirements for a good web hosting company, some other providers offer extra tools that can be very useful. The most useful features we have discovered are those which aide in the creation of your website. Choosing a web hosting provider which offers website creation tools can be a great benefit to your business, by allowing you to quickly create a very professional website in very little time. Another benefit of this type of services is the ability to publish your website automatically without uploading it manually.