Hosting is important! Without it your site is simply off line so taking the time to get it right out of the gate is one of the most important steps you have in planning your project.
Without adequate research and preparation when researching your potential hosts you could end up very disappointed. The first thing that needs to be done is a list generated of the requirements for your hosting. This could include technical requirements but should also include non technical items such as customer service, technical support and pricing.
Take some time to search for reviews and customer complaints relating to the providers under consideration. Every large company will have some complaints documented. What you want to look for is an over abundance of complaints and if these complaints have a common theme to them. This will help you to establish a comfort level with the providers you are considering.
Check to see what level of support is offered by the providers. Are they available twenty four hours a day, seven days a week and three hundred and sixty five days a year? If not there may be an issue with that. Think about what may happen should your site go down at 6 PM on Friday. It your host works a traditional work week you could be offline for two days until support opens up on Monday morning.
Does the provider lock you into something or give you the flexibility to change as your needs change? When a website first starts out a shared hosting plan may be fine for your needs but as your site gains popularity and exposure your traffic will grow. That could cause problems with a shared hosting plan so find out if the hosting services can grow as your sites needs grow.
The last thing any webmaster wants to do is have to change hosts. There is a lot of work and stress involved in it with backing up files, downloading, then uploading to new host, setting up databases again, changing of DNS information. I typically find that if something can go wrong it will go wrong and that is about when the stress level jumps a bit. Sometimes there can be down time for the site as the migration takes hold.
In the end it is best to get the hosting provider right out of the gate to avoid the unpleasantness of having to change providers later. That ensures that down time is avoided for visitors to your site and with that your stress level will decrease.
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