Saturday, November 1, 2008

The Importance of Having a Reliable Web Hosting

By Ricardo d Argence

Reliable web hosts aren't as easy to find as you might imagine. There is considerable competition out there with an increasing amount of web hosts, and resellers who all claim to give the consumer upwards of 99% uptime. For any website, reliable web hosting is incredibly important. It can mean the difference between a frequently returning visitor and one who doesn't bother at all.

If the pages are not available then your rating will be impacted, you will find good service somewhere else if you are not getting it from your own provider.

Why is it important to have a reliable web hosting? Your peace of mind is one reason that springs to mind straightaway. Imagine trying to build your website, to find that every time you go to upload new content or make any changes you can't, because the service is down. Consumers are more demanding and won't keep coming back to a website that offers less than perfect service. Whole businesses have been lost because of the same thing, and it's this sort of problem which needs addressing the moment you realize you have it.

When is it critical to have one? It's important anyway, very important unless you have a website you aren't too concerned about people seeing. Today's new search engine methods mean that reports are made each time a URL is inaccessible and this can lead to a drop in search engine rankings after so long.

If your company includes a significant web presence, you must have a good hosting service. In todays market you need to have at least 99% uptime, there are some companies that even exceed this.

Picture this: if you have 20% downtime, this means you are loosing up to 20% of potential customers. This is affecting your earning ability, thus losing you potential revenue. As with any employee, the webhost should not make you lose money!

Is there a way I can check to see if my webhost is the best one for my needs? You don't, not at first. There are many methods that can be used to find out their reliability. The free tools on the internet that are used to monitor up and downtime are becomming more popular in the search for the top search engine.

More and more people are realizing the importance of server uptime, and these tools can become an invaluable resource if your webhost isn't communicating too well with you. If you are with a decent webhost then the likelihood is, you'll either receive an email advising you of planned downtime, or there will be a portal on the webhosts website advising of any problems. Webhosts who hide this sort of information do so for a reason, and that is because they're frightened you'll go elsewhere.

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