logo

The Importance of Your Webhost to Your Business

By rotide
Created 31/07/2015 - 08:50
webhost.jpg

Since one of the fundamentals for success of any business is accessibility, protecting your business from downtime [0] is exceedingly important, however mundane or rudimentary it may seem.

Unless you experience a city-wide power outage, usually any downtime will be owing to some technical glitch with your web server, which in turn is the responsibility of your webhosting company to manage. Therefore, picking a reliable webhost [1], although it may not be the most exciting part of your business plan, is extremely necessary. Luckily, we have constructed some guidelines that might make it easier.

When considering a webhost, ultimately you want to go with a company that: 

Has efficient 24-hour support

Has multi-locational servers

Contains scalability

Tech Support

Tech support is number one on our list because even with the promise of near-flawless performance, there will always be instances of downtime and glitches; this is unavoidable. It is exceedingly important, then, to be able to get any technical issues dealt with immediately. Downtime means money lost after all. If a company does not prioritise customer support and offer 24-hour assistance, then you need to move on. You can learn a lot about a company's customer service through online reviews. 

Multi-location servers

Multi-location servers are important for when you are targeting specific markets or if you are trying to reduce operational costs. Many companies rely on offshore web hosting to be closer to their target demographic, ensuring optimal website performance within this location, as well as reduced costs in relation to manpower.

Of course sometimes this is a concern for privacy and security, since your website can only be governed by the laws within the location where your server is situated. This is particularly applicable when dealing with freedom of speech or copyright laws. Moreover, some companies host offshore in order to safeguard against security threats. By hosting offshore a company can make their private information harder to find, particularly if they are working through an anonymous offshore hosting account.

Security and privacy is usually only a concern for larger organisations, however, so for the majority of businesses, the desire for offshore server locations will be motivated by proximity to the target market and financial solvency.   

Price and Performance

This leads well into point number three: price and performance. Of course pricing is not necessarily the main principle in deciding on a quality webhost; however, it is indeed a large determining factor for most businesses. Just keep in mind that you usually get what you pay for, so don't be swayed by a low price alone. In reality, quality hardware costs money, so you always want to consider the price within the context of the performance that is being offered.

Scalability

Finally, and perhaps the most important factor, is scalability; being able to scale merely means that you are able to grow your business with this webhosting company. Is there room for you to increase disk space? How affordable is it to increase CPU, Bandwidth, HDD+SSD, and RAM?

Scalability is one of the major concerns prompting the popular debate between dedicated and cloud servers [2]. Cloud servers are preferred in terms of scalability and the ability to only pay for what you use, while dedicated servers are preferred for performance and customer support; in the end it is a question of preference and what may work best for your particular business.

 


Source URL:
https://www.newbusiness.co.uk/articles/internet-advice/the-importance-your-webhost-your-business