Who to pick for website host

[BoBrooke]

:dizzy:

Ok I know nothing........................ LOL

Found this website
http://www.comparewebhosts.com/TopHosts.asp

Can you help me with what to look for .
I am just a small homebased business doing some homework for acquiring a business website.
I have not a clue on charges, monthly yearly, and so on..... I am sure it all varies but what is to much for what you get and who is just as good????
I really only need a good basic plan with good exporsure to search engines how ever that works......?
I know there is a lot to cover here but any info. would help me out at this time;)

Thanks
BoBrooke

[degsy]

What do you want?

PHP? mySQL?
ASP?

Will you be hosting simple, small HTML pages or will you want dynamic pages (news, blogs, memberships etc.)
Will you be using alot of images or media?

Will you be getting alot of traffic?


These will determine what kind of hosting you will need.

If you have a few HTML pages then go for a reliable budget host such as http://34sp.com
You get 50MB of space, PHP, mySQL (database), email etc. for £18 per year.


It's upto your site structure and design as to how you will faire in search engines.
You can submit your sites to them.
http://www.google.com/addurl/



If you need ASP (Windows server) then checkout http://www.streamline.net/wh.php

[BoBrooke]

Hello Degsy,

What do I want ???? good question
Here is what I think I need :
My products will be in
photo images
easy way to update products, information, prices, adding images.
secure shopping cart
gosh I am not sure what all I need sorry

I need some sort of business advertising shopping avenue?

I know I am not much help here.
Looking at this link I am so far fond of this site plan
http://www.websitesource.com/

Here is where I got this info.
http://www.comparewebhosts.com/TopHosts.asp

What do you think?

[degsy]

It will cost more to get ECommerce as standard.

As you see, the plan would be $15 per month. That soon adds up.


You can always install your own though.
e.g.
If you get budget hosting with PHP & mySQL
http://www.oscommerce.com/
It's free


Or if you get Windows hosting
http://www.pagedowntech.com/products/pdadmin.asp


Or there are other type of Ecommerce available where you compile the site on your PC then upload the pages. You don't need server side scripting for that.

[BoBrooke]

Ok Degs,

I am totally lacking verbage here LOL

Wow this is over my head at this time.
First I do not know what a Ecommerce is sorry

[degsy]

Ecommerce is an online store, shopping cart system etc.

[boardernerd228]

go to http://www.elance.com you can tell people what you want and foreign/stateside firms/companies will bid on your "project". I am getting my ecommerce website done with graphics and logos for my new company all for $170.00. I am new to it too. Trust me go to the site above; it is free to register and great! Tons of people want to do your work for you for cheap!

[Buzz]

www.guru.com or www.rentacoder.com tend to yield better results when looking for programming help. At least in my experience.

[oracle128]

Presumably you already have a Merchant Account (and, depending on your country of origin, a registered business name and number too; eg. RIN (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Registered_Identification_Number) (USA), ACN (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Company_Number) (Australia)). If not, or if you don't know what one is, you'll want to have a long talk to a rep at your local bank, as well as your accountant/financial advisor and family lawyer. Setting up the technical aspect of an online store is the easy part, because you can get pre-built scripts for it (eg. osCommerce). Even if you made it yourself, it would still be fairly easy, compared to the business aspects of running an eCommerce website; what you are effectively doing is setting up a company.

Reading through this (http://www.nightcats.com/sales/free.html) would be a good start.