As a company these days, you can’t really get past your own homepage. Not only innovative start-ups or e-commerce projects but also classic founders from retail, craft or gastronomy should no longer do without the Internet as an essential marketing channel. Online use has changed too much in recent years so that a lack of an Internet presence is now a major competitive disadvantage.
If you want to run your own website, you have to find a provider that provides the desired website on webspace and connects the server to the World Wide Web so that everyone can access it with any Internet-enabled device. However, dealing with the web hosting of websites requires certain basic technical knowledge and therefore presents many founders with significant hurdles. Below we give a guide that also helps less tech-savvy start-ups to make their own website available online to customers via web hosting.
Web hosting depends on the type and complexity of the website.
- There are a variety of different web hosting solutions on the market from which to choose the right one. The choice of the appropriate web hosting depends in particular on the requirements of your own homepage.
- For example, if you, as a founder, want to operate a pure presence website, the content of which is limited to the presentation of the most critical information about the company, then the demands on web hosting are generally low.
- However, if you plan to map the processes of your business model mainly via your website, the requirements for web hosting will be higher. Depending on the functional scope of the website, the complexity of the software used, and the planned number of visitors, web hosting must be able to meet various criteria.
If an online shop is planned in your web presence, through which larger quantities of goods are to be sold, then it is all the more essential to carry out a precise analysis of your needs for the optimal web hosting. You don’t have your own homepage yet? Use a website builder or use one of our web designers who will also help you with web hosting. You can go for the web hosting reviews to choose the best hosting deals now.
Which server is the right one: shared web hosting, root server etc.
As a founder, you should start by asking yourself what type of web hosting is suitable for you. The most common forms of web hosting and the respective target group are described below:
Free web hosting
Even if founders lack financial resources at the beginning, please do not save on hosting. Free web hosting can be quickly recognized by the trained eye and harms your young company more than it brings you something.
Web hosting via website builder
If the money is really scarce, you’d better switch to a website builder. This is a finished website that you can individualize in parts and fill with content. A website builder is an acceptable solution for small presence websites with a low budget. Web hosting is usually included in the price.
Shared web hosting
If you have your website developed by a professional, you need your own webspace now. Shared web hosting is a sensible option for most websites. This means the shared use of a server by several customers of a web host. For example, 50 different customers can host your homepage on a shared server without having any relevant restrictions for their own website and its web hosting.
Web hosting with its own server
For founders, there is rarely a reason to use an utterly own server instead of shared web hosting, which does not have to be shared with other customers. For example, if you plan to operate a website with several thousand visits a day, the technical resources of a shared server are often no longer sufficient and a dedicated root server or managed server is required for web hosting. The same applies to high software requirements that a shared server usually cannot keep up with. Security aspects and data protection reasons can be another reason for companies to choose their own server.
Another little tip for the initial phase: Even if you are optimistic at the beginning and expect a large number of visitors to your website start small with web hosting. Most providers make it very easy for you to upgrade and, for example, switch from a shared server to your own root server.
You have to pay attention to this when choosing your web hosting.
Now that you have decided which type of web hosting you would like to operate, it is now necessary to find a provider that covers all your needs. But what should you pay attention to when choosing the right web hosting package? Below we have broken down the most important criteria for web hosting:
Domains
Your run a sole proprietorship then you should possibly register the domain. The domain is the basis for your homepage and is already included in the web hosting depending on the package booked. Otherwise, you can book one or more domains for a mostly low annual fee. So make sure that the domain extension you need is also available from your preferred web host. The number of subdomains that you can create is also essential.
Storage space or webspace
With web hosting, the maximum storage space determines the amount of files that are available for your homepage and your email content. Since storage space is very cheap, web hosting packages are usually more than sufficient for most founders and self-employed. It can only be problematic if you use memory-intensive files such as videos in large quantities for your web hosting.
Email addresses should not look unprofessional and are an absolute no-go for self-employed people. Fortunately, almost all web hosts now offer to set up their own email addresses in connection with the associated domain. For your web hosting, you should now check the number of available email addresses,
Whether both POP3 and the IMAP transmission protocol are available and to what extent additional features such as spam filters, auto-responders or mailing lists are offered.
Server availability and server speed
If you run an online business, high server availability is essential. Because you can’t make any money every minute, your website is unavailable. As soon as you start working in a professional online business, you should make sure that the provider guarantees your web hosting availability of at least 99.9%. This corresponds to weekly unavailability of your website of around 10 minutes. In addition to server availability, server speed also plays an important role, because slow-loading websites are cheating customers. An often free test account with the web host lets you easily check the server speed.
