Web Hosting Service – What’s best for an online business?

So, I hope you are all set with your own idea for an online business. I suppose you have had your own research and sketched all your ideas, business name, domain name and even a blueprint for the income model of your business. And now, I hope you are in search of deciding on the best web hosting service for your startup.

If you are indeed, here is an article which discusses the concept of hosting, various options for web hosting, choosing the best web hosting service for your business and a few comparisons of host providers.

Remember, This entire post will guide you through the relevant information which you need to be aware of hosting.

Let’s get started…

First, What is hosting?

Basic Idea of Web hosting

Web hosting is a mandatory service for any online business(website). The services which provide technologies and services for a website to be viewed online is what everyone calls as web hosting.

This serves as an online storage center which contains the contents of a website like information, images, audios, videos, and any other format of content which endorses the website. This info will be stored on special computers which are known as Servers.

How it can help online businesses?

Hosting allows your site visitors to access your information through a website by just typing the address of your website in their browser.

Consequently, it also helps to keep up and run your site smoothly all the time. This is why a web hosting service is most important in a competitive marketplace – to lose not your sales. Hosting servers are usually measured by their amount of disk space they have – to store the information, speed of data transfer and bandwidth to access them.

For instance, if you have a wholesome amount of user interaction at your website, such as file downloads, you will be needing more space other than a website without any files to download.

 

The more you have content & operations = The more space you require.

Factors to take into consideration:

• Sufficient Storage Space and Bandwidth
• Hosting that Supports Your Software
• Enables Secure Card Payment
• Reliable Friendly 24/7 Support.

These were the major factors to be taken into consideration for your web hosting. Now let us understand what are all the options you have for web hosting.

What are the Web Hosting options Available?

There are 5 Web hosting options available :

• Shared hosting
• Cloud hosting
• Managed hosting for WordPress
• Virtual Private Servers (VPS)
• Dedicated servers.

Let us look at the definition for each hosting in the below image:

Managed hosting for WordPress

As the popularity of WordPress is high, several web hosting service providers have chosen to expertise in WordPress and offer services which are known as Managed WordPress hosting.

In other words, Managed hosting takes care of all the technical aspects of WordPress, conceding you to focus on sharing and creating content. You don’t have to worry about site updates, website uptime, site speed, scalability, or anything like that.

Managed WordPress hosting is the premium support which consists of real WordPress experts with plenty of experience rather than a representative reading a support manual.

Hence, I hope now you might have understood what are the options available for hosting and definitions for each of them. I could go on and explain all the aspects involved in each and every hosting option.

Since it would take so long to go through all of them, I will be explaining each and every hosting options in detail in my upcoming blogs.

Understand that all the above hosting options will be suited for an online business. Selecting the best fit for your startup is totally up to you. We at Appkodes prefer Cloud Hosting technique as most people use it for their websites and online businesses.

Let me explain why?

How does Cloud hosting work?

Cloud hosting is the purchasing of resources from a cloud computing provider to host data, solutions, and services.

The cloud serves Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) delivery model which provides a combination of remote/virtual services. It is mostly preferred by corporate giants as due to its ability to operate across various servers that are interconnected.

Okay, now let us learn the benefits of cloud

As explained earlier a Cloud hosting server basically runs across various web servers that are interrelated, which was completely proportional to the traditional hosting forms such as dedicated hosting, and shared hosting, data is delivered from various servers.

According to Forbes, by 2020 that 83% of enterprise workloads will be in the cloud. The habit of managing a dedicated on-site server is regressing and shifting to a hosted cloud service.

This will help improve an organization’s workflow, save wealth, and will make sure that you stay ahead of the twist.

More than this, most organizations use this technology to maintain a stable run of their business, sales, to serve customers and drastically improve profits.

Yet, there are few companies that are remaining uncertain about committing to cloud solutions. So, here I have listed the most important benefits of using cloud computing.

Security:

When it comes to acquiring cloud computing solution, most organizations will hang up at the security. Whenever any programs, files or any other data is not secured, then how come it is possible to protect your data?

 

94% of business claimed that they saw an improvement in security after switching to the cloud.
– RapidScale,Inc.

But in cloud computing, the data are transferred over networks with very much encrypted and stored in databases. By using encryption, the access of information by hackers or any other unauthorized to view your data. As an additional security measure, the user may set the security settings with most cloud-based services.

Mobility:

Over 2.8 billion smartphones are being used as of today, Cloud computing provides mobile access to data through smartphones. It was one of the best ways to never leave any on the table.

Mobility is the factor which satisfies the staff who travel, live in remote places and freelancers. Organization’s Staff who live a long way away from the corporate office or who has busy schedules can make use of this feature to keep up-to-date with data, clients, and coworkers.

Flexibility:

If your IT solutions make you commit too much to the storage and data, then it would be difficult to concentrate on your business and customer satisfaction. This must be completely sorted out by opting for a cloud hosting.

 

65% of respondents said that the capability to meet business demands quickly is the most critical reason for a business to move to a cloud environment.
– InformationWeek

The service providers of cloud offer more flexibility other than a local server. Even if you are in need of extra bandwidth, cloud hosting service would fulfill your demands in no matter of time.

Scalability:

Most of the cloud servers provide the benefit of scalability, which means they are able to adapt in any size either in case if an increase and decrease in workload. As your organization size increases and changes, cloud computing can expand or diminish accordingly.

It is totally possible on dedicated servers, but it is costly, complicated, and time-consuming. But in cloud servers, they provide an option to pay monthly subscriptions which can be changed as per the business needs. Eventually, if your business grows, your cloud platform will grow too, it is as simple as that.

Competitive edge:

Cloud services make you stay put at the competitive edge. There might be many organizations who still prefer to use local servers, let them be like it. But, it places them in a  diverse disadvantage while competing with the organizations those who benefit by using the cloud.

If an organization uses cloud computing ahead of their competitors then it will definitely be in a step ahead.

 

77 percent of businesses feel cloud technology provides them a competitive advantage. – Verizon Wireless

There are also more benefits for the users of cloud computing which includes prevention of loss, disaster recovery, Auto-updates of software, and sustainability. What’s more critical is that which web hosting service users decide to go for.

Cost savings:

If you wanna save money in the long-term you should go for cloud hosting. There is no need to worry about the price tag which comes with switching over from other hosting to the cloud.

Most cloud hosting services offer pay as you go option for their features. This means that you do not have to pay for any services which you don’t use and it will also be applicable to data storage space which means you will not be charged a dime for any space that you do not use.

As of now, you would have learned about

• Web Hosting
• Hosting options available
• Benefits of using cloud computing.

Now let’s look upon best cloud hosting service provider.

You may find a vast variety of options if you dig in for a hosting service provider.

Few companies to mention are :

• Digital Ocean
• Amazon Web Services
• InMotion Hosting
• Bluehost
• Dreamhost

And much more available in the market. Among these, I would recommend and most entrepreneurs prefer for their online business or for a readymade solution is none other than the DigitalOcean.

You wanna know why? Continue reading…

DigitalOcean is a cloud infrastructure solution that is designed to simplify web infrastructure for developers. Their plans are affordable and feature-rich, as well as straightforward to configure.

DigitalOcean thrives in being a simple cloud hosting service provider which offers very basic solutions, namely VPS’s in the cloud and DNS management.

Why we prefer Digital Ocean?

First of all, it provides a vast variety of features which makes it very well suited to all our products or any other readymade solutions.

• Simplicity at scale
• Predictable Prices
• Reliability
• User-Friendly
• One-Click Application
• Security
• Floating IP
• Load Balancers
• Automatic Backup and so on.

DigitalOcean does also conduct events for developers to learn and know more about them. Below is a snap while our team attended one of their events. Also, If you feel that DigitalOcean would suit and meet all your requirements then you may signup for their services here

Extraneous Key Assets of DigitalOcean

• DigitalOcean uses only high-performance SSD (Solid State Disks) only cloud. The speed of SSD directly benefits the performance of hosted sites and applications.
• DigitalOcean servers are live and configurable in less than a minute.
• Simple Control Panel – Configuring Cloud servers and development of frameworks are simple and intuitive.
• DigitalOcean’s community consists of active developers where their community pages are continually moderated and updated.
• In DigitalOcean multitude of application stacks can be installed with just one click, including LAMP, LEMP, MEAN, and Docker; also development frameworks and popular applications like eCommerce software Magento, CMS solutions WordPress and Ghost, and MediaWiki.

Conclusion

To run a successful online business you need a reliable hosting company which is secure and respond whenever you need support. They must also be the one who is as committed to the success of your website as you are.

Modern business activity includes building a persistent connection with cloud services. You may set to free from the work with your huge data with the endowments of cloud platforms. Best web hosting service provides you with a great set of tools, which will assist you to manage data storing, computing, and analyzing.

Opting for the right clouding platform would help you to focus on your responsibilities and establish a higher performance of all business processes. The first move an Entrepreneur should make is to encounter his own expectations. Focusing on features that you need other than the price would save you and your organization a lot.

We prefer Cloud Hosting Service – DigitalOcean for our clients who wish to start their online business using our digital products.