This is very important to know how to choose the right web hosting plan if you are going to start a new website. Because you are going to create a website which means you are going to take a hosting. Much of your website's future depends on this hosting. Just like a building stands on a base, hosting is a base on which your website stands. If your base is not strong then your future is very bad. So you should know how to choose the right hosting plan for your website.
10 Points to choose the right web hosting plan
I have used different types of hosting services and from that experience I have learned some things that everyone needs to know before buying a web hosting plan so that you can stay safe from bad hosting. I will talk about 10 points, looking at these, if you buy hosting, that will be the right hosting plan. I hope you will have a strong foundation and will not face any hosting related problems.
Uptime
The first thing I will talk about is uptime. If you go to the home page of most websites, you can see their uptime. I would suggest you not to take any hosting of uptime below 99.5%.
You will find some hosting companies that have not shared any information about their uptime in their website, you will ignore them.
One of the hosting I have used and using that provides 100% uptime and that is Cloudways. You should check it because very rear companies can provide 100% uptime.
Support
The second factor is support. You need to see how and where they are giving supports. Many companies provide chat support, many companies provide call support and many companies provide email support. You have to see if they are giving 24/7 support.
You go with the company that you think is most effective for you. But I think there should be 24/7 chat support at least.
At first you may feel that there is no special need for support. But believe me in your journey you will face such situation that will require support. Because you never know when an error will be happened or when your site will be crashed or if attacks any virus. So support is so important.
Cost
You have to see what is the upfront price and what is the renewal price. It is usually seen that you will get the first year price at a discount but from the next year the discount is not applied. So keep an important look on this matter.
Most of the companies share their renewal price on the pricing table but if it is not showed you can ask their sell team. You will find their sell team contact info in their website.
Backups
Backup is so important for a website. If your site destroy for any reason then with this back up you can up your site again without any hassle.
Some companies provide backup and some companies don’t provide backup. You have to check it on their website.
Such as Siteground, Bluehost, Cloudways. These are the companies provide back up. You should go with a company which provides backup.
Upgrade
Upgrade means, suppose you have taken a hosting but a certain time later you need more resource, you need to upgrade into a higher plan. You should go with a company which allows that you can upgrade your plan anytime.
Mostly this information is not shared in any hosting company’s website. In this case you can ask their sales team about this matter. Usually sales teams are very active because they need to increase sell.
Inode count
In easy language inode count is the number of file that you can keep in a hosting. Normally in shared hosting you can see 1-3 lac of inode count. If you go with cloud server then inode count is increased.
Anyway you should not go with a company which has inode count bellow 2.5 lac. More indoe count is better. But how to know how is the inode count because this information is also not published in company’s website. You have to ask it to the sales team or you have to know from his who has used the company and know the matter.
Server response time
This is so important because this will directly affect in your site’s speed. The shorter the response time of the server, the faster the speed of your site will. Mostly in shared hosting you can’t get a lower server response time. Because a shared hosting server used by multiple users. In this case this is very tough to get a lower response time.
In vps or dedicated server you get a great server response time but most of the case this very costly. In a cheaper solution, you can use cloud hosting which will be cheap in price but not in quality with having a decent response time.
One more thing, suppose you have hosted your site in a server located in US but your traffic are coming from India then the server response time for those traffic will not be less.
Refund policy
You have to ensure that what is their refund policy. It is possible that after using a hosting you do not like it for any reason or do not feel suitable for your site. In that case you definitely need a refund. Some companies share about refund policy on their website, some companies don’t. You have to find it.
In this case I should talk about a hosting company which will not take money from you before but will give you money. This means you can use their hosting for free for a month and you will only pay if you like it. So there is no question of refund here. Cloudways will give you the unprecedented convenience.
Account suspension
This is the worst case scenario. This is usually the case with shared hosting. You know that many websites use one server at a time for shared hosting. In this case, if a post of a website goes viral, the website gets under a lot of pressure of visitor and the effect falls on all the websites of that server.
In this case, some companies suspend the website immediately. But it is a complete defeat. This types of hosting plan can not be the right hosting plan for you. So you have to be sure beforehand in this matter. If the site goes down, it can be accepted but it should not be suspended.
But in cloud server will be free from this worst thing. When you will know the differentiation of cloud hosting and traditional shared hosting then you will understand the matter clearly.
Staging facility
This is an amazing feature. It is very useful to me. This is a feature by which you can clone your site with a click. You can change the domain name with your preferred premium domain name of your clone. In this way you can change your domain name if you want.
Another way, you can apply a new design in your clone site. If it seems good to you then you can apply it on your main site. In this way you can use the clone site as your rough site.
This is the feature which is available in very few companies. Such as Siteground, Cloudways. For choosing the right hosting plan you should find the hosting plan which has staging facility.
My recommendation
In this age shared hosting is much backdated. I think after 5 years no one will be interested in shared hosting plan because the world is moving. So I think cloud hosting will be right web hosting plan for this era. In cloud hosting system you will get a dedicated cloud server in a price of shared hosting.
You will find the best hosting plan for you. But I have found a company which seems best to me and this is Cloudways. This is a modern cloud hosting provider with a high quality service in an affordable price range and this is also best according to these 10 points I said. Cloudways can be the stoppage of your hosting searching.
