Most reviews on web hosting plans are written by technical experts for technical experts. My discussion today is from the point of view of a marketer. I believe today’s discussion will provide a different angle to this topic.
Generally there are 4 types of web hosting plans to choose from, namely shared hosting, reseller hosting, VPS hosting and dedicated hosting. If you are new, you can see the pricing and detailed descriptions here.
If you are a server expert or you are planning to start your own webhosting service, this article is not for you. But if you are an internet marketer, looking for a web hosting plan that meets your needs, I’m sure my experience in web hosting will help you.
So, which web hosting plan should you choose?
Cheap is better
When it comes to hosting, paying more doesn’t mean you get more. In fact, it’s the reverse. Let me explain.
The cheapest plan is called shared hosting, which usually cost you less than 10 bucks a month. As the name suggests, shared hosting means you are sharing a server with probably hundreds of other users. Because of this, the hosting company has huge liability in these shared servers. It cannot afford to have these servers fail or it will affect hundreds of their clients. As a result, they do regular server updates, backups, maintenance and they provide 24/7 uptime monitoring.
But if you go for other more expensive hosting plans, the servers usually have lesser users and as a result, those servers receive lesser attention from the hosting company. (Most companies will deny this, but that is the truth.)
Take the most expensive plan, dedicated hosting, as an example. Most hosting companies will not monitor the uptime of such servers. Also, they will do lesser system maintenance and updates. Reason? Because you own the whole server and are responsible for the maintenance yourself!
In addition to this, most shared hosting plan offers unlimited disk space and unlimited bandwidth. Yet, almost all other more expensive hosting plans have limits on disk space and bandwidth. If you are using one of those more expensive hosting plans, you have to worry about your disk and bandwidth usage.
Think about it this way. By paying more, you get limited disk space, limited bandwidth and lesser server maintenance. This is what’s happening when you pay more for your web host.
Of course, there are limitations to shared hosting. But that is when you become a heavy user.
As a rule of thumb, if you are simply running niche websites for Adsense or affiliate commissions, shared hosting should be your best choice…… until you max out your shared server.
How to max out your server?
So far, the message I’m trying to put across is get a cheap shared hosting plan because you get the best server support compared to all other hosting plans. But that is assuming you are just a small-time marketer (most people are).
If you are a big-time marketer or going to be a big-time marketer, things may be a little different.
Below are ways in which you can max out the capacity of a shared hosting server.
1) Mass Mailing
One of the most taxing activities in a server is mass mailing. If you are intending to build a list and send out mass email through your own server, chances are, you can’t live with a shared hosting plan, not even a reseller or VPS plan.
Most shared hosting has a limit of 500 emails per hour. This means if you were to mail to a list of say 5000 people, it will take you 10 hours.
If you are using hosted autoresponder services like Aweber, this will not be a concern since emails are sent through Aweber’s server, not yours.
2) Product Launch
If you are planning a big product launch, there is a high chance that you will max out the server bandwidth.
“Kenneth, I thought shared hosting has got unlimited bandwidth?”
Yes, that’s a lie.
Imagine bandwidth as a pail of water. When you are promised with unlimited bandwidth, what it means is you have an infinitely huge water pail, full of water of course. The catch here is water must flow out from a tap. For shared hosting, you’ve got a small water tap. So if there is a sudden surge of traffic to your server, this small water tap may not be enough to cater to that surge. The result is you get very sluggish web loading speed and occasional disconnectivity issues.
3) Video Hosting
If your server hosts a lot of videos and a lot of people are watching it, you will run into the same bandwidth issue, as explained in #2.
Basically, any activity that involves huge data transfer to and from the server will tax on the bandwidth and create potential bandwidth issue.
4) Hosting Too Many Domains
Did I mention that most shared hosting plans allow you to host unlimited domains? Well, that’s another lie.
Yes, theoretically you can host unlimited domains. But in reality, each domain has files in it and there is a limit to the number of files you can host on your cheap server.
In hostgator, it is termed ‘inode’. Your maximum allowable inode is 250,000. But if you have more than 100,000 inodes, hostgator will stop backing up your files. So to get the best, you should limit your usage to 100,000 inodes.
Now, how is inode calculated?
Very simply, it is the number of files in your server. This means regardless of how many domains you have, you should keep the number of uploaded files below 100,000.
That may sound a lot, but guess what, I maxed that out once! That’s why I know this limitation.
Let me show you how easy it is for an average marketer to max out the inode limit.
Do you know that WordPress script itself contains more than 700 files? If you install WordPress to every domain and you have 150 domains, that will make up 105,000 files (or inodes). And I haven’t considered other possible scripts that you may be adding to your domains.
The good news is if this is your only issue, the solution is simple. Just get another cheap and good shared hosting account and you can load another 100 or so domains.
5) Excessive Concurrent Server Usage
If you run online services that require a lot of concurrent script processes or database activities, such as an online forum, or social networking site, you are likely to max out the apache and mysql process limit during the peak hours.
Take hostgator for example, the limit is 25 at any one time. So technically if you have 30 people making a system enquiry at the same time, 5 of them will get an error message. The chance is extremely low, but if your website has a lot of users, it can be possible.
These limits can be raised if you are on dedicated or VPS hosting, not if you use shared hosting and reseller hosting.
Conclusion
Just get yourself a shared hosting account, unless you have no better use for your money or you foresee that you are going to run into one of the five issues above.
When it comes to low-cost hosting, all the hosting providers offer more or less the same thing. If anyone claims to offer more, say it claims that you can send unlimited emails with a shared hosting plan, it just shows that the webhost is an amateur and will run into problem in the future, potentially a server crash!
The key is to get one that is well established (i.e. it has gone through enough server nonsense and implemented the necessary steps to ensure system stability). It must also provide 24/7 chat and telephone support, so that you can get help at any instant.
This was a good read, and it brought up some brand-new questions I now have regarding this whole online business field. It has now been 4 months since I decided to give pursuing an online business a chance, and it all started with a 7 day free trial.
That first step got me my very first website and my very first sure-fire, step by step, so easy a rocket scientist could do it, business plan guaranteeing me fantastic wealth. It blew me away to see one of the first ads I created back then, today, at the top of this site!
And you know what? I’ve tried many op’s since then, justifying that it would be just a matter of time, and that I could earn my upgrades to Pro by getting just 5 referrals out of the whole world–did everything just like the ads said.
All the while being bombarded by countless new op.’s, new claims, new faces of rich, all of them marketing to the new guy that they’re going to ‘finally’ reveal something new or different, or…anything, and it turns out to be just the same thing in a different box. So, is that all it is?
If that’s all it is, then how many websites or domains should someone have to make it rich? And why do all the opportunities need a mile-long webpage to advertise how easy it is to succeed and that everything’s free? Or should I say fre’e?
What happens, or better, what do you get when you go “gold”, besides the debit to your bank account? Is all this hype a deceptive scheme to get people to cough up 7, 17, 27, or 97 bucks, and then hope they get discouraged?
And what’s with all the $7 pricing anyway?
Hi,
Thanks for your great tips. I currently use the UKs lowest price domains -Heart Internet scheme you can earn 10% commission on all domain and hosting sales by referring new customers online. Great Value Domain Names! They all have good affiliate program.
Sooner or later everyone realizes that they must have their own web site. However, most hosts simply provide you with space and that’s that. Affiliate hosting program changed all that turn a necessity into a profit machine.
If you have to have a host anyway, why not choose one that pays you back? That’s my idea.
Thanks Kenneth for this information. Currently, I have 5 domains on one shared hosting account with Hostgator and intend to add more as soon as possible. I have wondered about the bandwidth and disk space. I have also wondered about how “fair” it would be to put so many sites on one $10 a month hosting account. I came to the conclusion to open another one after a certain amount of domains on it. Now you have given me something to look at to help determine how many – inodes. Very helpful post.
Hoots!
Shared servers are ok to start with, but once you expand its best to get a dedicated server, or another fresh shared hosting account. As for WordPress and installing 150 blogs, on a baby croc account, well to start with it may well be 150,000 inodes but believe me you’d be lucky to get a hundred on your server without crashing it. I have around 60 WP installs and my inode count is standing at 176545 or more than 2 thirds of my 250,000 allocation. The trouble is wp is a resource hungry cms, and if you use a lot of plugins especially auto ones then your struggling.
Nice article, hopefully this will help out people starting out
Great article, hopefully this will help out people. Currently, I have 5 domains on one shared hosting account with ixwebhosting.
Hi,
You have a nice blog. Multiple ip hosting is the latest successful method in SEM. Multiple domain hosting helps your website to get quality backlinks from different ip addresses. This definitely helps with website ranking.
HostGator is cheap and you have a lot of databases but I don’t know if that’s the best choice… Maybe it’s a little overused…
Getting a dedicated server hosting plan is important. One should take time to pick the right web hosting plan which suits one’s budget.
The article touches on shared hosting, reseller hosting, VPS hosting and dedicated hosting. If you are getting a dedicated server hosting either in UK or USA you got to check if the company is good.
Thanks for your thoughts Ken, I am shopping right now.
Thanks for sharing Kenneth.
Your points consolidate many of my thoughts regarding web hosting plans / services.
Whilst certain aspect of these type of offers may be true, as you describe in your post, there are many catches too.
Now, speaking of ‘Unlimited’ Domains or Unlimited Hosting – this has been such a powerful but misleading selling point made by many hosting services – it certainly got my attention in my early days.
I recall being asked once by a web hosting provider to reduce the numbers of files (or directories) I had, which then led to me being asked to delete databases (Over my head that’s way too technical). Anyway, squeezed into taking some action, with the constant reminder of these ‘RED NUMBERS ’ appearing on my dashboard. So I deleted everything that was redundant plus any websites that I felt were not performing well. But still I was showing the RED ALERT.
Eventually I ended up inadvertently deleting my main business’ website’s database… Only to be told later that the numbers were inaccurate.
I believe though, this was an attempt to get me to upgrade to a more expensive account.
Start off with one website for your blog and make sure it is free. You can learn from your mistakes and it won’t hurt your wallet. Don’t overload your website/blog with too much information. Tease your reader, make them follow you. If someone asks you about your program, whether they bite or not, share what you’ve learn. Trust me, the rewards will follow.
Web hosting is a big challenge for any webmaster as it has limitation and much more than your Google guidelines prohibits fake ips and low profiled hosting companies therefore rather than choosing a company having server in denmark, its far better to choose an American IP hosting company because it is a war of ips today.
Thanks for the article Kenneth, I learned something new about shared hosting.
Excellent read, great tips and thanks for sharing Kenneth.
This information has clarified my non technical issues.
Wow oh wow Kenneth you certainly shared a lot of beneficial information that people should know about choosing the right web hosting plan. Kudos to you on keeping it real here.
Terri Pattio
MLM Coach/Mentor with a servant’s heart
Twitter Strategist
You are welcome, Terri.
Web hosting is the life blood of an online business. Choosing the right hosting is like choosing the right vehicles for a cab service. Get it wrong and you will pay dearly! Believe it, cheap hosting will be, well cheap. In performance, response and delivery. Money is well spent with hosting.
Cheers!