There are a lot of options when it comes to choosing a web hosting solution. When making a decision which one to take, many people are driven by the need to save money and they put that on the top of the list of demands they have from their provider. While sometimes this can’t be helped, I wouldn’t recommend picking a hosting solution while primarily concentrating on the price.
Many people don’t realize that, in the long run, a poor choice can cost you more money than it would save because of the bad services that are provided. If you are making a website for your company or business than you should probably stay away from free hosting and low-cost, great resources offers that look too good to be true (mainly because they ARE too good to be true).
Probably the most widely used form of hosting you can rely on is VPS. It is ideal for small business websites, blogs, basically anything really. The reasons why this is so are numerous and this is what I will be discussing in this article. First of all, let’s start with the basics.
What exactly is VPS?
VPS, or Virtual Private Server, is a type of web hosting that uses virtual technology. The provider uses virtual technology to divide a physical server into a number of virtual servers. It then allocates resources to those virtual servers based on the amount that was agreed on with the server owners.
These resources are divided among the websites that use them and they can only use the resources that are paid for. Now, the simulated servers give the user the freedom to choose what software the virtual server will use, including the operative system and security software. All of the users that are located on one server are completely independent and do not in any way interfere with each other.
Why Is VPS Cost Efficient
Since it gives the provider the ability to chop up a server’s resources into smaller pieces, it only makes sense that the price will go down since more than one customer can be taken care of by one piece of hardware.
Also, you can pretty much decide on how many resources you want to use, therefore you can preserve money at the start of your web business and then move to a larger package when you feel the need for it.
But there is free hosting out there! Why should I pay for VPS?
Well, most of the free hosting solutions are very, very unreliable. They offer no security, no backup, no support, etc. Now imagine yourself hosting a website using free hosting and everything is going just fine for a week or two and then your website crashes. You will need to pull out your backup, upload everything again and hope it won’t happen again.
Things like that happen very rarely with VPS and if they do, you can just call the support and they will get your backup working if need be, but will also try to solve the problem first. Losing time and data can be frustrating and can cost your website the much needed traffic. If you want to make money off your website it needs to be reliable and constantly present.
Most free hosting providers will take the liberty of advertising themselves through your website and there is pretty much nothing you can do about it. This makes you look unprofessional and, let’s face it, people get money for allowing ads on their websites, so why should you give that space away for free?
Flexibility
VPS is ideal for more serious websites that are just starting out, because it is very flexible in both the aspects of price and reliability.
When you decide and you have tested the market enough, you can easily transfer to a more serious package and continue functioning without a hitch. The freedom of software choice and the cPanel are very important. They give you the ability to change anything you want if you are not satisfied with certain elements of your website. Also, it does not force you to pick out a specific OS, therefore, you can stick with what you know and this will make your life a lot easier.
Basic VPS packages are very affordable, so it really doesn’t make any sense going for some free option that will only waste your time in the end. People rarely give a second chance to websites that are not working properly and that has a lot to do with your hosting. Why not leave a good impression from the start?
