When you’re looking for a web hosting service, it can be incredibly useful to read and study the various reviews of that host that have been published online. But what kind of questions should you look for the review to answer? By taking inventory of your hosting needs, you’ll know what answers you’re looking to find inside the hosting reviews you read.
Are you trying to get started, or move up?
Web hosting comes in all levels of service. If you’re just trying to get your first website(s) online, a shared hosting plan is probably a great way to learn the systems at work behind the scenes of a fully hosted domain name. If your business has established traffic and delivers income that is essential to your monthly budget, you might want to invest in something a little bit more substation like a VPS or dedicated hosting service.
Ask yourself the following questions:
How many domains will you be hosting? How essential is speed and reliability right now? It might not be a big deal if your first blog goes down or slows a bit during peaks, not at first anyway. When your sites grow, you can upgrade later on.
Do users have a good experience?
Look for hosting reviews from customers who have had problems and issues that require the company’s service and technical support crew. Everyone will have some kind of glitch – so the important thing is to analyze how the company responds to these errors and breakdowns. A helpful hosting company will own up to the problems that are on their end, and do what they can to set the user on the right path.
On the other hand, if someone has complained that their host won’t hold their hand and build their websites for them, you’re probably looking at a review from someone who doesn’t want to take personal responsibility for the things they are ultimately responsible for. Until you’re spending hundreds a month on a dedicated hosting plan, you’re mostly on your own when it comes to the development, maintenance, and security of your domains.
Is the review honest about weaknesses?
Since everyone has different needs in a web host, there really is no such thing as a perfect service. So if someone can’t fess up to the potential downside of a particular hosting choice, they might not be completely honest about their review: they might just be focused on trying to sell you something.
Every hosting plan and company targets a certain user base, and the trick is to find a service that matches your particular needs. This probably means finding a company that cuts corners in features that you don’t personally need! Generally though, be wary of that perfect review. Every webhost will have some kind of down time and occasional bug, so take inventory of those weaknesses before deciding if those are limitations you can live and work with.
A good hosting review will help you answer all of these questions, and probably even more you didn’t yet know you had. At the end of the day, the goal is to find the best service for your particular needs – not someone else’s business plan! With these points of consideration in mind, you should be well on your way to finding the right web host for you.