Web hosting coupons and web host discounts

What are the things to consider before deciding on a web host? For a large number of folks out there, apart from price and space, there really isn’t anything else to it. Thus, searching on Google for a web host will normally involve the following search parameters.

web host discounts
web host coupons
web host offers
best web host discounts
discounted web host

The above search pattern goes on but I think you know what I mean. More often than not, your search results will land you on some ‘web hosting reviewers’ site with their affiliate links plugged all over the site. It’s not for me to say that these are crap. Still, some of these sites only show ‘positive’ comments about the ‘top 10 web hosting companies’ they listed. How these review sites rank them can be questionable at times. By dollars they earn from each web host as a referral fee? I have seen some of these sites recommend dirt cheap web hosting like:

WebHostingPad @1.99 per month,
JustHost @3.45 per month,
SuperGreenHosting @3.95 per month,
StartLogic @3.95 per month.

I will not claim to be a web host expert but I do know enough that though price and space are still things to consider, it does not stop there. Reliability, uptime and speed are just as, if not more important in my mind. There is absolutely no point having a @1.99 per month web hosting plan when your site is down on a regular basis. Check out some of the uptime monitors I pulled off some of these ‘review’ sites.

JustHost for one seemed like a really interesting web host with the popular cPanel software plus Load Balancing or Cluster Server Technology (CST), also known as Grid Hosting. Just 6 months ago, ‘review’ sites were promoting JustHost like crazy and ranking them in their top 3 recommended web host. Today, it is not too hard to find consumer complaints on poor tech support and lousy uptime.

Now, these same review sites are promoting HostClear and SuperGreenHosting. If you know your stuff and aren’t too lazy, go do a Reverse IP check on JustHost, HostClear and SuperGreenHosting. What you learn will be interesting.

All 3 web hosting companies are own by the same chap and located on the same server. The same company with US. and UK. phone numbers with outsourced Indian tech support only good for reading telephone scripts? The same server that offers lousy uptime but is supposed to be on Load Balancing technology?

There are other web hosting companies like FatCow and iPage both offering packages under @4.99 per month. Again, both are owned by the same folks who claimed to have been in business since 1998, went quiet and resurfaced just recently.

Identical trademarks with the first 4 examples I listed here, FatCow (H-Sphere) and iPage (cPanel) only offers 1 Shared Hosting plan and nothing else. Though it is tempting with the low cost, I will in the right frame of mind steer clear of hosting companies without upgrade options. I am not saying that they are bad news. I’m just not too sure if they will be able to cope as their business grows. For new sites with little traffic, it is probably fine. Come the day when you start getting 10,000 hits daily, chances are, you will want to start considering your options and start looking for a new web host just in case.

DreamHost is another overhyped web host. Do a Google search on them and you will notice the amount of negative feedback on they reliabilty and uptime. My thoughts, the only reason why DreamHost is so popular is due to their affiliate program. For maximum savings, you could sign-up with them for a 10 years contact. Which also means, you will be locking yourself with them for the next 10 years regardless of they server reliability issues. Not a very wise thing to do.

Sure there are some premium web hosts out there or what some may refer to as the web hosting superstars. The couple of names that come to mind are Media Temple and RackSpace. Undoubtedly, these 2 offer good reliability, uptime and speed at an equally superstar premium in pricing. Unless you have a PR5 and above site with 20,000 hits daily and get your articles dugged occasionally, it’s a little hard to justify paying for premium web hosting. Else, these 2 hosting companies would be recommended for mission critical sites if you are in the likes of ABC, Adobe, NBC, Warner Bros and such.

Case in point here. I’m looking for a new web host since my current hosting package with BlueHost is about to expire. To many other webmasters, BlueHost is one solid hosting provider that has created a niche for themselves by offering affordable web hosting packages at decent prices. My personal experience with them has been marred by just one incident where my site was suspended without notice.

The suspension came with no warning. All I got was

a “this site has been suspended” message on my homepage,
with an additional “you have 15 days to” blah blah blah,
“before your data is deleted” blah blah blah,
“you may still access your admin page via’ blah blah blah.

Well, for one, I couldn’t login to my cPanel nor blog. When I contacted BlueHost, all I got was that one of the plugins on my WordPress blog was causing the problem with no clear indication on which one. After back and forth emails with over 3 days and escalating up tech support ‘levels’, they finally told me it had to do with the ‘Yet Another Relevant Post Plugin’ (YARPP). It took me close to a week to resolve the issue. All the drama for one plugin. So why couldn’t they just send me an email instead of suspending my account?

Anyway, that was the only issue in the 2 years I have been with them. So, is BlueHost a bad consideration for your next web host? I won’t really say so. So long as your website or blog isn’t overloaded with javascripts and plugins (you’ll know when your load times are slow), I believe you will be fine. Considering that I had used more problematic web hosts.

BlueHost

WordPress.org has listed BlueHost as their top web host recommendation for 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008. I won’t be surprise if 2009 is thrown in sometime early next year.

Even b2evolution.net (another blog platform) continues to list BlueHost as #1 in their best web host. If an established web hosting company with decent reliability and pricing are your main considerations, BlueHost (affiliate linked) is still a good and probably your safest option.

In reality, whichever web hosting company, package or plan you choose, it matters little until crunch time. Meaning, when there’s actually an issue with your hosting service. This is where 24/7 tech support is the most critical be it via phone, live chat, emails or ticketing system.

Assuming you do find a @0.99 per month with zero incidents for however long your contract is with them, you are one hell of a lucky. Otherwise, you could be with another web host that is here today and gone tomorrow. Doesn’t matter if you paid via PayPal when you first signed-up. Doesn’t matter either if they offered you a ‘cancel anytime guarantee’ I doubt you will be getting anything back.

Just so that it’s clear, I have decided to sign-up with another hosting company which came as a recommended by my cousin. I did a little research online and it turns out though little heard of, Arvixe has been around for awhile. Customer feedback is largely positive. I have yet to find a web hosting company that has at least 5 years of presence with zero negative feedback. There is bound to be a few customers that thought a ‘free domain for life’ means they do not pay for the domain renewal if they decide to leave the hosting company. My suggestion is do not go for the free domain offers. I have always bought my own domains at either GoDaddy or Network Solutions. GoDaddy (affiliate linked) domains are affordable. I would only recommend Network Solutions (affiliate linked) for mission critical sites.

Though there is no way I can confirm this, Arvixe (affiliate linked) claims to route their sites with Tier 1 broadband carriers like Level 3, Savvis and Time Warner Telecom. Having hosted my own sites since 2004, I’m not afraid to take some risk and try them out myself for the next 2 years. Fingers crossed, I will renew my contract with them after it expires and enjoy a 10% loyalty discount. If you rather not take the risk, then I will suggest you stick to BlueHost if you think you can pretty much handle your own and need not to depend on tech support.

For newbies, FatCow (affiliate linked) or iPage (affiliate linked) might still be worth considering for a 1 year contract. I would take full advantage of iPage’s sign-on gifts. The last I checked, you get:

$50 in Google AdWords Credits,
$25 in Yahoo Search Credits,
$75 Submitnet Search Directory / Engine Submission Service,
$100 SiteLock Security Scan and
$20 ShopOnline Rebate (one month’s fee).

You can make use of the credits to advertise your new site. The SiteLock and ShopOnline might benefit folks who are intending to setup their first online store.

Some links above are my affiliate links. If you do sign-up for them, I will get a little something so no need to buy me a beer nor coffee. In any case, I hope you find this article useful and perhaps share this with someone else. I will leave you with some other points to note in things to consider when deciding on a web host.

Speed

The speed at which your site loads is very significant for ecommerce and even blogs. First time visitors usually spend no more than 5-7 seconds waiting for a site to load before they panic and hit that close button. Even to your returning readers, a slow loading site will eventually be a major put off. As a rule of thumb, a good site design will load completely in 3-5 seconds. Pingdom is a free and good tool to test on your own site.

Disk Space / Bandwidth

Most of today’s web hosting plans offer high limits or virtually ‘unlimited’ disk space and bandwidth. To the average customer, this will meaan the amount of files for upload, download and access. This can be useful it you intend to host videos, images or files on your site for your readers. The types of multimedia supported by your web host is also critical.

Most web hosting companies today support Flash, Macromedia Shockwave, Real Audio & Video, MIDI files and Stream Audio or Video. A small handful also supports SilverLight. Truth is unless you are a developer, most web hosting companies will do fine. How smoothly your media stream is another question entirely and directly linked to Speed and Bandwidth Carriers.

Email Capabilities

The general use of emails today can sometimes be neglected or overlooked. Most folks today still use POP3. Most hosting companies do offer POP3 and IMAP access for the slightly more tech savvy. Personally, I prefer IMAP for better email management. Some web host also allow users to connect to IMAP using a SSL mailbox. Though some may not use it very often, webmail access can be a life saver should your email client on your machine ever goes down for any reason.

Reports

This refers to all kinds of reports and logs from error logs to site visitor stats. Though Google Analytics offers a very comprehensive solution, basic web stats available to you on the admin page will come in useful as you plan site marketing and figure out what your readers are interested in. Understanding stats may not be as idiot-proof as can be but nevertheless, it’s a good place and way to start.

Reliability

Again, I can’t stress again how important this is. No point in saving a couple of dollars a month to get 2 hours of downtime in the same period. It can be frustrating and worst still looks bad on your site. The length of time a web hosting company has been in business should provide a rough idea about their reliability. It does not necessary mean old players are always good and new players are bad news. Do some research and read customer feedback / reviews. Picking out genuine issues from false praise may not be easy and can be quite time consuming.

Other things to look out for are possible upgrade options should your site traffic grow beyond shared hosting needs. This will give you an indication on how ready the web host is able to cope or do they just squeeze everybody on one server and hope for the best.

Support

The best news is that you will ever need this. Technical support is however critical should anything happens i.e. your site goes down. Some companies offer phone support on a toll-free number. No harm calling them to see if they offer 24/7/365 native American, English (or whatever language you need) speaking technicians. The last thing you want is a duck talking to a chicken if you get what I mean.

Support ticketing system though not liked by all (including myself) is good for logging all email communications between you and the web hosting company. A live chat on the main page might help on some occasions. Though be forewarned, some web hosting companies that have a live chat on their front page only connect you to their sales staff. Which is absolutely useless when you need tech support.

Costs / Extras

Depending on different companies, some will throw in extras like dedicated IP, SSL certificates and advertising credits. If your site is new and you want some marketing extras, the advertising credits will come in handy. If you are intending to sell stuff online, a dedicated IP and a SSL Certificate might be something you want to seriously consider. For most parts, SSL certs can usually be bought at a discount from your web host with free installation. Buying a SSL cert is easy, installing it is another thing all together. So if you can, get your host to set it up.

As for normal blogs and sites, there is no reason you need a dedicated IP. Sites without these have not been proven to rank lower when it comes to SEO. Unless of course you prefer to look as if you have your own server and are not on shared hosting with 1,000+ other sites. Fret not as most web hosting companies charge an additional 1-2 dollars a month for it as an addon. All these and any other extra scripts you need to purchase should be considered into your total expense.

Good luck and happy self-hosting!