Website Hosting

Finding truly great Web hosting can be a daunting prospect. With so many different options and providers to chose from, searching the net for your perfect web host can quickly turn into days of work. Cheap website hosting might seem like a good idea, but if your website is critical to the success of your business or organisation then can you really afford not to do your research? A website that goes offline is like a shop that disappears overnight, it could endanger your brand credibility and your client confidence. In order to find the perfect web host you first must know what your website, email, sub domain and parked domain requirements are. Questions that you should be considering range from server speed and redundancy to website uptime and back up facilities - to name but a few.

DUSZA suggest asking these, sometimes unthought of, questions of yourself before selecting your hosting arrangement.

Is my website's uptime mission critical?

If your website goes offline, which can happen, and there is no redundancy in place then your website will not be found when a user attempts to access it. If it is essential that your website is always available to users then you certainly need to consider both server back up and redundancy.

Does my website require back ups?

Backing up websites periodically allows for peace of mind. The likelihood, depending on your provider, is that you shouldn't ever need to use the website back up. However if things go wrong having an up-to-date replica of your website and all it's content really can be a life saver - well a time saver at least. Content Management Systems allow you to upload a variety of content and writing that content takes time. Time naturally costs money so to protect your content DUSZA advises, especially on heavily content managed websites, making sure you have a back up server in place.

Should I consider server redundancy?

Server redundancy means that if the server that holds your web site fails, your website is still available because another server will take over. Mission critical websites such as ecommerce or administrative websites that run companies should consider redundancy to safe guard their online operation.

The dreaded 'Can't find server error page' can be an all to common sight if you are unfortunate enough to place your hosting with a less than perfect hosting provider. Am I concerned about Uptime?

Uptime is hardly ever guaranteed on low specification web host packages. The main reason for this is cost. To guarantee uptime you can not rely on one server alone. One server could be severely affected and go off line for a whole host of reasons such as: a fault with a component within the machine itself, a fault with the internet connection to the server, a fault with power lines outside of the data centre, a fire inside the data centre, a server reboot, server upgrades - the list goes on and on. With this in mind it is easy to see why finding reputable hosts is time consuming.

Will I need support? What are the support charges?

What is 3 hours of your time worth? This is a good question to ask yourself when considering hosts. Many of the cheaper website hosting providers outsource their support call centres to non-UK companies. It is cheaper for them, however it usually impacts the customer. When a web server fails, it can be a worrying time for the website owner and knowing that you have reliable, personable customer support is definitely worth considering.

At DUSZA we offer several levels of web hosting from which we create you a hosting package that suits your requirements perfectly. We do this because each website's requirements are different, we want to find a hosting solution which is perfect for you rather than sell you hosting which you simply don't need.

To keep your website online with great uptimes and a comprehensive support service, give DUSZA in Bournemouth a call on 0845 094 6442 or email hello@dusza.co.uk and find out what we can offer your company.

The majority of DUSZA's websites are hosted with us, below are a selection of websites that require vastly different levels of hosting:

Skate Sale
Skate Sale has multiple redundancy, database, media back up every hour and 24/7 telephone support - in case they ever encounter problems with their online business. Down time is just not an option with this ecommerce website.

Blues & Soul
The Blues and Soul website has a huge bandwidth allocation and a database back up in place to cope with consistently large volumes of traffic.

KKExcel
With relatively low traffic and a small Content Management System, KKExcel needs only DUSZA's Base Hosting Package.