Blog Hosting is a place where you put your blog data. To communicate to the rest of the world you need to purchase a small space on a server somewhere you will put your data so that others can see it.
There are many companies such as blue host where you can register your domain name and rent a server. It is a simple process but a costly step if you are not careful.
First, I will show you what to avoid while you purchase blog hosting.
- Blog Hosting 101: A Practical Guide to Hosting Your Website
- Domain Name 101: How to Choose a Great Name for Your Blog
1. Avoid free services.
It is always attractive to go for free. It seems a wise way to do especially when you start out. But free is not always free. It comes with a baggage.
The people who give you something for free had to pay for it. So, they need to make money somewhere. And this is where trick comes in.
Most free services run ads on your site. This means they need to make the money by running ads on your traffic. This means you are working too hard only to make money for someone else. This is a no-no
Others may ask you for some hidden deal.
The biggest challenge is, you don’t own nothing. For example, if you host your site on a site called freehostd.com then you may get names like pc.freehostd.com or even a dot com only name.
The truth is you don’t own the domain, usually. They register it. And you host it on their domain as a sub domain. It is like blogging on a social media. There is a traffic there but Facebook or other media owns you. And they can go out of a business anytime or change their algorithm without warning.
2. Go for unlimited space and bandwidth
Unlimited is not measured. What does it mean when you pay for unlimited service? It is something you don’t use anyways. You are just paying for a concept.
However, this is necessary. You only need few kilobytes of space to put your blog on the server. Sometimes few megabits. If you are good at optimizing your images to a lower size, then you may not need much space.
Only social medias or very big sites with lots of audience and traffic need a dedicated server.
Bloggers only need a shared one. This means you don’t need a high size and band width and a server dedicated to your site. You can share it on same server with others.
Imagine your pc drive. You can put your only data or you can share it with other 10 people. The more one person puts a data, they more they have to pay. Because we are sharing and they are taking lots of space. In dedicated one you don’t have it.
The trick is if you get unlimited space service then no matter how many data you put; your spaces keeps increasing.
If you have limited service, they will ask you to upgrade with payment.
The bandwidth is the speed of your site to download data to your audience. When a lot of traffic comes to your site, then you are sharing a band width with others. Then your speed will throttle. Your site will be limited because you are consuming much resource. Then your website may crash when it gets to its limits on server.
If you get unlimited bandwidth, this probably will not happen.
3. Free means limited service.
Usually the free services have premium services as well. For them to keep you in their service they keep limiting your needs and forcing you to upgrade.
This is not a dark move.
It is just a way of business model. It is like a drug. You keep testing it for free until you need it someday. They give you for free until you are addicted.
The free service is a great way to test the water but when you grow you probably need more. Something brandable and personal.
Here is where the trick comes in.
4. You need to pay to upgrade and more to move.
Since you don’t own the content, even if you need to move it is sometimes impossible. Where is the content? How do you download your database? The service is limited, you don’t have customer service because it is free, man.
They will probable assign someone to help you move but you need to pay a good money.
5. They can change their plans any time.
I remember few years back, I started with a free hosting site. There were three options for me and I chose the free. After a year of on and off blogging, I received an email that I need to upgrade or lose my data. The company was shifting their business model. They probably had this on their mind when they began their company or they might have changed their mind at that time. But I was the one who had to lose everything. A month later, I received another email that says, my website was switch off and I come no longer claim my blog.
I believe many people lost their site this way as well.
So, when you buy blog hosting service, you will get an AD free service. This means only you control the website. The other advantage is you determine the domain name. No subdomains.
The other advantage is you have a fast website based on the service you bought.
You can change the look of the website as much as you need. No limited setting, no limited colour change or not limited design.
What is the Best Blog Hosting service?
Blue host is not a leading blog hosting provider. Blue host hosts more than 2 million domains and the blog hosting plans are much preferred by many bloggers.
The services are affordable, generous and cheap at the same it.
Setting up your setting in blue host is a one to one process. It is easy to follow. You can pay using PayPal and this makes them best services.
Word press installation is simple and may not take you more than a few minutes to launch your site.
Finish after domain registration
Finally, blog hosting
Avoid free blog hosting serves. Free is attractive but free comes with hidden cost. You can not afford for some one to control your website. You cannot afford to limit what you want to do with your website to save a fraction of money.
A good hosting is also the one that helps you to start fast with out hassle. Your primary goal is not coding or learning about settings or not to be good on hosting for that matter. Your primary goal is to launch your blog, grow it and make money.
Any thing other than this, you should avoid.