Some companies rush the decision on choosing a company for web hosting. They quickly choose a company that appears on the top of their search engine results, or they simply choose a famous company that offers web hosting. This is as dangerous a strategy as marrying the next person to come through a door. You are likely setting yourself up for months or years of problems.
A better strategy for determining the right company for your web hosting is to first design your rough requirements. A simple website that only provides a small amount of information or shows a few pictures can use almost any hosting company. However, if you plan to distribute information of any size, like video files, then a hosting company that charges reasonable prices for high storage is appropriate. If you plan to sell items, then you need a hosting company that supports storefronts. If your needs are even more complex, then you will likely need to carefully specify your requirements, then plan to spend some time finding a reliable company to meet them.
The facts are that there are many more web hosting companies than there are good hosting companies. Web hosting is a commodity, and many people are lured into low-quality plans at bargain basement prices. They quickly find that their websites look amateurish, their sites are hard to set up, and their sites do not work as intended.
The first step is to be realistic about costs. An above the board company will charge you monthly hosting fees and initial setup costs for allocating your website and taking care of fees such as your domain name registration. Anyone promising less is likely trying to rope you into some impossible bargain plan that cannot work until you “upgrade to a premium plan”. Unfortunately, this is a very common tactic.
A second thing to do is to not choose a hosting company simply because they are well known. The larger companies tend to focus on only the simplest websites (because they are the most lucrative), and a website with any complexity is often not supported.
The best strategy is to shop on a consumer site that offers ratings and feedback for the type of website you are designing. Then investigate these sites with three things in mind: price, their capabilities (based on their online portfolio), and the level of their customer service.
