eCommerce Blog

Step Number Two – How to Select a Small Business Hosting Provider

First and foremost, do not have your domain hosted at the same place you got it registered.  Unscrupulous hosts can hold your domain name hostage forcing you to continue hosting with their company or else risk losing the domain name you worked so hard to establish.  At the very least, some hosting providers might intentionally delay and make a domain transfer next to impossible.  Having your domain separate from the host gives you complete control over where your site is hosted.  Very important and a mistake many newcomers, including yours truly, make when first starting out.

Once you have the domain, it is now time to select a host.  There are a myriad of providers offering incredible deals and unbeatable prices.  Beware of relying on Google to sift through the reviews.  Many hosting review services charge a fee for placement in their top-10 lists.  Basically, a host with top placement just has deeper pockets or more dollars attributed toward advertising.  It says absolutely nothing about customer service and quality.  Nothing.

Perhaps the best source for unbiased and realistic reviews is webhostingtalk.com.  I was blind until I found this resource.  This forum is populated primarily by hosting providers.  However, the forum rules do not allow them to hype or advertise their services.  As such, you get information from arguably the best source on hosting – the hosts themselves.

Coupled with this unparalleled access to information, the site is littered with offer after ofter for hosting services in a single category that allows for host advertising.  This is where I found perhaps the best host I have ever had, Sharkspace.com.  This is where my eCommerce site is hosted.  It’s also where this very blog is hosted.

The biggest factor you should consider when choosing a host is customer service.  I don’t care how much of a budget you are on, nothing is worth working with a lousy, unresponsive host.  Think of choosing a hosting provider as aligning yourself with a business partner – which in essence it really is.  Would you consider forming a partnership with someone who is at best incompetent, and at worst uncaring?  No way.

Sharkspace, for example, combines a great pricing structure with amazing customer support.  Want to move away from a bad host?  Sharkspace will personally handle your site migration.  Need help assigning a dedicated IP, establishing a Secure Sockets Layer certificate (SSL), or setting up a blog at the touch of a button?  Sharkspace did all that for me…at no additional charge.  *Note – I’ll discuss these topics in future how to steps.

If you are building an eCommerce site for the first time, select the lowest level of shared hosting.  However, make sure the host allows for an upgrade on the fly in the event your site starts to outgrow the level of service.  Trust me, if you have to upgrade and pay more for hosting, then you are going to be beyond happpy to spend those extra dollars.  It means you’ve got an up and coming internet business.

The bottom line is that you need to research a host and hold equally price and customer service.  This decision alone can set up a positive, strong foundation from which to anchor your eCommerce website.

***  Got a couple of emails asking more info about Sharkspace.com.

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Step Number One – How to Select the Perfect Domain Name.

It’s easy to get the impression that all of the great domain names are already taken.  While there’s an awful lot of truth to that statement, there are still good names available for small business owners.  Here are a couple of strategies to nab that perfect domain.

The most inexpensive way to find a domain name is by searching through available domain names.  The cost to hand register a domain name ranges from $7.59 to $9.99 on average.  Try name.com, godaddy.com, namecheap.com, or dynadot.com.  All of these registrars are dependable and good at what they do.

As a side note, it is a good rule of thumb to keep your domain registrar and hosting provider separate.  How to choose a great hosting company will be featured next in this blog.

The consensus is that registering a .com extension is generally the best.  For the most part this is true.  However, there are many successful .net, .org, and .us websites on the net.  I would suggest taking a .net only if the .com is not already developed.  No reason the send type-in traffic to your .com neighbor.  Most of your customers will have an easier time remembering your .com extension.

When choosing the domain name, consider how easy the name is to recall, how natural the domain sounds in conversation, and how easy it would be for the would-be customer to type the domain name in without any errors.

One of the resources I like to use when searching for a domain name is domaintools.com.  Domain Tools has a suggestion area to check for similar names in the event the name you want is already taken.  Once you find a name you can live with, then it is time to register the domain name with one of the afore-mentioned registrars.

The next way to find a great name is one that is at auction.  NameJet.com is a great site to pick up expired domain names, names that the owners failed to renew.  There are a lot of choice domain names at this site.  However, the cost can skyrocket in a hurry with just a few interested bidders.

The bottom line for the domain name: make sure the domain is short.  Two words (maybe three words) is optimum.  Make sure the domain sounds natural and is easily remembered.  Try and get a .com.  Leave dashes and numbers out of the domain name.  These are all generalizations, and there are definitely exceptions to this rule.  But, by and large, you will position yourself to more success with a decent domain name.

Welcome to eCommerceBlog.com  The purpose of this blog is to detail a step by step process on building an eCommerce store solution for a small business.  As an owner of a small business, I found the task of implementing an internet presence daunting to say the least.  While researching I found a ton of diverging information on starting up a store.  After a couple of years of tough lessons, here’s the path I took to building my dream eCommerce store- minus the misteps and pitfalls of course!  Here is my method of How to Start a Small Business Ecommerce Website.