Hosting / servers
Although websites can be accessed from anywhere in the world, the information on them still consists of data which is stored on a physical server somewhere. Depending on the scale of your website and the amount of data, images, animations etc that you have on it, you’ll need a varying amount of server space.
“We started with a smaller cheaper company for our server, but once we brought the web deign in-house we upgraded to a better one that had faster response times and more back-up,” says Sophie of Notonthehighstreet.com.
“We don’t exactly have the Rolls Royce package but I’d say we have the highly engineered German car of the server world. It’s well worth the money and defiantly something to invest in.”
You can host a basic business website for free with some packages. However, if you’re business primarily operates online then you’ll need something a bit more dedicated to your requirements.
A basic shared server web-hosting package will generally cost around £40-50 pounds per year, although it really depends on the size of the site.
A dedicated server can cost you in the region of £40+ per month depending on your requirements, but as with most internet related packages, it pays to shop around.
Mitesh from Chemist Direct took a novel approach to comparing hosting packages. “I pulled together a list of all my requirements and sent it to hosting companies inviting them to tender.” In the end I went with a company that offered the right balance of features and price, but it’s still an area I review regularly to check I’m getting the best deal.”
For more information on web hosting, check out our section on hosting your site