Don’t forget that tomorrow at our FB fan page, I’ll be answering your questions about blogs, blogging, and WordPress. What questions do you have?

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Category: General

When you are new to blogging, web hosting isn’t really on your radar because most likely, you are using a free blogging platform. You grow your blog, you gain a little notoriety, traffic picks up to the point that you you’d like to be more of a professional blogger. You find that WordPress is generally where bloggers head and find out that you must have your own hosting to place advertisements and monetize your blog. ::::sigh::::

Hosting? What is hosting and why do I have to “buy” it?

Hosting is that complicated middle man between the domain name (URL) and when you can view your blog on the Internet. The “host” does just that. It “hosts” or serves up your site in such a manner as to cause it to be viewable when someone types in or clicks on your URL.

Hosting = Viewable.
Hosting = pay someone to provide that service.
Hosting + WordPress = professional blogging.

Hello, you now have expenses!

Don’t despair. You can get great hosting for less than $100 per year.

Does it really matter who I choose as my host?

If your host does not provide your site with enough speed to load your blog in the blink of an eye, you have the wrong host. It can cost you in traffic, readership, Google page rank and frustrated readers. PLEASE, do your homework and know exactly what you should be looking for.

If you aren’t careful you purchase hosting service from a re-seller from a larger company? Re-sellers are probably not going to give you the same level of service as an actual hosting company. They are only leasing server space from a hosting company. I vote NO especially your first round of purchasing hosting. Watch out for sly, silver-tongued re-sellers who rook you in via a webinar too!!!!

How do I find a great host?

Below is the list of questions about the info I could have used to start with. I certainly wish I had enough knowledge to know before I purchased hosting the first time. I learned the hard way that all hosting is NOT created equally.

1. Will you be allowed to make all the changes to your account yourself, including contact, credit card and other changes?
2. How easy is it to cancel  hosting if you purchase it?
3. What are the limits on the number of email boxes, size of email box, the site size or the bandwidth?
4. Is it possible to install WordPress with “one click”.
5. Is it possible update your WordPress site easily?
6. Do you have full FTP (File Transfer Protocol) access to your files?
7. Do you have full access to your control panel and databases through your phpMyAdmin?
8. Is the host using the most current versions of PHP and MySQL software?
9. Is the host keeping PHP and MySQL software updated?
10. Is tech support available directly from the hosting company?
11. Does the host offer 24/7 phone and/or chat support?
12. Is the hosting company too busy promoting themselves in a manner that is demeaning to women? Have they been sold lately? Does their CEO hunt endangered animals? If so – RUN!

I can’t teach you in one blog post what a lot of the terms mean, so use your fave search engine and learn what they mean or at least get a good idea. I don’t know in detail, but I know enough to have a good feel for their meaning.

Which host do you recommend?

Revka will tell you and (now) so will I, that if you are looking for hosting, we vote for Hostgator (aff. link). Before Revka switched me over to Hostgator, I was personally unable to get my page rank to show at all after 8 months. After 3 days on Hostgator I had a PR2.  I also now  have a WebSite Grade (websitegrader.com) of 99/100. Like magic, I am now getting organic traffic from search engines.

If in doubt, ask for help, use search engines, ask for referrals from bloggers who have been at this for more than a minute.

I hope you find this helpful!

Ginger Jones

Ginger Jones from Attention Deal Shoppers shares coupons, great deals, and other frugal ideas with her readers.

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Category: WordPress Wednesday