Web Publishing Guide for the Beginning Entrepreneur (Part 1)
"The best things don't come easy." - Quoted
The finished web pages in your hands could be likened to a
painting by Michelangelo without the Sistine Chapel. In your
case, the Sistine Chapel would be the web server to host your
web site masterpiece.
This is the first part of a series of articles touching on
various aspects of publishing on the web. In this edition, we
will dwell on the aspect of domain name and web hosting.
Domain Name First, you need to register your domain name. FYI, a
domain name is the location of your web site on the Internet,
just like http://www.internetmarketinglearningcenter.com.
You should have your own domain name if you envision yourself to
be a successful Internet entrepreneur. BTW, the domain name you
have registered with some free hosting services is not too
professional to be used for your business operation. Unless you
are on some form of an experiment, get your own domain name. The
cost of getting one has considerably gone down than say five or
two years ago.
People would take your product or service seriously if you do
have your own domain name. There are a host of domain name
registrars out on the Net for you to choose from.
Before you go out and register your domain name, check it out
first if the domain name you are planning to register is still
available. There are a number of free services to check the
names of registered domain names on the web.
If you check my web site you will find a listing of better
domain name checkers. It will save you a lot of time. Some of
these free services offer domain name registration - for a fee,
of course.
Web Hosting After you have decided on - and subsequently
registered - your domain name, the next big task is for you to
find a host server to which your domain name will be pointing to.
The choice of your web site host is crucial enough to be left to
guesswork. For one, a downtime in your host's server will
severely impact your online operation. The profit returns of
your business will be at stake.
Tip: You often come across an advertisement that says: "We
guarantee 99.9% uptime." Come to think of it, a 0.1% downtime
translates close to 9 hours within a year that your web site can
not be accessed by your clients. Can you afford this? My advice
is for you to do your math if a web host is giving you this type
of advert.
Web Hosting Checklist The following checklist will help you
select a reliable and efficient web site host: - Does it offer
24/7 technical support? - Does it have a reliable performance
record? (Go for the near zero per cent server downtime) - Does
it offer a fast connection speed? - Does it offer a quick and
easy access to your log files? - Are CGI scripts allowed for
your package? - Is autoresponder services being offered?
Web Server Categories There are three types of web hosting
services you can categorize web servers. List down these three
categories and put under the appropriate item the name of the
web host you are evaluating. Two things worth checking are
pricing and performance record of the web host.
Offhand, a web host could fall into three types, namely, cheap
web hosting, affordable web hosting, and free web servers. For
reasons already discussed above, you have to opt out the free
web hosting type, if you want to make serious your Internet
business venture.
My web site at http://www.internetmarketinglearningcenter.com
conducted a study on the cheap and affordable web hosting
services. You may want to check it out yourself. It may save you
time.
Tip: You can get cheap web hosting for as low as $0.50 a month.
Some web hosts claim to offer free web hosting if you register
your domain name with them. Check this out very carefully
because the cost of the web hosting may already be added to the
cost of the domain name registration. See if the cost of domain
name registration is high compared to the web host's
competitors. Also check out the performance record of the web
host.
Uploading Web Files to the Server After you have registered your
domain name and signed a web host, the next big task is
uploading your files to the host's server. The popular and
traditional way of transferring files to your web host's server
is via an FTP program (for Windows) and Fetch (for Macintosh).
If you belong to the 95 per cent of the computing population
(i.e., Windows based), the best FTP program for you is still the
WS-FTP software. You can download if for free from the web.
Most web hosts offer control panels where you can directly
browse your file source and upload the files to the server. In
this case, there's no need for you to use an FTP program.
Tip: Some web hosts offer state of the art control panels.
Others have amateurish control panels. You have to choose
between simplicity and time-consuming operation. My advice is
for you to choose the easy to operate panel that offers
hassle-free transferring of files.