Building Your First Website: Day 4

This post is geared for mom and pop business owners who are creating their first online presence, or other newbies to the net.

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With the dawn of Day 4, here’s what you should have so far:

1. A mission statement and idea of what you want your website to be about;
2. An outline of your content; and
3. A domain name.

Today, you’re going to get a hosting service.

What is a Hosting Service?

In simplistic terms, hosting is a space on a computer that is networked onto the Internet.  Visualize, for a second, your mailbox that is out on the street.  The address; i.e., 123 South Main Street, is like the url (www.123mailstreet.com).  The box, where envelopes are picked up or dropped off, is your host.  To access the mailbox, you either walk or drive up to it, which is akin to your personal Internet connection (i.e., your DSL, dialup or other way that you connect to the Internet).

Some Questions I’ve Been Asked.

When it comes to getting a host, here are some questions newcomers have asked me:

1. If the company is in Texas and I’m in Arizona, will it affect the speed? The answer is no.
2. I only have dialup.  Will this make my site slow? The way you access the Internet has nothing to do with the speed of your host.
3. If my computer crashes, will my site go down? No.
4. I’m going to have at least 400 pages.  Should I get a server? No.

What You Should Look For In a Hosting Service.

For your very first website, I recommend that you get a basic Unix account that has the following options:

• Control Panel -  It is critical that you can see the “back end” of your site; in otherwords, the guts of your hosting account.
• Fantastico – This will install blogs and other services automatically.
• Awstats – This is a wonderful way to find out more about your visitors.
• PHP and CGI scripting capabilities.
• At least 1 mySQL database; preferably more.
• Multiple domain-based email accounts.
• Crontab.

The NotGuru’s Recommendations for Your Hosting Service.

#1 Deal – 10 Years for $40

The very best deal you will ever find is offered by Web Promotions Systems, which provides an outstanding deal:  10 years for $40.  You get 1 gigabyte of storage (more than you’ll need), a complete control panel, 100 email addresses and much more.  I have several different domains hosted at Web Promotions Systems and have not once experienced downtime or trouble.  This works out to around $0.33 or $0.34 per month for quality hosting.  Get this outstanding deal by clicking this link.

#2 Deal – HostGator

HostGator is extremely fast and reliable and one of the most respected hosting companies around.  I’ve been thrilled with them.  I have some reseller accounts with HostGator that start at just $24.95 a month.  For your very first site, you can get by with just $4.95 a month (or if you anticipate a large site, maybe go with the $7.95 option).  HostGator has tremendous customer support and all the perks that you need.

WHAT DO DO AFTER YOU HAVE PURCHASED YOUR HOSTING.

You will get a welcome email from your hosting service.  That email will give you two DNS nameservers:  i.e., NS1.hostname.com and NS2.hostname.com.

1. Go to your domain registrar’s site (i.e., GoDaddy) and log into your account.
2. Click the link for managing your domain.
3. Click the nameserver option and copy/paste the nameserver information you just received.
4. It may take up to 2 days for your nameserver to go through.  You will not see your domain until it does.

If you have signed up with GoDaddy.com here is a quick tutorial on how to do this:

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Yesterday:  Getting a Domain

Tomorrow:  Web Authoring Software

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