There are two vital things that your site cannot exist without - a domain and web hosting. The domain is simply a name, it's meant to help people find your site easier and perhaps give them an idea of what the site is all about. The web hosting however is what provides you with the chance to truly build your site and show it off to the world. Essentially, every website is a group of files working together to give you the whole page you see when you open it, so you need a place to store these files.
Web hosting is a service - hosting companies provide you with the space to store your site's files, so that people can see them when they access your domain. These files are stored on servers that are constantly connected to the Internet and can provide your site's content to the public whenever someone looks for it.
There are various different types of hosting - self-hosting, shared hosting, cloud hosting, virtual server and dedicated servers. While self-hosting is an option for some, it is very costly as it requires procuring a good enough server and an excellent and fast 24/7 Internet connection. The most affordable options are the regular shared hosting and the cloud shared hosting.
The cloud hosting is also a type of shared hosting but rather than sharing one server, all of the sites are in our cloud. The cloud is supported by several servers and more can be added to it at any time, allowing it to grow as our customer base grows as well. The cloud is more flexible and reliable than the regular shared hosting and also comes with a control panel we have developed ourselves that we believe is very intuitive and customer-friendly. The cloud environment we have created allows for both Windows and Linux sites to be run on the same account and it also offers the opportunity to use a hybrid between the two.
Having a dedicated server means that you get the whole machine as well of all of its resources for yourself. With our dedicated solutions we can customise the environment for you, so that it provides you with everything you need for your site or sites, including optimising the speed and adding any software required.
The virtual servers are similar to the dedicated servers, however rather than having a whole machine for yourself, you would have a virtual part of it. Virtual servers unlike shared hosting have dedicated resources, smaller than the actual server, which makes them a more affordable solution.
If you are familiar with cPanel and would rather have your shared hosting set up with one, we can arrange this for you, however we strongly recommend our cloud hosting instead.
The type of hosting you select is entirely dependent on your needs and preferences. If you need any help figuring it out, please contact us and we will be more than happy to provide you with further advice and assistance.
