Website hosting and test tube babies

Like the quest for ultimate self–enlightenment, the search for the perfect hosting company seems neverending.

No matter how happy you are at the beginning, inevitably something crops up along the way that causes you to revisit your original decision. What was it that made you whip out your credit card? Why did you trust them? Are they really as capable as you thought they were? And, the (sometimes almost literal) Million Dollar Question: are they worth what you’re paying them? The reason for all this questioning (and if you’re not, you should be) is that hosting is the unavoidable foundation of any online business. Everything is built on top of it and, depending on which route you take, you’ll either be facing an endless blue sky above you or a tower of Jenga blocks waiting to collapse at any time.

To measure your hosting company’s worth, you have to look at the value they’re adding to your business. Are you simply looking for them to provide raw hardware (or manage the system for you)? Are you expecting uptime guarantees (or did they not even hint at Service Level Agreements)? If the unthinkable happens and the server goes down, will they notify you immediately via SMS (or the next day via email) and have everything resolved in an hour or less (or a week or more)?

In this cutthroat world of cost–cutting fire sales and feature oneupmanship, you get what you pay for. But in hosting terms it’s probably a bigger reality check to remind yourself that you don’t get what you don’t pay for. Along with lunches, there are no free firewalls, free memory upgrades, free specialist technicians, free quad–cores for one day only or free anythings that mean something. If you go into it knowing that this is the case, with your wallet ready to put its money where the value is, your ride to Pleasantville will have far fewer detours, blow–outs and “are we there yets”.

The key really is to manage expectations — yours, your company’s and your host’s. Don’t for a second try to make yourself believe that someone charging $5 a month is going to (1) have the resources to provide any kind of technical expertise or customer service and (2) actually care about you and your plans to dominate your niche with a bit of VC funding that you’re trying to raise.

But if you do manage expectations properly from the very beginning, choosing a host should be like ordering a test tube baby — safe, well–planned and 99.9% predictable.

You have the opportunity to sculpt a completely customised environment, specifically created to accommodate the features and components you need. Just make sure you can separate your needs and wants so that you can survive the sales pitch from the host you finally pair up with, say no to the things you don’t need, and make a decision that’s right for your business, your visitors and your bottom line.

Where to from here?

Be clear on exactly which features you want (and those you don’t) before you even introduce yourself to a potential host

Plan your infrastructure (and performance requirements) for what you need right now — have a minimum and maximum in mind

Draw up a diagram or list (based on management/development/marketing plans) of what you see your network looking like 3, 6, 9 and 12 months from now. This obviously depends entirely on how you plan to scale things; all four of these might be identical for your business

Start researching locations and costs. Consider your options based on the hardware, features, performance and support levels you’re looking for; remember that reputable companies with a long–term history of competency and good customer service aren’t going to disappear overnight, and this peace of mind is easily worth the few hundred dollars more that they’ll probably be charging

Learn from the experience of others and make a shortlist – visit www.webhostingtalk.com for thousands of reviews of just about every major hosting company around the world

Approach your companies for final custom quotes and verify every single item. If you’re paying for Dell boxes, make sure you’re getting Dell and if they’re promising incredible service levels, ask them to explain exactly what this means, especially when things go wrong (how long do their tape backups take to restore, for example)

Lastly, once you’ve made your decision, do your best to stick with it, unless all hell breaks loose. You don’t want to divorce your host every 3 months, which is why all the previous planning is so important

Of course, as technology advances and your business needs change, your hosting setup can become an extensive and intricate operation. You may decide on several hosts at the same time, for different reasons. But if you’ve planned from the start and build in such a way that you can adapt at the first signs of growth, your test tube babies should turn out to be nothing but bundles of joy.

P.S. I’m not a sysadmin and don’t profess to be one. But at the start, we had to learn a few of these lessons the hard way, while running the rest of our business at the same time. If you’re in the same boat, hopefully this will help. If you have a permanent sysadmin, this might be the perfect time to re–evaluate your current hosting setup and make sure you’re getting (1) what you need and (2) real value for your money (which is not the same thing as discounted pricing).