Yes, big moment has finally arrived. Your business is now on verge of taking next step forward. It will establish a web presence. This is an important step as from now on your business is able to reach more customers, is able to get more exposure, and hopefully enjoy online recognition.

Space, bandwidth and domain name all come with a cost, but there is a possibility to get them all for free. Resource management principles will probably tell you to choose free solution. Nowadays cost for web hosting services has a very reasonable reason partially because of technological progress, partially because of stiff competition on web hosting market.

Still… why pay for it when you can get it for free?

Free web hosting

Dozens, even hundreds of free web hosting providers offer their services on Internet. Could there be one that meets needs for your business? Hardly, if any.

Please let me state clearly that this article is not intended to attack or discredit hosts or advertisers. It’s only purpose is to assess and understand how can be best met hosting needs of a business. Any business. And yes, in spite of everything stated here, even author of this article has resorted at some point in time to services of free web hosts!

You probably learned too, and at a very small age, that in life everything comes with a price. However, there it is … allover Internet: Free Web Hosting.

Nothing in this world is free. So how comes there even is free web hosting?

The definition of term “free” according to The New Lexicon Webster's Dictionary, states gives following definition for term free: 1.adj. not subject to external restraints or domination; not captive, at liberty; not having to be paid for; unhampered; open to all without restrictions; etc. 2.adv. without expense; without penalty 3.v.t. to release from constraint, set free

Therefore a literally free hosting service would mean no restraints, no expenses and no restrictions for user. Webmasters would design with only limited by their imagination and skills. All space and bandwidth you would possibly ask for at no cost whatsoever. Real-life scenario? Could anyone really think so? Indeed nothing in this world comes without price. Even it is not apparent. And price you must pay for free web hosting comes in many forms, as free web hosting providers must pay too for bandwidth, not to mention other costs.

While some free web hosts require you to have one on their banners on your web site, others place pop up adds, or flashing advertising messages. So it’s free for you as long as you fulfill their set of requirements and meet their conditions. In addition to this, you should consider that host's service is free with let’s say 25 Megs of space; more space means different conditions and you could have to pay for it.

Paid web hosting

If you are billed, it means you own something.

There is now a contractual bind between you and your web-hosting provider, which in turn must offer you his services.

Ownership gives you more control of your online presence. Important as ownership is, it is neither only nor biggest advantage of paying for your hosting solution.

The identity of your business would be clear from your URL down to your web content without banners confusing your customers. Imagine that you deal with What I would say, is ask yourself if you would deal with someone offering a similar service/ product as you are promoting, who was obviously using a free site. If you would, then fine, but if not, don't expect anyone else to deal with you!

What is web hosting anyway? What do I get when I buy a web hosting solution?

To make thing clear from start let’s just say how it all works.

Web pages basically consist of text and images. Generically, information contained by these files is called content. The look of web page is called design.

In order to be accessible to online users, all these files must be stored on a web server. You can think of web servers as computers storing files of tens or hundreds of web sites. These computers are all connected to Internet through high-speed connection.

When you access a web page, your browser connects to web server that stores that page and downloads it to your computer.

So a web server is a must when you plan to share your web site content with online users via Internet.

There are thousands of web servers in world, and there are companies that own them. Such a company is called web-hosting provider. A web-hosting provider can have dozens of web servers hosting thousands of web sites. The web server computers are found usually in large numbers and are all housed in special buildings or sections of buildings called data center.

Apart from high-speed Internet connection, these locations are set up to ensure optimum operational conditions and security for web servers. HVAC (Heating, Ventilation, & Air Conditioning) control, fire protection, virus protection, data backup facility, power backup, even autonomy in case of disaster. Another term for web servers in data center is a web farm.

To be able to run your site properly you need a space on web server to store your data and an Internet connection to it. The amount of data available to you on a web server is simply referred as space and is usually quantified in MB.

The Internet connection needed so that your web site can be accessed online is referred as bandwidth and is also measured in MB or even GB. Having glimpse of basics, it must be said that different web-hosting providers offer different space and bandwidth. Space and bandwidth are usually main characteristics of a web-hosting plan.

The terminology associated with web hosting can be quite dazzling: virtual web hosting, dedicated hosting; co-locating hosting, shared hosting reseller hosting.

Shared Web Hosting

Shared web hosting or virtual web hosting are two terms for same thing.

Shared web hosting means that on a web server are hosted many web sites that all have a defined quota of HDD space and bandwidth. They all run simultaneously and there can be from hundreds to thousands of web sites on same web server.

Given high number of web sites should you worry about exceeding performance of web server, issue better known as slow server response, meaning that your visitors will have to wait too long for your web pages to load.

That is usually not a real problem when dealing with serious web hosting providers, because operational parameters of web servers are monitored and appropriate actions will be taken in order to maintain level of service contracted.