The task of choosing a web host may seem overwhelming. There are thousands of hosting providers with dozens of hosting features. The search for the perfect plan to fit your needs will take some time and effort on your part. However, this is time well spent, as the costs of a bad decision can be quite high.

Step 1: Decide exactly what your hosting needs are now
Make a list of the features that are necessary for your website. How large is your website? If you have a small site without lots of detailed graphics and sound files you will not need more than 1 gig of disk space. How much traffic do you expect? If your site is new you can check the traffic to competitor sites using Alexa.com or a similar traffic analysis service. Most websites have less than 1,000 visitors a day, but some have up to 10,000 visitors. If you expect more than 10,000 visitors a day, you will need high bandwidth hosting. Do you need email or will you just use Hotmail or a similar service? Do you want to host more than one website (multiple domain hosting)? Do you need any ecommerce or site design software? These are just some of the questions you must ask yourself.

Step 2: Narrow your pool of possible choices
You can start browsing through hundreds of plans listed in our hosting directory. Alternatively, there are many other hosting directories and indexes where you can start your search. Narrow your pool of possible choices based on those that fit your selection criteria. Give yourself a buffer and don’t choose a plan that just barely meets your minimum requirements. If you think you will need 20 gigs of data transfer per month, consider a plan with 50 gigs of transfer. You want to allow for the growth of your site.

Selection Criteria

• Disk space – If your site is very large with many graphics, databases, videos and the like, don’t choose a plan that only offers 100 megs of storage
• Data transfer – How many visitors a day do you expect? How many pages will they view on average? How big is each page? Are there any large graphic or audio files?
• Billing cycle – Do you want the option to pay monthly? Are there significant discounts for paying annually?
• Setup – Is there a setup fee? How long will it take? Will the hosting provider transfer a site for you?
• Ecommerce features – Will you be selling things from your site? Does the host offer a shopping cart, mysql database, payment gateway, ssl security?
• Website statistics – Are graphical statistics such as Webalizer offered? Can you access raw server logs to analyze stats as you see fit?

There are also other selection criteria that may be relevant to your particular needs. Once you have narrowed your list of candidates, it is time to research the top contenders.

Step 3: Evaluate each plan and company
Compare each of the hosting plans based on the most important features. Determine your maximum hosting budget, than evaluate hosting plans in that price range. If you have a mid-sized site about 100 megs in size with 2 – 3,000 visitors a day, many budget and basic hosting plans will fit your needs. You will not have to worry much about disk space or bandwidth. However, you may want the ability to host additional websites or easily add a weblog or forum. These are features that you will want to compare between plans and hosts. What kind of user are you? If you are not comfortable with managing a database or uploading scripts, than you will want to find a hosting plan that has ready-made scripts that you can easily customize online.

Regardless of your level of expertise, you will require a reliable hosting provider. Reliability can be measured in terms of network uptime (usually 99.9%) and technical support. If you are paying $2/month for a hosting plan, don’t expect flawless performance and excellent technical support . Very cheap hosting is fine for personal and smaller websites, but mission-critical websites require more expensive, flexible, and reliable hosting solutions. Scour hosting indexes, consumer reports, review sites, and search engine for customer reviews of the appropriate hosting providers. Don’t be discouraged by a few negative reviews. Try to look at overall satisfaction with the companies. Don’t be afraid to call the companies and ask their sales and support staff specific questions. This should help you feel more confident in your final selection.

Conclusion
When choosing the best plan for your needs, you should first determine exactly what features you need and would like. Narrow the list of possible plans and evaluate each using the factors that are most important to you. Resist the urge to make your decision based on price alone. Cheap hosting often does not come with good technical support. Do your research on each of the hosting providers. Look for customer reviews about each of the hosts and contact the hosting companies to ask any questions you may have. This will increase the likelihood of choosing the best host for your needs.