We all want for our websites to be online and active 24/7, but we don’t all need for our websites to be readily available to the world at all hours of the day. Today we’re going to talk about what mission critical websites are and how you can find a host to support those needs.
Defining mission critical websites
As important as we all think our own websites are, we don’t all have the same needs. Grandma Jean’s blog about her favorite childhood recipes will rely on an entirely different infrastructure than a busy, well known e-commerce site doing $50,000 in business each day. If Grandma Jean’s site goes down for a few hours she may be perturbed, but she won’t be losing money or customers.
Mission critical websites are entirely dependent on being online 100% of the time. No exceptions.
How to find a mission critical web hosting company
While it’s entirely possible to cut a few corners to save money when searching for a hosting company for your personal blog, that cannot be done when it comes to finding a home for your mission critical website. Because your site needs to be online all the time, your number one goal is to find a web host that will guarantee reliability above all else. How do you do that?
Read web hosting reviews: Seasoned webmasters are very good at leaving quality web hosting reviews for hosts that they liked and didn’t like. Take the time to read reviews and make a small list of web hosts that most interest you.
Research. Once you’ve narrowed down your search to one or two companies, research those companies histories in the industry. As with all other businesses, not all hosting companies have a solid reputation. Find out how many years your potential new host has been in business and what theBetter Business Bureau has to say about them.
Make contact. Reach out and contact the sales and support teams of those hosts you’re most interested in. Pay attention to how long it takes for basic questions to be answered and how knowledgeable the support teams are. Is support available 24/7? Is there a setup fee for new accounts? Get all the details before you make your final decision.
Choose reliability. It’s always tempting to run with a company that offers unlimited space and bandwidth, but be realistic in your approach, and choose reliability over anything else. Since your business relies on you being online, you have to make the right decision the first time around. Realizing two months from now that your web host isn’t living up to your expectations means that you’ll have to move your website again, which equals more downtime and more money lost.
The search for a reliable web hosting company begins with reading quality web hosting reviews and investing your time and energy into finding the one host who will help you to succeed.