VPS hosting, cloud hosting and shared hosting providers–when deciding what form of web hosting service to purchase, the first thing you should ask is, what type of an online presence will your business have?
Are you a small business or entrepreneur looking to use your website to advertise and supplement an already established shop? Or will your website be the main focus of your business?
The next question is whether your business will be starting out small, building up to more visitor traffic as you grow? Or will your website start with an established heavy customer or visitor traffic base?
Understanding the vision for your website will help your shared hosting provider fit you with the right hosting service for your unique business needs.
Shared Hosting
Shared hosting is not only the most popular website hosting service but also the most affordable. With this type of service, multiple users with individual domains utilize one web server. Bandwidth, storage, and other resources are shared amongst the users, and providers are able to discount the maintenance and server expenses.
Beginning users will find shared hosting the easiest to use as well. Shared hosting providers are highly-skilled professionals that can guide you through all stages of creating, configuring and launching your website.
Your package may also include drag-and-drop website builder software, email accounts, marketing tools like visitor statistics, and security services. All designed to help you better understand and attract new visitors.
This type of service is especially useful for small business owners, bloggers and entrepreneurs who are either just starting their online website presence or plan to have a static, basic level of traffic flow to their website. As your website traffic grows, you can transfer to higher hosting tiers to address bandwidth needs and have faster content delivery.
VPS Hosting
Once you’ve reached the constraints of resources provided by shared hosting, looking into VPS hosting would be the next step.
VPS, or Virtual Private Server, is the middle service between shared and dedicated hosting. While it is still one shared physical server like shared hosting, the server is set up with only 10 – 20 websites, each with separate virtual machines.
While VPS hosting is more expensive than shared hosting, it also provides more flexibility and resources for a growing website. Since each account is virtually separate, you have more flexibility to make changes without affecting others.
However, this service isn’t necessarily for the beginner. As you have more ability to manipulate your software and files, you also need a better understanding of what you’re doing.
Similar to VPS hosting, cloud VPS hosting is on a separate virtual machine. Instead of on a physical server, though, clouding hosting is run through a network of computers. This allows for much greater capacity and security.
Since cloud hosting pulls from multiple servers, requests can be spread out to avoid a single-server shutdown.
If you are not sure which hosting plan will work best for you, we recommend our full guide on Shared Hosting vs VPS Hosting – How Do I Choose?
Dedicated Hosting
One of the more expensive options, dedicated hosting provides you with your own single or dual processor server. Since it is your own server, providers offer a wide range of customizable options such as memory, hardware, and operating systems.
This type of hosting provides excellent flexibility, reliability, and security. With a dedicated server, you don’t need to worry about other clients that may affect your resources such as bandwidth or cause a security issue. Having a solid understanding of the technology is important as well.
Making the Right Choice for your Website
If you are a small business or entrepreneur starting to grow your online presence, the most affordable option to begin is shared hosting. Not only is it the most affordable, but the easiest for beginners to use.
Truly a great starting point, your shared hosting provider can help you identify which hosting tier is right for your unique business needs.
