Ecommerce Hosting Considerations

Before you purchase an ecommerce hosting plan, there are many things that you will need to consider in advance. The points below are necessary decisions that will need to be made to ensure that you get not only the best deal, but the best site for your business.

Is Your Database Supported? This is an area that many business owners neglect when selecting a hosting company. You may not be familiar with all of the jargon that goes with website packages, so it is important to check with your web development staff, if you aren’t handling this yourself, to make sure that your current database will be compatible with your prospective hosting plan.

Are There Enough Features Included? Since ecommerce plans cost more than regular hosting plans, you will need to make sure that you will not have to spend more money above and beyond your monthly hosting charges. The ecommerce hosting market is competitive and it is important to shop around before selecting a host to make sure that you are getting the features you need at a price you can afford. You should, at the very least, have a host that provides a shopping cart, SSL certificate, mailing list software and unlimited databases. This way, you can be sure that all of your needs will be met without having to find and pay extra for additional applications.

Will I Have Enough Disk Space? This is an area that many people underestimate. If you plan on having a shopping cart, customer database and a large product catalog on your site, you will need to make sure that you will have adequate disk space to handle these files. Many companies penalize you if you go over your limit and you can actually end up paying more for additional disk space than you would if you purchased a plan that offers a larger amount. It is best to err on the side of caution and get extra disk space than to run low and end up paying more later.

Will I Have Enough Bandwidth? Bandwidth is one of the costliest aspects of owning a website. Popular stores may need quite a lot of data transfer and there is nothing worse than having your site suspended for going over its bandwidth limit. It gives an unprofessional appearance to your store and can cost much more money if you are penalized for exceeding your limits. While simple ecommerce sites may not need a terabyte of data transfer per month, you should make sure that you have at least 10 gigs of allotted transfer in your monthly plan to avoid any future problems.

Will I Have Enough Email Addresses? If your company has more than 30 employees, or you plan to organize your incoming email with several email addresses, you will need to make sure that your ecommerce plan offers more than enough email addresses. These can cost as much as $5 extra per email account if you run out of your allotment, which can quickly add up over time.

These are the most important points to consider while you are shopping for your hosting plan. You will need to weigh what is important for your individual company in addition to these points to make sure that you are getting a hosting plan that can grow with your business and not hold you back.