Startup guest post - Netfirms: Hosting: The Start Up's Hand Up

Hosting: The Start Up's Hand Up

Why Hosting Works

The field of technology is updated so rapidly that it can be hard to keep up with the latest editions, newest gadgets, and best protection. Couple that with beginning your first technology start-up and the task can go from difficult, to overwhelming, as quickly as it takes the latest story of Lindsay Lohan to circulate. Despite the daunting loom that this may seem to impart, there is help in the form of a hosting company.

What is the worst case scenario you could be faced with? Server down-time. Down-time communicates negatively with your clients as it causes frustration and instils doubt in your ability to provide prompt, quality service. Other issues you are potentially facing are viruses, bugs, system crashes, etc. As a small business, you may not have the time or man-power to deal with these complications thoroughly. That is where a hosting company comes to your rescue.

A Good Host

There are a various assortment of hosting companies available, some of them are the big names everyone has heard of, some are less known names. Google, Microsoft, HP, and Amazon are ones people have heard of due to their pivotal technological places. In the following paragraphs Rackspace and Equinix will be discussed. Before that though, let's look at what you should expect from a hosting company:

Is the company financially stable?
Are they expanding their resources?
What kind of tech-support do they offer?
Do they provide the services they promise?
Who else uses them?

Now to explore the some of companies mentioned.

Equinix

Equinix has been around since 1998, providing service for over three-thousand customers in eleven different countries over five-hundred different networks. They provide service for customers of AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint. Equinix has a twenty-four hour, seven day a week support system available to its customers that provides help with installation, troubleshooting, and other issues. Pricing is flexible and competitive, set-up to be customized based on what the client is seeking. Some of the drawbacks to Equinix for US users are the monitoring services and valuable asset protection in the event of IT downtime are available only for customers in Asia and Europe.

Rackspace
Rackspace has also been in business since 1998. They provide service for over eighty-thousand customers. Their overseas expansion is on a smaller-scale, with two centers in the UK and one in Hong Kong. Rackspace boasts a high-security capability, including key-card and twenty-four hour monitoring features. A different aspect to Rackspace is there billing protocol, which is based on individual customer usage of bandwidth. Rackspace only bills clients for the bandwidth they have used (versus the popular 95% billing), based on outbound bandwidth; that means not being charged for regular maintenance. Cloud hosting is a specialty for Rackspace. This is where websites are hosted on various servers that are connected; in short, that means you pay less.

There are multiple options available for tech start up companies looking to use hosting. The benefits are well weighed in your favour.


Bio
Netfirms, Inc. is the premier provider of web hosting, domain name search and registration, e-commerce web site hosting, e-mail hosting, e-marketing services and technology solutions. Our customers include families, small home offices, established businesses, and large corporations who need reliable domain name registration and web hosting services.