I’m often called upon by clients to recommend to them a good company to use as the host for the applications and websites that we build. We do offer the service ourselves, but sometimes clients like to split up their services between vendors. I suppose it makes them feel like they have a bit more control this way. So, over time we’ve worked with various other company from small time hosting companies, to big ones like Godaddy, then to specialty dedicated server companies like RackSpace. I hear lots of reviews on hosting companies from our clients, and keep a general idea of why they were chosen and how it works out. So, I’m going to share with you a few ways to NOT choose a hosting provider.

The top reason is don’t pick a hosting provider out of the back of a magazine. I know, I know, it’s a really pretty ad and they must be doing it right to afford a two page spread right? Wrong, what we’ve noticed they do something right, and that’s design flashy ads. These hosting companies are built on mass production. There goal is to squeeze as many websites onto one server as possible. You don’t want this for your business website.

The second big mistake is of course picking the cheapest company. I’m not sure how it happened, but clients have the general view that hosting is a commodity item now. The issue is that you can’t commoditize the support level. If you pick a cheap company, you get cheap support. Good luck getting in touch with a seasoned engineer when you have problems. Again, if you have a lot of problems with them, they won’t care. It doesn’t cost them but a few bucks a month if you leave.

The third big problem is to pick a hosting provider based off of reviews on the internet. It’s mostly fake, don’t you know? It’s really easy for a hosting company to have their sales people surf the net and fake lots of great sounding customer testimonials.

Probably the third big one is buying from a reseller. Yep, most of the hosting companies out there aren’t really hosting companies. They just build a nice marketing website and are actually reselling another companies hosting plans. So, you’re paying a middle man for nothing. And, you’re adding an extra link into any support that you might need in the future.

So, how do you pick the right hosting provider? It’s hard. A lot of it is through trial and error and learning who to avoid and what types of companies to steer clear from. You could also just ask someone like us who’s been through it all before!