Free Web Hosting - The Downside
If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
If you want your own website, you’ll need to get a ‘host’ to store all the files and information related to your website, and keep it connected to the internet.
When looking for web hosting you’ll come across lots of different hosting services, some of them free, some paid. Are you wondering why people pay for web hosting at all when you can get it for free? Let me clear this one up for you.
The problem with free web hosting is that there’s no such thing as a free lunch. Free web hosting providers have to make their money somehow - with advertising revenue. So, if you don’t mind your professional-looking website being littered with unwanted ads, then by all means go for it.
The other problem is that free web hosting doesn’t come with any support. What will you do if your website ‘goes down’ and no-one can view your webpage? At least with a reputable paid hosting service, you’ll get 24 hour support and some kind of guarantee of uptime. Not to mention, an ad-free website!
If you’re serious about your website and your business, get paid hosting. I use Hostgator and highly recommend it. They have live chat support 24 hours a day, all year round. I’ve asked them a number of questions and they’ve always been very helpful.
Popularity: 14% [?]
Hi Lisa.
I am planning on starting up a virtual assistant home based business. I went to the Hostgator web site to see what they had for web hosting and building a web site. I didn’t see anything that resembled the virtual assistant business. When you had your web site done, what did you use for your category to get them to build your web site?
Thank you.
Ana
Hi Ana, I didn’t use Hostgator to build my site - I use them to host my site. As for building the site, that was done in Wordpress. When you use a site builder with a hosting provider, you’ll find that there are categories you can choose from - so it’s best to look for a business category.