If you’re starting up a web presence, you’ll need hosting. And you’ll need to know how much hosting space you actually need. Most people are using around 2 to 4Mb for their websites, even if they are 20 pages or more. That means that you don’t need to purchase a huge hosting package because you’ll just be buying space that you don’t really need.

Finding out your total file size and then seeing how much space you’re paying for might show you that you have a lot more space than you need. Switching plans could save you money.

The thing with most hosting packages is that they try to sell you a lot more space than you actually need. It’s their job, because they want to make a lot of money. They might be able to profit from it, but you’ll find that they’re getting rich off of your money, and that’s annoying.

If you don’t use anything close to the space that you bought, change plans. If you haven’t purchased a plan yet, figure out your file sizes and how much space you need before you spend that money.

If you’ve acquired a web host who you think is great but the company has no customer service, you might want to think about the company again -and then go somewhere else.

What if your site goes down? What if you need a question answered? Can you rely on your webhosting company to take care of you?

Cpanel is usually the only way you can configure web hosting, unless you have shell access, which most people don’t. You can add ftp users, create directories, make databases, access administrative functions, and make email accounts with Cpanel, and you can do most of your other, day-to-day functions that involve maintenance. Anything beyond that has to be done differently, but Cpanel is quite advanced and can handle a lot. It also usually comes with Fantastico, which lets you autoinstall php-based scripts.

If you’re just new to web hosting, chances are you don’t know that much about it. That’s ok, but it’s important to work at getting an education. There are three basic things that you really need to know about it. (more…)