Small business web hosting companies provide business hosting services for your company's website. If you intend to have a large number of photos or other images, music or video files; your website requires more disk space. However, it's equally as important to pay attention to bandwidth, or the maximum amount of monthly traffic allowed by your small business hosting plan. Look for options such as easy to use site builder and ecommerce solutions to sell products directly on your website.

Determine the type of host based on the website you intend to create. The most common types of hosting for small business include shared hosting, which involves sharing space on the same server; virtual dedicated server hosting creates a virtual server space, but in fact you’re sharing with other websites; and dedicated hosting, which provides your company's website its own server, offers a large amount of disk space, and allows for high traffic.

Consider the following as you select business hosting services as an important marketing tool:

1. Decide on a budget for business web site hosting.

2. Compare features in your price range and select affordable business hosting.

3. Use web site hosting to advertise your business to customers.

4. Include your web address in other forms of small business advertisement.

Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done

Choose affordable business hosting plans for a business website

Choose low-cost shared hosting plans. This type of small business web hosting has many features for a low monthly price. The domain name is usually included in the price, and many hosts do not charge a set-up fee. Look for hosting for business with other options such as templates or website design services.

I recommend: Sign up for a low-price hosting plan with a long list of features including a site builder and ecommerce capability at HostMonster or BlueHost. Choose a host that has all those great features and low prices, but also has room to grow at StartLogic or SimpleHost.

Obtain business hosting services with a mid-priced plan

Buy business web hosting services that provide more help than the average web host if your budget allows. Extra services worth the extra cost include automated search engine optimization and advanced ecommerce options.

I recommend: Yahoo! Small Business offers unlimited bandwidth, easy to use site builder, and advanced ecommerce solutions on their Merchant Solutions plan. Site Build It! has video tutorials that walk you through every step of building a website and also provides search engine optimization automation.

Select dedicated business web hosting services

Choose this type of hosting if you plan to have a big store, host lots of streaming videos, an active forum, or any type of website that will generate a high amount of traffic. Most lower cost hosting plans have bandwidth limits; dedicated web hosting is for websites that regularly go well over those limits.

I recommend: SuperbHosting and Lunarpages Web Hosting are among the best-rated web hosts that provide dedicated business hosting services.

Tips & Tactics

Helpful advice for making the most of this Guide

• •  Learn more about search engine optimization or hire someone to optimize your site for search engines. Your website will do you no good if no one visits it, but many hosting services look upon this as an afterthought.
• •  Create a professional-looking website by using a design template or a design service, even if you have to pay extra. The look of your website is a big part of your online corporate image.
• •  Assess the quality of customer service at various hosting companies by trying to contact a live support person, and by contacting their customers to ask about their opinion of the host's quality and reliability.