The choice of a good Web host is one of the most crucial decisions an online store owner will make. A good e-commerce Web host can make the experience pleasurable. Choose the wrong host, though, and the online store owner's life can become a living nightmare. Here we'll help you make the right hosting decision based on your ecommerce needs, as well as make it very easy and attractive for you to switch if you decide that your online store is hosted at the wrong host.
General Purpose Web Hosts Not Geared for E-Commerce
While it's theoretically possible to host an open source commerce store at nearly any Web host by observing your own security measures, even the best general purpose host can be fraught with problems for the online store owner. They may be dirt cheap, but you get exactly what you pay for.
The support staff at a general purpose Web host may not be accustomed to the specific configurations and the ever-important security measures necessary to run the store. They may blame any technical problems on the program that runs your store simply because they don't understand the store program or its requirements. A general purpose Web host very likely will not include the large amount of disk space and transfer bandwidth that an online store needs, and you may run into significant over-charges as well as have pages that load slowly. Even the initial installation of your store can require multiple contacts with a non-specialty host with no guarantee that your store will be successfully installed.
Specialty Web Hosts Fine-Tuned for E-tailers
Enter the era of specialty Web hosting: niche players who specialize in and court the needs of open source e-commerce customers. These specialty hosts know the technical ins-and- outs of e-commerce. They understand that an online store takes a lot of file space and transfer bandwidth, so hosting plans are generous. In short, they speak the language of e-commerce.
Installation is often free and included as part of the initial setup. Your ever-crucial security needs will be addressed to help prevent outside hackers, and the host will have beefed-up internal security measures. Some specialty hosts will even move your old site to the new host for free, as long as you request this service during registration. Many offer plenty of freebies such as unlimited e-mail accounts or mailing lists, unlimited sub-domains, or secure Shell access, so be sure to compare so you get the deal that best suits your needs.
Specialty Hosting Plans
If you are just getting started with an open source online store, you can very likely start with an inexpensive "shared hosting plan" and a "third-party transaction processor." Let's look at what this means.
A shared hosting plan means that the computer that holds your Web site files also houses other online stores. Too many stores on one computer can lead to slow page-loading times, though, so do be careful. One of the vendors reviewed here, Crucial Web Hosting, specifically limits the number of stores on a computer, calling this a "split-shared hosting" account.
A third-party transaction processor means that the actual credit card transaction is done at the Web site of the credit card processor, such as 2CheckOut.com or PayPal.com, rather than on your Web host, and none of the credit card information is stored on your Web site. After the transaction, your customers are returned to your store. For security purposes, an online store hosted on a shared hosting site should never store actual credit card information.
As your sales volume increases, you may eventually want to move your store to a "dedicated host" where your store is the only one housed on the computer, and you can safely use credit card transaction processing on your Web site, along with additional security measures.
Specialty Web Host Comparison
Here we compare and contrast some of the most popular Web hosts that specialize in hosting for the major open source e-commerce programs Zen Cart™ (Camelot-hosting.com), Zen Cart, osCommerce and AgoraCart™ (Bluehost.com), Magento™ (Crucialwebhosting.com), CRE Loaded™ (Chainreactionweb.com), and osCMax™ (AABox.com).
All of the hosts reviewed here are "certified hosts" for the programs they support, which is a term that means slightly different things to different certifying bodies. In general, it means that the maker of the program has reviewed the services that this host offers and has not received any egregious unresolved complaints against the host. In theory, these hosts should be the "best of the best."
In addition, both Chain Reaction Web and osCMax are also the developers of the programs they host, CRE Loaded and osCMax respectively. By being the host as well as the program developer, the tech support you get should be top-notch since nobody will know the program as well as they do.
Free Installation
Installation of an online store can be very trying for a non-technical store owner, since installing these programs is not as easy as loading a DVD into your Windows computer and having it auto-installed. A database must be manually set up, a username and password attached to the database, and then the database and path information manually entered into a "Wizard" that tests it and then completes the installation for you. If there are any technical anomalies, the program simply fails to install. So getting free online store installation can be extremely valuable to a non-technical store owner in making the hosting purchase decision.
All of the specialty e-commerce hosts surveyed here are happy to custom install your e-commerce store for free, except for Blue Host which offer free one-click installation via the Fantastico add-on to cPanel control panel. Fantastico is discussed later on under control panels.
Free Technical &/or Application Support
All of the specialty hosts offer free technical support via a ticket system, and three of those surveyed offer instant chat support — Blue Host, Chain Reaction Web and AA Box. Although Crucial Web Host does not offer chat, they do have a one-hour guaranteed ticket turnaround, 24/7.
For application support, only Chain Reaction Web offers free, unlimited technical support for the ecommerce program, CRE Loaded. AA Box will do application support such as template installation for the noted hourly fee. Camelot Hosting does provide some application support, though they will refer some questions to the Zen Cart forums.
Free Initial Setup
Many general purpose Web hosts charge an initial setup fee equal to about a month of Web hosting. However, all of these specialty ecommerce web hosts either have free setup, or waive the setup fee with a promotional code.
(Continue to Page 2 for Migration, Account Access, Pricing and an In-Depth Feature Comparison Chart)
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