Comparison of Web Hosting Sites

Whenever I need to look for a new web host, I prefer to visit independent web hosting user review web sites to get a feel of the web hosts that look promising to me. Web hosting is big business online. Affiliate commissions for web hosts can go up to a few hundred dollars at a time if a new customer signs up for a 1 year service contract or more. Not everyone has your best intentions when they refer you a particular web host when money is involved.

Types of Web Hosting Review Sites

• Independent user reviews of web hosts
• Biased user reviews of web hosts created just to make an affiliate commission
• Web hosting review forums created for the discussion of web hosts

Independent User Reviews of Web Hosts

My favourite place to read reviews of web hosts is Web Hosting Magazine. They have a very detailed review criteria and a strict review process. They have both editor reviews and user reviews of web hosts. Although they display banners and ads for some web hosting companies on their web site, they do not have affiliate links in their reviews, which is a very refreshing change. They do not artificially place certain web hosts at the top of the list for the sake of money.

Biased User Reviews of Web Hosts

Some web sites like to list the “top 10″ web hosts on their web sites and give them ratings on the different features of a web host. If you visit such a web site and make a decision on their information alone, you would have been duped. Compare more than one web host review site and see if the top web hosts appear in most the reviews. Chances are, you will find a huge difference from someone’s “top 10 list” to another web site’s “top 10 list”. They usually have very vague review guidelines. I tried to leave a negative review on one of these sites and they disapproved the review because they felt that the web host I was giving a negative review of was good.

Web Hosting Review Forums

Forums can be a good place to find some real user reviews of web hosts but at the same time, web hosting companies plant their own “spies” and “salespeople” in web hosting review forums to sell their services. A few examples are the forums at DigitalPoint.com, WebHostingTalk.com and SitePoint.com. These forums may be very messy and you won’t find an easy way to list the best web hosts in a user friendly way. I would not use the information from forums as my primary decision to get a web host. Instead, I would use it as supplementary information to the independent user reviews.

Web Hosting Reviews from the Search Engines

Simply type the following in any search engine:

• Web hosting company + review / review
• Web hosting company + complaints

You’ll see a huge list of web hosting reviews that could be one or more of the types of review sites listed above. Try to ignore the ads on the right and top of the search engine result pages because those are just paid text ads. Sometimes, you might stumble on a review on someone’s blog, which can be an honest review or a dubious one. Take the reviews you find from the search engines as supplementary information to the independent user reviews as well. There is too much web hosting review junk out there.

Conclusion

Take your time to look for a web host that suits your needs. Read the terms and conditions BEFORE you sign up and try not to sign up for plans that require to pay more than 1 month up front because they may not refund you your money if you decide to quit before your contract period is up. Furthermore, try not to get your web domain from a web host as this may get a bit complicated. You need to find out who really owns the domain name and whether you may move the domain out of the web hosting company in the future.