Website host advice

newmee

Hi all,

Does anyone have any knowledge, advice or recommendations for choosing a host for a new website for our Community Interest Company. We do not need paypal / purchasing options, so that not a consideration. Just need a professional looking site where people can get information, contact us online and complete or download information and application forms. a bonus would be to link to our blog which is already up and running (with Blogger)

newmee

anybody? Bump

InsideInsurance

Sounds like you are asking about web design/ development or about content management systems.

The hosting is just a box and network that your site sits on. Most hosts will have one click installation of things like Wordpress, Joomla, DNN and other CMSs so, assuming you arent wanting to use a professional designer, it is really a case first of deciding which CMS you want to be using. I'd suggest looking at Wordpress first as it is one of the most straighforward to use.

newmee

Thank you. I will look at wordpress. it's all very confusing! I will look at what ipage use as their CMS as they seem to be a recommended host.

newmee

By the way what is a CMS ? :rotfl:

steve1980

Content Management System.

InsideInsurance

newmee wrote: »

Thank you. I will look at wordpress. it's all very confusing! I will look at what ipage use as their CMS as they seem to be a recommended host.

One of the reasons why professionals in this space can charge a reasonable fee for their expert knowledge.

As I say a host is just an infrastructure provider. When you talk about a good host you are talking about a reliable service, good up time of the hardware, uncongested networks, strong backups, DR etc.

What you are talking about is the software side in terms of the online application (or content management system) that you use to generate the site. In 99% of cases these are created by companies other than the webhost and if you go to the host with a piece of software in 80% of cases they will be able to provide a box for you that will run your site.

Given it is the CMS that you have to operate and generates what your customers see it is the primary thing to sort out. Once you know what you are using there you can then look for webhosts that support that software.

If it is something generic like Wordpress then 99.99% of hosts will. If it is something more off the wall then you may find a lot less options out there but it is still right to bend the hardware to the software and not the other way round.

newmee

fantastic advice many thanks InsideInsurance.

digp

try tsohost.co.uk or medialayer.com