5 essential elements of an E-commerce Website
17 Aug 2009Essential Element 1: A reliable web hosting service/company/server
An ecommerce website lets you conduct your business online and five essential elements form its backbone. In this 5 part series we will discuss different options that you have while incorporating those elements on your website.
| Reliable web hosting: There are three ways in which you can host your website: 1. Do it yourself: Any computer can be converted into a server. All you have to do is connect to the internet, get a DNS hostname, a fixed IP address, configure your router and firewalls to accept HTTP requests and install web server software (e.g., Apache, Microsoft Internet Information Server etc.) Upside: You get to learn ins and outs of System and Network administration; you will be in control of the kind of software being used. Downside: Making your system a server is like opening a can of worms -installing and maintaining a web server might take a lot more than simple googling, tracking hacks or keeping up-to-date with latest security patches would burn eyes, performing data backups might get labyrinthine and tedious. We do not recommend hosting your own website (even if it’s a small home based business), the learning curve might be too high for anyone not deeply interested into IT. |
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2. Hire an Admin: You can hire a system administrator, exclusively for your website.
Our advice: Don’t do it! Do it if you can afford to pay someone a full-fledged salary, if you are planning to start a large social community like Facebook, or if you are getting someone to do it for free. 
But if you are using your website to sells products or services, then hiring an administration would be an overkill. The best way is to go to a Hosting company.
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3. Get a web hosting company to host your website: It’s always a safer to go to Web hosting companies as they are dedicated toward hosting. A typical Hosting company has server farms where many computers are connected to each other in clusters. This way, these companies are able to utilize the combined capability of several computers and thus, are able to host several companies.
A word of caution: Before committing to a web hosting company always check their credentials, read reviews, ask for reference websites, learn about what software they use and most importantly, read all the things written in the small print. In short, know your web hosting company well before you hand them your website. |
