Why I Chose BlueHost

Choosing a good web host provider can be a difficult decision for many. After all, there are thousands of choices on the market, some offering a variety of services, including shared hosting, VPS (Virtual Private Server), or dedicated hosting. Each has a different purpose, and will serve you differently. A majority of blogs that are run by a single person and don’t have a huge amount of traffic, including this blog, are using shared hosting.

Now, before you start saying that most web hosting companies oversell when it comes to shared hosting, you need to look at the facts. I won’t say that most don’t, because they do oversell, meaning that they place thousands of sites on each server – one site with extremely high load (thousands of visitors per hour) could bring the entire server down as well as all the sites on it for hours on end. In the end, you don’t want to be in this situation, as your site will be unavailable for access by the people who are supposed to be your daily readers.

In the search for the perfect web host for this blog, I settled on Bluehost – a company that I had first seen even before starting with blogging, a company that I had heard raves about in terms of service and reliability – especially for its price.

After more than a year of using Bluehost to host this blog, I can still honestly say that they are one of the best hosting providers around. Read more to find out the services and features, plans, and other details, which set Bluehost apart from the rest of the “value” hosting companies.

Pricing

When you sign up for a new account, you will be charged through either Credit Card or PayPal. It is quite easy to sign up.

— 3 Month Price: $9.95 per month + $30 Setup Fee and $10 Domain Fee

— 6 Month Price: $9.95 per month+ $30 Setup Fee  and $10 Domain Fee

— 12 Month Price: $7.95 per month – No Setup or Domain Fees

— 24 Month Price: $6.95 per month – No Setup or Domain Fees – BEST VALUE

— 36 Month Price: $6.95 per month – No Setup or Domain Fees

You cannot pay the 3- or 6-month plans through PayPal (credit card only).

The Different Types of Web Hosting

A majority of all web hosting is based on three different account types and, depending on your needs and the amount of money you want to invest in the hosting, each serves a different purpose.

Let’s explore the options that you have and see which account is ideal for your needs.

• Shared Web Hosting - The most common type of web hosting, as it is one of the most affordable. Essentially, you get a share of a storage, meaning that there may be upwards of a thousand other sites hosted on the same server. In respect to larger sites, you are getting a fraction of the speed and bandwidth (the speed distributed when thousands of people are trying to access your site at once). However, it is also ideal for people who don’t plan to upscale their site that much in the near future and don’t require the advanced configurability that other plans offer.
  • Price is generally less than $20 per month and many small businesses with moderate levels of traffic use this type.
• VPS Hosting - In-between shared and dedicated hosting, a single physical server is partitioned into multiple virtual private servers, with each VPS account getting a dedicated amount of CPU and memory resources. Less accounts are placed on each server (typically a fraction of what shared host providers utilize per server), meaning that you’ll be able to do more with your account. Each virtual server is able to run its own full-fledged operating system, and each server can be independently rebooted. However, not all hosting companies are able to provide VPS servers, as they are generally reserved (commonly) for development and sandbox/testing use – much like virtual machines used on your personal computer to run multiple operating systems.
  • Within this type of hosting, you can also have Managed Hosting – tools are provided to monitor and control the virtual machine; Unmanaged Hosting – only minimal services are provided, such as a SSH console and reboot, typically less expensive than managed; Unmetered Hosting – similar to unmanaged hosting, but a fixed bitrate is offered, so it is not possible to exceed a monthly budget.
  • Costs range from $60 to $100 or higher per month, ideal for small and medium businesses who need special server configuration and secure options for hosting an e-commerce store.
• Dedicated Hosting - Dedicated hosting is used to run some of the world’s largest sites (although they may have multiple dedicated servers). You have full control over what you do with the server, unless there are restrictions set upon the server by the web host company (essentially, you are renting the server). You have full control over the following: choice of operating system, hardware, and are often located in data centers, providing redundant power sources and cooling systems. There are some limitations with dedicated hosting, including the fact that you need to manage everything about the server, including the back-end software used to power your site(s).
  • Price is generally high compared to other server types, starting at about $150 per month, upwards of that with additional features, storage, and RAM (overall speed). Ideally, you shouldn’t purchase this type of hosting unless you really need the features and you receive upwards of 10,000 visitors a day and/or have a large supply of media – videos or photos hosted on your site. Companies that outgrow VPS hosting will need this type of hosting.
• Other Types - In addition to the three main types of hosting listed above, there are a few additional types of hosting that you need to be aware of as alternatives.
  • Free Hosting - Nothing in life is free. Therefore, free hosting isn’t free either. You have extreme limitations as to what you can upload to your site, how many people can visit your site each month, and you may see downtimes in excess of many shared hosting services – tens of thousands of sites are possibly hosted on each server. In addition, you may not be able to generate much income from these services, as you aren’t able to place your own ads on the site, so they are only ideal for people who don’t need features, reliability, or any guarantees.
  • Clustered Hosting - Servers using technology designed to eliminate problems inherent with typical shared hosting infrastructures. This allows the server to balance and allocate necessary resources to the websites that require it. Multiple servers may be attached to extend the reach of each physical server, in a virtual manner. Security is implemented into the clustered hosting platform, including firewall and proxy technology. However, not all hosting providers utilize this technology. Plans are generally between that of regular shared hosting and VPS, $10 to $30 or more per month.
  • Reseller Hosting - A web hosting type in which the account owner has the ability to use his or her allocated drive space and bandwidth to host websites on behalf of third parties. You may not even be aware that you have purchased from a reseller, as it is almost seamless between what you would receive from the main provider, who provides the reseller the servers to resell, for profit.

Main Features to Look For

Depending on your unique requirements from your web host provider, you will have to make a choice of what is most important. In other words, not all web host providers, if any, will be able to satisfy you if you have needs that are extremely unique, unless you configure the servers yourself. Don’t think that you can only pay for what you use, as many companies only have a few select plans, in order to reduce costs and confusion.

• Storage Space - Each web host solution can only provide so much before exhausting their servers, causing you and your visitors to receive a less-than-desirable situation. Most websites won’t need more than a gigabyte (1,000 MB) of storage over the lifespan of the site, but let’s assume that you attach the equivalent of 200 KB of files (depending on size, this is between less than one to four images) per blog post. To reach 1 GB of files, it will take roughly fourteen years before you even reach this limitation.

However, many blogs do insert files much larger than that (as in the case of this post), and by the time you add in server-side backups, installation files for your blog system, email, other forms of media – videos, for example, which average between 50 MB and 1+ GB apiece, you will run out of storage quite quickly if you are limited to just 1 GB. Therefore, you need to calculate how many files you plan to upload and the size that you want to make your blog/website.

• Data Transfer Limitations - Quite possibly more important than the number of files that you upload, the data transfer (bandwidth) that you have to utilize on your server will limit the number of people who can visit your blog/website each month. Let’s assume that you have one gigabyte of files, as in the case above. If you receive a hundred visitors each day and each visits/views each file on your server, that means you are transferring in excess of 100 GB each day, quite a hefty amount. You need to choose a web host provider that is able to keep up with this demand. If it can’t, your visitors will experience downtime when multiple people are trying to access the large files, resulting in a decline in traffic and/or visitors over time.

In the end, data transfer limits will force you to upload smaller-sized images and graphics, meaning that visitors won’t see the true quality that you are able to produce.

Many hosting providers are able to easily provide the bandwidth required to serve all your visitors each month. However, as your site becomes larger, it may become an issue where speed goes down as traffic goes up.

• Features and Scripts - When you look at web host provider, make sure that they use a cPanel Control Panel to manage your back-end or similar solution. This will allow you to easily see the status of your website(s), install scripts through the automatic script installers, such as Fantastico/SimpleScripts, and manage the files, services, or create backups of all files on your server. If your host doesn’t provide many features, that means that you will have to utilize third-party scripts or install them yourself on your server, causing extra hassle that would be overcome if you chose the leading option.

Bluehost control Panel Screenshot 

You can also find this page here.

In the case of Bluehost, they provide multiple features within the Control Panel, some of the most advanced out of any shared hosting provider. However, I’ll provide more information on that later on.

• Domain Name - Do you really want your own domain name? There are some fairly popular blogs and websites that are still using developer-hosted blog services, including Blogger, WordPress.com, and so on. They are typically content using a domain.wordpress.com address, although this may not be the best solution if you want to scale up your blog.

Bluehost Domain Manager/Interface

Look at it this way. Would you rather type in a 20+ letter address or one less than ten letters? Obviously, you want the shortest domain possible. Some hosting providers even throw in a free domain, meaning that you’ll only be responsible for paying the actual hosting costs, rather than the hosting costs plus that of a domain (ranging from $5 to $20 per year). Keep in mind that search engines favor domains that are hosted on their own server, rather than on another site.

• Reliability and Uptime - Be sure that when you chose a host provider that they have some type of guarantee associated with each plan/account. Otherwise, you’ll be out of luck when your sites are down for hours on end and you lose potential sales/customers. Most web hosting services offer an uptime of 99.9% – what does this mean in terms of how much time your site can be down each month? We’ll use a month with 30 days as an example. 99% uptime is roughly 7.2 hours of downtime each month (about fourteen minutes per day); 99.9% uptime is roughly 43 minutes of downtime each month, and 99.99% uptime is extremely low, at less than five minutes.

Be sure to look at reviews of the service before you finally settle on any single provider. While a company can excel in customer service, if they are unable to deliver in terms of reliability and dependability, you should move onto a better solution – one that can provide what it is supposed to.

• Support - Even if you don’t think you will ever need to contact the web hosting company, it is a good idea to make sure that you have a service that doesn’t outsource its support team. If they do, you will be talking to someone whose English isn’t their native tongue, and they will have little idea how to configure servers or how web hosting works. Rather, you want a host that is able to deliver twenty-four hour service and support with multiple options.

In the case of Bluehost, they offer the following ways to contact them:

- Technical Support can be had through their main, toll-free telephone line. Other than Billing and Affiliates, you are able to call them 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Billing is available Monday through Friday 7 AM to 9 PM (MST), Saturday 8 AM to 8 PM, and is closed Sundays.

- Sales, Billing, and Affiliates/Business have separate telephone numbers, meaning that your inquiries will be answered quickly and promptly by support that is located in your country (there is a separate telephone number for each department for users outside of the United States).

- The Help Desk can assist you with minor problems and questions that don’t necessarily need to be solved as quickly (within 12-24 hours, generally). It is for general questions and for people who may have a general question, unrelated to their server/plan.

- Chat will allow you to quickly have problems solved. They have a dedicated support team waiting to answer questions or problems that you may be having.

- Within the Forum, you will find information, such as past support tickets and other problems that users have been encountering. They also have forum moderators who will assist you in answering any questions that you may have.

Features

These features can also be found here.

Features Included for All Accounts

• Disk Storage - Unlimited (New)
• Host Unlimited Domains
• Free Drag-and-Drop Site Builder - New
• Free Domain Name
• Support for International Domain Names
• POP3/Secure POP3 Email Support - 2,500 Addresses
• IMAP/Secure IMAP Email Support - 2,500 Addresses
• 3 Different Web-Based Email Solutions
• Forwarding Email Accounts - Unlimited
• Email Auto-responder - Unlimited
• Gigabytes of Site Transfer (bandwidth) - Unlimited (New)
• Add-on Domains - Unlimited
• Parked Domains – Unlimited
• Sub-domains - Unlimited
• Additional FTP Accounts - 1,000
• MySQL Databases - 100
• PostgreSQL Databases - 100
• CGI-BIN
• CGI Library
• Sever Side Includes
• Frontpage 2000/2002 Extensions
• Account “Control Panel”
• FTP Access
• Shell Access (SSH)
• Override .htaccess Support
• Anonymous FTP
• Log Files and Site Stats
• Customizable Error Pages
• Web File Manager
• Custom Cronjobs
• Hotlink Protection
• Fantastico and SimpleScripts Script Support
• Spam Assassin Protection
• Free Privacy for Domain Information

CGI/Databases

• PHP 5
• Perl 5
• Python
• Ruby/Ruby on Rails
• Support for Custom PHP.INI Files
• MySQL 5 Database Sever
• PostgreSQL Database Server
• Javascript/DHTML
• Flash/Shockwave

Free Website Plugin Scripts

• Message Forum (PHPBB and More)
• Form-mail Scripts
• Guestbook (Multiple Options)
• PHP Nuke/Post Nuke
• Weblogs (WordPress and b2evolution)
• Mailing Lists
• Image Galleries/Coppermine (More!)
• Poll and Survey Software
• Moodle
• Tikiwiki
• Mambo and Joomla
• phpForm Generator
• Help Center/Support Ticket
• Plus many more…

E-Commerce Features

• SSL Secure Server
• OS Commerce Shopping Cart
• Agora Shopping Cart
• Cube Cart Shopping Cart
• Zen Cart Shopping Cart
• Free Generated Certificate
• Password Protected Directories
• OpenPGP/GPG Encryption

Multimedia Features

• Supports Streaming Video and Audio
• Real Audio and Video Support
• Flash Support
• Macromedia Shockwave Support
• MIDI File Support
• Add Own MIME Types

World-Class Technology

• Quad Processor Performance Servers
• UPS Power Backup
• Diesel Generator Backup Power
• Linux Operating System
• Customized Apache Web Servers
• 24/7 Network Monitoring
• Courtesy Site Backups
• OC-48 Backbone Connection

Site Promotion

• Search Engine Submission – Free
• Free Yahoo and Google Credits
• Discount Coupons for other Webmaster Tools

Compared to the Competition

Several of the “Top 10″ web hosting providers have similar features to Bluehost, but they are the only company that can truly provide an all-around better service with more features. While the page they have on their website may be a bit biased – after all, they are trying to sell you a service, it gives you a good idea of what they offer that their competition doesn’t.

Click Image for Larger View – Found Here

The following can be found on the page, as well additional details.

• Script Security – The user:group permissions running for an individual script tell us just how secure your server really is. Ideally, you want your server to use user-based permissions to keep hacking attempts to a minimum.
• Environment – The server environment is key to having an efficient and smooth running website. Security is also key here, as many operating systems are sluggish and/or allow for insecure operations and hacking attempts.
• SSH Access – SSH (Secure Shell) is a command-line level of access to the server. Its uses stretch past the standard control panel, and allow a special level of access to databases, Python interpreters, and much much more. This extra level of access makes many hosts skittish, and most won’t take the extra precautions necessary to offer the service.
• Memory – As with processing power, a server’s memory is critical to the performance of your website. The lower the memory, the less the sever can handle.
• Dedicated IP- Dedicated IPs have several benefits. Most notably, many search engines base a large portion of their page ranking on how many websites are on one IP address. Additionally, outbound connections are made possible for such uses as remote databases, payment processing, and many others. Dedicated IPs are also necessary for the installation of a Private SSL certificate for e-commerce use.
• Extras – Extras entail pre-made pre-made scripts that professional programmers have made available free of charge, so that you can have  good looking, functional website with the click of a button. Unfortunately, not all hosts are well-equipped. so if you don’t know exactly what you want yet, or how to program it, you’ll want a host that can offer these extras.
• Control Panel – Your control panel is like your car dashboard. You have control, you get feedback, or you get isolated. The control panel you use should be capable of handling whatever you throw at it, and it is important that you take it out for a test drive before you buy.
• Add-on Domains – Add-on domains offer the ability to host more than one domain name on your hosting account. These could be family websites, aliases of your main domain, or completely separate business entities. The ability to house these additional domains can maximize the cost effectiveness of your web experience.
• Backup Restore – Your data is the one thing that’s specific to you on the Internet. Its value can be incalculable, and losing any portion of it can be catastrophic. However, most web hosts will actually charge you to restore your own data, whether or not it’s your fault the data was lost in the first place. Bluehost views it as ridiculous to charge this extra cost.
• Registrar – When you purchase hosting, you must also pay a yearly fee to hold onto your domain name. You should have the ability to modify and control it as you please. Every web host has a registrar, but not all registrars have been created equal. Many do not give you the control or access you need to do want with your site.
• MySQL – Databases are at the core of any interactive website. They contain certain product catalogs, blog entires, customer information, and more. The more you have available, the more you can do.
• Sub-domains – Sub-domains are extensions of your domain. Without sub-domains, many sites would not be able to operate using the unique feel that they have, so mail.google.com and other domains wouldn’t exist.
• Email Add-ons – Some control panels do not give you the ability to create or use email accounts on your additional domains. This severely limits use of your domains for any useful purpose, such as business transactions.
• SSL Certificates – Private SSL Certificates are extremely important for anyone considering running an online store or some type of data exchange. Without one, your customers would not even consider purchasing your goods and services, as all credit card and private information they submit would be plainly visible to everyone. Most certificates are equal in value, but most hosts will play on your insecurity to gain a little extra cash.

Other Metrics:

The following graphs and information can be found on the DomainTools Hosting Reviews page.

Peak Uptime - The peak uptime is measured every thirty seconds by their monitoring stations, checking if a simple web page can be loaded from an account established with the provider. Higher is better.

Current Bluehost uptime is 99.955%, 2.2% higher than other hosting companies. Dots in the graph represent the Bluehost average, the solid gray line is the average of all providers, and the solid gray/shared area is the worst providers.

Uptime - This statistic is measured every thirty seconds by their monitoring stations, checking if a simple web page can be loaded from an account established with the provider. Again, higher is better.

Current Bluehost uptime is 99.959% (overall), while others are 97.729%, or 2.3% worse than that of Bluehost. Gray shaded ares represent the worst providers, Bluehost is represented by the dots, and the average host is the solid gray line.

Web Speed Index - Measured every thirty seconds by averaging the speed at which their monitoring stations can download web pages and images from an account established with the provider. Higher is better.

Currently, Bluehost has a rank of 109.7 (8.2% higher than previously), but 9.2% slower than other hosts. Gray shaded areas are the best providers at the top/worst at bottom, Bluehost is represented with dots, and the solid gray line is the average hosting provider. Therefore, Bluehost is somewhat slower than other shared hosting accounts, but not nearly the slowest.

The “Unlimited” Theory

Whenever there is a product that is “unlimited,” it means that they are pulling all their resources together to claim that they can provide something that they are truly unable to do. Very few people will ever reach the “unlimited” factor, so they are in a win-win situation – their customers are the ones out of luck. By the time you start approaching their limitations, they will warn you and tell you that you need to upgrade your account or move to another web host. Bluehost is (likely) no different. However, there is a difference with Bluehost’s unlimited, one-size-fits-all plan from other web host providers.

In reality, unlimited is simply a gimmick, a marketing ploy to trap new customers into purchasing the unlimited plan compared to one that offers one hundred gigabytes of storage and 500 gigabytes of bandwidth each month. Think about it. You have to analyze the true cost of it. Each hard drive that makes up the servers costs the company upwards of $100 apiece, even if they are only a few hundred gigabytes (and this is where the overselling begins to take place). The average customer pays $100/year for hosting, meaning that by the time you add in all the extra costs, from paying the employees to keeping the data center maintained (energy, taxes, maintenance, etc.) you are looking at a loss for each plan. The only way they truly make money is if you continue hosting with them, year-after-year, which quite a few people do.

At some point in time, they will have to charge you or have a rate increase. Even renewable resources are, at some point, not renewable when you can’t keep the supply going strong.

The one bit of advice – ask other users of the service before purchasing, as to what the cutoff is, and what the reliability is when the storage space is utilized properly, Be sure that you read the terms and conditions, asking support when the unlimited factor isn’t so unlimited.

To finalize this topic, as long as you don’t have the needs or requirements of unlimited hosting, these plans are OK, otherwise you should stick with a provider that doesn’t claim that they are able to deliver unlimited bandwidth. The truth of the matter is, hardware and resources aren’t able to provide unlimited storage/bandwidth, unless you have a budget to create a server farm (and you probably don’t).

Overview

In general, I’d have to say that there isn’t any other web host provider that can offer a combination of service, reliability, support, and features with a price as low as $6.95 per month. In one word, it’s unbeatable. Sign up for Bluehost now to take advantage of the free domain special and all the other features.

Over the past, I have encountered very few problems (most of which could be solved within a few minutes with the dedicated support team) and were mostly my fault – not on their side. Uptime hasn’t been a major problem. There have been outages, but most were resolved within a few minutes (averaging in the 99.9% uptime range for every month that they have been hosting this site.

If you are serious about which web hosting service you use, don’t hesitate to join Bluehost and start your first blog or e-commerce store today.

Additional Links

Use the links below to quickly find out about the service or to answer any questions that may have arisen through reading this review.

• BlueHost.com Terms of Service
• About the Company
• Help Desk/Help Center
• CEO’s Blog
• BlueHost Forums
• User Reviews/Testimonials
• Sign Up and Domain Check
• Products/Features

Note: This page was last updated on December 23, 2008. We cannot be held responsible for errors made on this pos or your experience. Information should only be used as a reference guide.