Early this year – we posted a brief Customer Care Announcement on Facebook to help start-up and small businesses avoid falling into a locked in situation that they can find themselves in due to lack of knowledge with regards to their web hosting solution and their domain names.

This blog post is a continuation and explores this potentially overlooked situation that can easily be avoided, but can cost you a lot of time and money if ignored.

We then provide a simple guide that each business owner needs to be aware of and put into practice when considering to take the initial step into online marketing or if they already have a website live on the world wide web.

web hosting Liverpool

As the year began – we noticed a rise in the amount of business owners that were struggling with their website. They had been let down and wanted to change their web hosting in an attempt to move away from their current support provider, but didn’t have the information or more importantly – the support to achieve this.

Luckily – many of these unsatisfied and poorly treated customers found us and now receive a more stable and understandable service and web hosting solution.

But for many – that same support just doesn’t happen. Or not until it’s too late and problems have been experienced.

The Problem:

Business owners with limited knowledge/experience of technology or web based solutions begin their online journey. In most cases they allow their web development team/support to take care of everything for them. They believe that their chosen provider will be honest, strait forward and will explain any potential problems that may arise.

If they have found a genuine provider – then the above is true, but like many industries – some providers just don’t have your best interests in mind.

You get a domain name (often FREE). Do you have access to it?

You’re provided with website hosting. Do you know how to access it to make changes?

If your current support team have all the information you require above to make changes or move your website at any time and you don’t – you are instantly at a disadvantage and in a position that can put your business through a lengthy and costly learning process if things were to go wrong.

Providers are known to go quiet for long periods of time or want to charge additional fees to get your website data back. Some businesses pay double hosting fee’s whilst trying to get their domain name transferred from one provider to another and in worst cases they have even lost their domain name all together, because they were unaware of what was required from day one.

So as a business owner – what do you need to know to protect/safeguard yourself?

• It is highly recommended that you purchase your own domain name directly from a well    known registrar like www.123-Reg.com.

If you already have a domain that is locked into your hosting account – then you will need to search your hosting provider name and how to transfer the domain away and keep on file.

• Make sure you always have admin login details (Username & Password) for your domain and your CPanel were you make important changes and have access to your website files.

• Access your CPanel administration area on a weekly basis and take a full backup of your website (i.e. Each Friday).

If you follow these simple rules – you can turn a negative situation into a more positive one. You will be in full control of your website & can change hosting provider in a few hours in the event of customer dissatisfaction, without having to ask anybody for permission.

DigitalConfig Team