I thought it might be helpful to discuss technical considerations when deploying multimedia websites. In this post I will focus on hosting options for your site and next week I will discuss email marketing options to promote the site once you have it up and running. If there are other technical questions that you would like me to cover, please leave a comment below and I’ll be more than happy to tackle them in the near future!
GoDaddy.com
I have religiously used GoDaddy in the past for all of my hosting and domain support. Even though their website seems overly confusing, their technical support is exceptional. Both times when II crashed in the past numerous technicians worked with me over the phone for hours to get the site back up and running. In addition to basic hosting packages, they also offer options specifically for particular CMS’s, such as the WordPress version that I use for this site.
Hosting.com
A recent client of mine was already set up with Hosting.com, so I moved them from a Windows server to a Linux one when I redesigned their site using WordPress (I try to use a CMS for all of my sites nowadays to simplify future updates to site content!). This company was extremely easy to work with, and they set me up with a temporary domain to build out the new site so that there was no down time during the transition. I did notice that their hosting was pricier than the one I use with GoDaddy, but there are so many bells and whistles to each plan that you will need to research all of your options to figure out what price point fits your needs.
WebHostGear.com
I have also heard good things about Coldfusion hosting through WebHostGear, particularly for scalable projects. Since I have not personally used it, here is a short description from their site:
“If you are planning a database driven website where scalability is a requirement, Coldfusion hosting is an option well worth considering. Coldfusion is a “rapid application development platform”, meaning it is used for quickly building web-based applications. Although Coldfusion is a dynamic scripting language, it is similar in syntax to HTML. Since Coldfusion was originally developed to access database information and for use as a web development language, it natively performs complex business logic with a minimum amount of code. These factors make the Coldfusion language much easier for most developers to learn than its counterparts, PHP and ASP.”
As I mentioned above, if you are going to use a CMS like WordPress, you can’t use a windows web hosting solution. However, if you are building out a static site, such as my multimedia project “Honduras and the Hidden Hunger,” you can look into a Windows server, which is normally more affordable than the Linux and Coldfusion options mentioned above.
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