1. Highly Reliable – In all my years with HostGator, I never really had any down or “lag” time using with the websites I use it with. It’s cool because it’s services oh ‘round one million websites to date. To top it all off, it’s got a 99.9% uptime guarantee.

That’s right, peeps. If you’re not satisfied, you have a 45-day money back guarantee. Not bad, but I doubt you’d want your money back after experiencing the World Wide Web’s hosting version of the “ark reactor” (sorry, Iron Man reference).

2. Awesome customer support – While it’s really easy to set up your account with HostGator (all you need is your domain name, some virtual cash and an email address – it usually walks you through the process), if you’re not the savviest of Internet businessmen, there’s always someone out there to help. HostGator doesn’t hold back in getting its customers in the right track in terms of technical and billing support. They offer the following options:

Phone
Email
Chat

Forums (They offer how-to guides and tons of tutorials too, EPIC WIN!)

All of these work 24/7 – from there you can tell that HostGator takes their business seriously. So if you’re not too tech savvy and you feel you’ll need a hand, don’t worry – HostGator’s got your back.

3. Scalable – If you’re thinking that something that’s relatively low-cost won’t really bring any good value for your website, well, think again. You see, HostGator caters to every aspect of the Internet, from start-up Internet businesses to large-scale Internet empires.

What this means is that you can start small with $4 per month and upgrade to higher and stronger plans as your Internet business continues to grow. All these, without the hassles of transferring to different providers, mean that you should get HostGator NOW.

4. Unlimited Bandwidth and Disk Space – A common problem for website or product launches is the sudden downtime that comes along with a surge of great traffic. When this happens, the good news is that the buzz you created for the website or product worked and you’re getting that much traffic – the bad news is that you don’t get to convert that much traffic.

With HostGator, you won’t have to worry about sudden downtimes. It guarantees that your site would still be accessible despite tsunami-sized surges of traffic. That essentially means that you don’t have to worry losing tons of potential customers. It also leaves a good taste in visitors’ mouths that says “these people mean business”.

5. Earth Friendly – Believe it or not, HostGator’s servers and cooling systems service 4,000,000 websites with nothing but the wind. That’s right, peeps – all their web-related gadgets are wind-powered. It’s hard to believe, but it’s a fact.
What does this mean for our environment?

Well, within a year we achieve the following:

• Remove 444 cars from the road
• Power 321 homes with clean energy
• Save ‘round 5654 barrels of oil
• Protect 551 acres of forest

That’s a relatively huge difference that a webhost service is making for Mother Earth right there. And if you want to make a difference too, then take up your green flag and go for HostGator.

That’s about it for my review of HostGator, peeps. If you’re not that convinced yet, here’s a little link you can click on to find out more about it. See for yourself.

The post [Highly Recommended] Hostgator is my favorite webhost appeared first on Ben Francia.

For some people who don’t want to spend time studying web development basics or go all OC on a specific web project, outsourcing is a definite must. Besides the fact that they want to focus on more pressing matters like how to manage their business other than working on a website, it’s also pretty low cost – I mean, really. While most experienced in-house web developers can charge you a hundred or more bucks for a web project, outsourcing it overseas can actually save you more than half.

Questions and Answers

Hey, you suddenly opened a can of whoop-ass on your inhibitions and decide to start your own business and put it online. You have decided what industry you want to rank and excel in and you’re pretty certain about the keywords you’ll use. You also decide on getting a few partners in on the project and start hiring people to help in-house.

By then, you’ll probably be asking a few people for website development and if they knew anyone who can make a real mean online machine, erm, website. You suddenly consider outsourcing overseas. A few questions pop into your head.

Can I really trust someone with my online presence?

Will this be for the long term or just the website?

Shouldn’t getting someone who doesn’t naturally speak my language screw up my website?

We’ve all heard about people losing money overseas and how the Internet is filled with scammers. But hey, stuff like that happen and it’s not inherent to overseas outsourcing services. In fact, when you find a trustworthy contractor, you’ll be assured that he’ll do whatever you say – this is because most contractors depend on you for supporting their respective businesses and families. He’ll keep his best foot forward and you’ll be assured of quality services in the long term.

As for the screwing up the website’s content, well, that’s where the challenge lies. It’s not that it’s hard to find a competent writer. The Philippines, being the only country in Asia that speaks the English language well, has loads of excellent Filipino writers. It’s communicating your marketing language that’s the hard part.

The key here is to properly introduce yourself to your contractor and get him to understand what you want to happen. Send him your mind map or your business plan and maybe some samples of copies and videos that you make. Most of all, make him feel that he’s a part of your team and that your success is his too – this creates a common ground with which you can both work with regardless how far you both are from each other.

Exercise Caution

In any case, since getting scammed is the biggest fear for most online entrepreneurs, I guess the best advice I can give you is to play it safe. How? Ask people you know about outsourcing services they trust. It gives you a sense of security and someone to blame when sh*t hits the fan. LOL

Let me know what you think in the comments section below.

The post Why Outsource Web Development appeared first on Ben Francia.