How to Choose the Right Hosting and Setup for Your DTP Website

So, you are getting ready to set up your very own desktop publishing website. No doubt you are excited about the prospect of getting your name out there and growing your brand. Not to mention the prospect of putting up your best samples to show off for your friends and family.

If you want to get your site up the very first thing that you need to do is get a host. If you do not have a host no one will ever see your site. (Unless you email them the HTML files, but that would be strange.) So, your first step is to choose a host.

• Look for reliability. You want to find a host that will be tried and true, otherwise you may visit your site to find out that it is not there. Do not just take the word of the host. Check on your search engine of choice to find real user reviews before you make a decision. You may also want to pick a host with a guarantee of recovery in 24 hours from any outage.

• Cost of the host. If you are on a budget, which most of us are, then cost is a concern. No one wants to be taken advantage of, so you should price check against other hosting services.

• Size of your hosting package. Most static sites will not have hosting issues on size, but if you plan on having any flash demos or a high number of PDF demos then you may want to consider sizing it out before you choose a hosting package.

Setup with hosting is usually easy enough. The most important thing is that your domain name is included in the package. It is not that registration is very expensive, but getting your domain settled on your host can delay you by a few days. Also, you should find out if you will have to transfer the files manually or if you will get to use an FTP service.

If you do not have the needed skills, and you do not want to use a template then you are going to have to hire a developer. This can be an expensive process. Always get competitive quotes if you need to hire a developer.