Commercial website hosting- recommendations needed

[GhostyDog]

pugwash4x4 said:

great feedback- i guess what i should have said is that i don't just want a hosting company but i want a web architect and hosting Co who can provide the above- i have a web designer who has deisgned the layout and function of the website- now i need a company to make it all work properly.

In that case I can recommend Zen Internet's hosted solutions team. We use them at my current employer and they are very good at attention to detail be it for a small uncomplicated website or larger more technical sites with multiple points of dynamic data entry (like ours).

[inkyboy360]

pugwash4x4 said:

great feedback- i guess what i should have said is that i don't just want a hosting company but i want a web architect and hosting Co who can provide the above- i have a web designer who has deisgned the layout and function of the website- now i need a company to make it all work properly.

What technologies have you used for your site and do you know the volumes, like how many users, etc as it could be possible if you have an inhouse developer, to host it yourself if he has some infrasturcture knowledge and it will allow you to expand at your pace wihout the hassle of pricing plans and relying on someone else to support it, but it all depends on your requirments.

I mean if it's a 9-6 website then maybe your developer could look after it and you get more bang for buck.

Otherwise if it's a more brochureware site then use some like Jamies company or our partner Zen as someone esle mentioned where it just runs without user interbention and your more interested in a service level to keep the site up.

I am not biased about any company and whilst alot of people bang on about Register1 til it gets annoying, Jamie is advertising in here and should be able to talk about his company offerings I'd have thought, but hardly an open debate is it if we all just said Register1.

Anyway, maybe you should do what big companies do and decide what to do using your NFR's and FR's?

NFR = Non-Funcational Requirement
FR = Functional Requirment

Example - A company reporting solution

================================

An NFR could be: It must be available 9am-5.30pm 5 days a week.

An FR could be: It must display ceratin fields from the database.



The NFR's is how I would select a hosting company, not cos someone thinks they are good as all our requirments can be different.

[JamieBeeston]

inkyboy360 said:

I am not biased about any company and whilst alot of people bang on about Register1 til it gets annoying, Jamie is advertising in here and should be able to talk about his company offerings I'd have thought, but hardly an open debate is it if we all just said Register1.

Debate away, Register1 only accounts for about 15% of our total business, with the much larger MSP Parent company Serverstream being the heart of the business.

Having such a large parent company gives massive economies of scale for Register1 which in turn benefits all the customers..

I'm not the #1 and #2 Most recommended by PH'rs business on here by fluke.

We deal primarily with bluechips / plcs / large corporates, this gives us great scope and experience and an ability to constantly hit the ground running for clients.

We're based in Telstra, TCRB Sov and TCRB HeX with offices and staff onsite.
All three facilities are on Marsh Wall, E14.. and all of my support staff live in company provided premises on ... Marsh Wall E14, primarily for the stunning USP this offers the banks / fiscals in relation to DR issues.

We operate 4 different networks, over the three sites, we run our own MultiRouter Diversely located Tier1 BGP solution, with private Fibre links between our Datacentre sites.

After 7/7 alot of people were caught out with DR, whilst their systems had failed over without much fuss, their physical staff were just not able to get to the DR Datacentres due to closures of roads and transport infrastructure.. having staff on the same street mitigates this issue for them.

Don't be blinkered into thinking Register1 is the total extent of our offerings.. it's a great solution for alot of people sure.. but.. it's just the tip of the iceberg.

I'm very open about all aspects of both businesses (where NDA's permit!)

J

[inkyboy360]

JamieBeeston said:

inkyboy360 said:

I am not biased about any company and whilst alot of people bang on about Register1 til it gets annoying, Jamie is advertising in here and should be able to talk about his company offerings I'd have thought, but hardly an open debate is it if we all just said Register1.

Debate away, Register1 only accounts for about 15% of our total business, with the much larger MSP Parent company Serverstream being the heart of the business.

Having such a large parent company gives massive economies of scale for Register1 which in turn benefits all the customers..

I'm not the #1 and #2 Most recommended by PH'rs business on here by fluke.

We deal primarily with bluechips / plcs / large corporates, this gives us great scope and experience and an ability to constantly hit the ground running for clients.

We're based in Telstra, TCRB Sov and TCRB HeX with offices and staff onsite.
All three facilities are on Marsh Wall, E14.. and all of my support staff live in company provided premises on ... Marsh Wall E14, primarily for the stunning USP this offers the banks / fiscals in relation to DR issues.

We operate 4 different networks, over the three sites, we run our own MultiRouter Diversely located Tier1 BGP solution, with private Fibre links between our Datacentre sites.

After 7/7 alot of people were caught out with DR, whilst their systems had failed over without much fuss, their physical staff were just not able to get to the DR Datacentres due to closures of roads and transport infrastructure.. having staff on the same street mitigates this issue for them.

Don't be blinkered into thinking Register1 is the total extent of our offerings.. it's a great solution for alot of people sure.. but.. it's just the tip of the iceberg.

I'm very open about all aspects of both businesses (where NDA's permit!)

J

Jamie, thanks for sharing that with us, as it is clearly a large organisation you are part of but we are really only debating Register1 and the end user offerings talked about here.

It does sound all great but to the OP all that means buggerall, and I was more intersted in actually showing the OP that there is more to just hosting for a solution.

If your happy people recommend your company then I have no problem with that, it is nice to be recommended for good systems, however it does get tedious and detracts from the value in the text in the forum.

I do wonder why you bold the text out about staff though. I am not a one man band either and certainly don't have a parent company I own the whole company and have a very good client base, and deal with alot of household names, I mean my last company project was a 15million pound project for a high street bank, however we are growing rapidly, and I like the fact I have full control.

All the best,

cheers
Paul

[JamieBeeston]

inkyboy360 said:

I do wonder why you bold the text out about staff though. I am not a one man band either and certainly don't have a parent company I own the whole company and have a very good client base, and deal with alot of household names, I mean my last company project was a 15million pound project for a high street bank, however we are growing rapidly, and I like the fact I have full control.

All the best,

cheers
Paul

Paul, it was nothing against you, I've no idea on Ping, or the services you provide past what I've read on your website, it embolded the text simply as in this sector of the industry, it seems every other company is run by some 15 yr old from his mummies front room, but from the outside it's quite difficult to differentiate between a legitiamte real business and a pocket money operation, hence my clarification.

As you say, the OP was reccomended Register1 simply as he initially requested somewhere to host his website, and this is something Register1 would be able to provide (either directly or by passing the lead up to Serverstream).. it was only in a subsequent post that the OP clarifed that what he infact wanted was hosting and someone to provide SEO / integration works (which again is not mutually exclusive to hosting with Reg1)

People, when asked for reccomendations (as they were) will reccomend what they know, just because somone else has already mentioned a brand doesnt mean the next person should not post at all... I'm happy that so many people are willing to put their name to our brand and service, it means that the hard work, time and money I've invested in my company have been worthwhile.

As I said, I'll happily talk shop all day long, but I fear we're detracting from the OP's purpose in posting the thread now, so I'll leave it as this

Ping <sic> me a email if you want to carry on

J

[pugwash4x4]

thanks guys- i think .

I don't have the resources for an in-house developer- i have a designer and publisher who does all of my branding (from logos to avn designs) and web designing however he is by now means a web optimiser.

What i want initially is just to get the website up and running (without spending a huge amount of money) so that customers can find it easily. I will contact you off site about this James (i've come across your site before oddly enough) to try and get through some jargon so i can get the right thing! I can't say i really understand how web optimisation works and the implications of it- but my first need is jsut to get the site up and running.

Thanks for all your replies guys, if anybody has any more thoughts then i would be glad to hear them.

[GhostyDog]

pugwash4x4 said:

Thanks for all your replies guys, if anybody has any more thoughts then i would be glad to hear them.

Google have good webmaster tools that are easy to use for anybody, one of their criteria for high placement is how many other distinct sites link to you and how highly rated that site is. So your website grows in status by association, on google at the very least, dunno how yahoo do it but the website i set up for my old karate club was top of yahoo's ranking when searching for karate west yorkshire and I didn't do anything special with it *shrug*.