Free Web Hosting:
Too Good To Be True?

Free web hosting and discount web hosting have all helped create the very rapid growth of the Internet. To the inexperienced webmaster or business owner, free naturally seems better than discount, right? And both are better than full price.

This is only half right. Free things are always free for a reason, and that reason always benefits the giver in some way. For instance, free giveaways on Freecycle are a way for the giver to free up some space in the attic or closet. Free reports are used to encourage people to buy the full package. Even free music and other media is given away for some reason: because the person sharing expects you to reciprocate, to draw viewers for advertising, or to sell other books and music.

You should ask yourself: what's in it for the people offering me free web hosting? In most cases the answer is they can sell advertising on your page. Your page acts as free content for them, drawing visitors who may stick with your site, but who may also be lost to the advertisers piggybacking on your page.

In certain cases, free web hosting with this additional advertising is fine. If you're creating and publishing a personal blog, for instance, you may not care if someone else advertises on your space, especially if you have some control over the type of advertising content (often you do). Or if you're running a startup page of some sort, using a free host while you get things going may be okay, at least for some testing purposes.

For most purposes, however, you just don't need or want that extra piece on your page. For one thing, it takes up space on your page that could be better filled with something useful to you. It's also very unprofessional to run advertisements on business sites, so any business or startup nonprofit should avoid these. Look at them as an advertisement plastered on the front door of your office – not great for the image.

Even if you're just running a blog, advertising-paid free web hosting is not a great idea. These sorts of blogs are often viewed by the blogging community as basically spam, and viewers will leave in a hurry if they think they're getting spammed (again).

Even the free web hosting providers, without advertising, should be looked at askance. Why are they doing you a favor? Some may be gathering information about your visitors, and others hid an ownership clause in the agreement you signed, giving them control over your content. Servers cost money, and so do the people to run them. You'll log on one day to find your site gone, along with the server, and have to figure out on your own how to get your data and even your domain name back.

You don't have to go with a high-price web host to avoid these problems. Discount web hosting provides you with nearly-free space to store your information without the problems inherent in the free sites. Your very low payment is enough to keep the servers running, and you don't have to worry about your information disappearing or your viewers being mistreated. Best of all, your bank account doesn't shrink while you're figuring out how to profit on the online world.

Return to Discount Web Hosting Advisor from Free Web Hosting.