Web Hosting Geeks' Blog » website traffic http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog Web Hosting Industry News, Latest Trends, and Analyses. Thu, 24 May 2012 11:11:11 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.2 When is it Time to Graduate to a Dedicated Server?http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/when-is-it-time-to-graduate-to-a-dedicated-server/ http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/when-is-it-time-to-graduate-to-a-dedicated-server/#comments Thu, 12 Aug 2010 16:55:45 +0000 Art http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/?p=1055 Most people start out online with a basic shared hosting plan that lets them build a small website and become acquainted with the web hosting world. However, it is not often that someone remains content with this kind of hosting setup, especially when operating an online business. Sooner or later, the urge and need to upgrade will be unavoidable, and at this point the webmaster begins considering more robust hosting plans such as VPS and Dedicated hosting plans. The problem is, it is not always clear when the best time to upgrade is. In fact, in many cases you can get by with a basic hosting plan for years. However, “getting by” is simply not enough if you are trying to strive, and slow-loading pages or site downtime is just one of the many hurdles you’ll encounter if your site is running on inadequate server resources. So how do you know when it is time to upgrade?

How Many Daily Visitors Does Your Site Get?

If your site is receiving more than a few hundred visitors on a daily basis, then you may want to consider upgrading from a basic hosting plan. This is especially true if you host a lot of multimedia content. If there are many people browsing your site and watching videos at the same time, the bandwidth will quickly dwindle and the browsing experience will become less enjoyable for your visitors. In many cases your site could lag to a complete standstill, causing your visitors to leave your site altogether. Upgrading to a dedicated server will give you the resources needed to accommodate thousands of site visitors on a daily basis.

How Many Sites Do You Have?

If you have more than five sites that receive a decent amount of traffic on daily basis, then it may be time to upgrade. Likewise, if you have one large website that is receiving a lot of traffic you will still need more server resources. Keeping all of your sites on a shared hosting plan is not wise when you consider the limitations of your current hosting setup. With a dedicated server you can host up to 50 high traffic sites without any problems in most cases, especially if you are renting a powerful server.

How are Your Sites Performing?

Ultimately the true test is the actual performance of the websites you own. If you are still able surf the sites without any slow loading pages, and you aren’t experiencing any down time, then it may be okay to stick with the plan you have. However if your sites are down more than once a week and it takes longer than 10 seconds for a page to load on a broadband connection, then you should definitely consider upgrading. A site’s performance will greatly affect it’s bounce rate and how many repeat visitors/page views per visit are received. Shared hosting can only take you so far before an upgrade is absolutely necessary.

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]]> http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/when-is-it-time-to-graduate-to-a-dedicated-server/feed/ 1 How to Maintain High Traffic Websiteshttp://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/how-to-maintain-high-traffic-websites/ http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/how-to-maintain-high-traffic-websites/#comments Mon, 02 Aug 2010 18:15:19 +0000 Art http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/?p=1020 Websites are growing massive in size and consuming an abundance of resources. With the additions of images, videos, a multitude of links and content, they are bringing in more traffic than ever before. As more guests visit, it becomes difficult to continually maintain the site. This includes approving or rejecting user comments, general maintenance and updates, and creating new content to keep the user interested.

In many cases the organizations that run these massive sites are focused primarily on the applications or constantly improving the website. While these ideas are important, the infrastructure plays a major role and should be part of the maintenance equation.

Some of the most important topics to remember when maintaining a high traffic website include:

  • Infrastructure focus
  • Consistent monitoring
  • Discovering how your guests feel
  • Managing unexpected traffic spikes

Focusing on these areas will help maintain high traffic websites. Concentrating on infrastructure will ensure the website is running smoothly. This includes regular updates and scheduled maintenance. It also ties in closely with consistent monitoring. By observing various events that are occurring on your website, you will constantly be abreast to the happenings. At some point you should be able to prevent disasters before they occur through preventative measures.

While focused on infrastructure and monitoring, it’s also important to take a general interest in your visitors. While it’s difficult to cater to all of them, try to discover how your guests feel about different areas and content on the website. Through a general consensus, you’ll get an idea of how the masses feel.

Finally, effectively managing unexpected traffic spikes can be a difficult task. Once again this relates back to infrastructure and actual hardware. You need to find a host that supports scalability and has the resources to handle large traffic spikes without disrupting normal daily operations. This can be tough as a great deal of trust and a solid uptime guarantee must be in place.

Maintaining any website can be a daunting task, especially one that’s exploded and has high traffic. To be able to maintain these users, infrastructure must be well-kept, monitoring must be consistent, listening to your visitors regarding improvements and proper traffic spike management must be implemented. As websites continue to grow, more individuals will be needed to maintain the sites and ensure the majority of visitors are content with what they see.

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]]> http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/how-to-maintain-high-traffic-websites/feed/ 0 Six Tools for Better Website Traffichttp://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/six-tools-for-better-website-traffic/ http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/six-tools-for-better-website-traffic/#comments Tue, 20 Oct 2009 17:54:20 +0000 Art http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/?p=581 After building a nice looking website, you are ready to market your amazing products and services to the world.  With everything seemingly in place, you are still missing the one ingredient needed to make your business a success – traffic. Without traffic, your venture with an online business is destined to fail quickly.  Luckily, there are quite a few ways you can go about bringing traffic to your site.  Everyone claims to have the secret that unlocks the magical fountain of traffic, but one method that has been tried and proven involves site optimization.  There are many tools available to help you along the way and below are five of the very best.

1.) SEO Book – Founded by Aaron Wall, one of the true SEO experts, this site makes a great resource for learning about optimization and moving your site in the right direction.  Here you can find all the tools need to help you become familiar with virtually every aspect of the game.  As a member of SeoBook.com, you are a part of a tight-knit community that will mold you into a better search engine marketer.

2.) Submit Ease – This is a powerful software tool that bundles article directory submission and website directory submission into a single user-friendly package.  With Submit Ease, article syndication is easy, and you can submit your site to more than 600 article directories. 

3.) Bookmarking Demon – This is a tool every internet marker should have in their bag of tricks.  It is a fully automated pinging and social bookmarking software program that can help you create an unlimited number of backlinks.  With the free upgrades and all the advantages it offers, many users find Bookmarking Demon to be worth every penny.

4.) Animoto - When it comes to the web, you don’t have to be a expert with a video camera just to incorporate video into your site.  Animoto is a great tool that gives you the power to create movie style trailers from the photos you upload to your site.  You have the option to choose from various default music themes or upload your own.  This is all made simple through an easy to use interface.  Simply upload your photos, choose the music, enter some text and the system does the rest.

5.) Tube Mogul – Video sharing has become one of the most effective ways to attract targeted traffic in fast and cost efficient manner.  Tube Mogul makes an ideal tool as it allows you to distribute your video content to several sharing platforms, including YouTube, Meta Café and MySpace.  Best of all, this tool is absolutely free to use.

6.) Keyword Elite - This is a great research tool that can help you save a lot of time when looking for keywords.  Keyword Elite also integrates with other tools such as Keyword Discovery and Word Tracker, allowing you to truly maximize your researching efforts.  It lets you find out which keywords your Google Awords competitors are using and where their sites rank in terms of optimization.  The Keyword Elite tool is like having your very own virtual researcher.

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]]> http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/six-tools-for-better-website-traffic/feed/ 2 How Web Hosting Aids in SEOhttp://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/how-web-hosting-aids-in-seo/ http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/how-web-hosting-aids-in-seo/#comments Fri, 17 Apr 2009 17:37:52 +0000 Art http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/?p=293 You probably know by now that web hosting is a popular service millions of people rely on to create their websites.  These services are used for everything from blogs and personal sites to e-commerce and community sites.  What many people don’t know is the importance of web hosting as it relates to search engine optimization.  You can truly benefit from search engine traffic by leveraging your hosting solution and devising a sound SEO strategy.

Domain and URLs

Before even purchasing a web hosting plan, you probably want to get yourself a domain first.  If you already have a name registered with another host, it shouldn’t be difficult to transfer it over to a new provider.  If not, you can easily register one for about $10 a year.  When it comes to SEO, both your domain and URLs are extremely important.  This is because when the search engine spiders come crawling, they index your pages individually opposed to the website itself.  With most hosting solutions, you have the ability to create custom URLs, so when used in conjunction with your domain name, it makes a great way to increase visibility in the eyes of the search engines.

Search Engine Friendly Features

The features a web hosting provider offers can also benefit your SEO efforts.  Because optimizing for targeted search engine traffic has proven to be effective, many hosts now offer tools that help research and choose the best keywords for your site.  Another great feature is the handy web application.  These utilities give you graphical statistics on your website traffic, showing when visitors came in and where they come from.  They usually show you which search engine spiders visited your site as well.  Then you have companies that offer free search engine submissions, free marketing credits, Google webmaster tools and more.   The average web hosting package is loaded with an arsenal of tools that can aid in SEO.

Finding the Right Solution

Although web hosting plays a major role in SEO, the actual results all depends on the hosting company.  This is why it is so crucial to put an emphasis on quality and reliability rather than the cost of service.  There are many types of hosting out there and finding a cheap solution is easier than ever before.  When looking for a service, you need to keep in mind that you are essentially placing the fate of your search engine rankings in the hands of another company.  This is one relationship where trust is key.  Without doing your research and rushing into a service, you can end up with a solution that does more harm to your visibility than good.  Worst of all, you may not even be aware of it.

You should also be cautious about hosting multiple domains on a single account and server.  While this may seem like a practical and cost effective move, it could also hinder your cause.

It is speculated that search engines view linking from within the same IP address as a move done to generate false link popularity.  In order to get the best results, SEO and web hosting need to work in perfect harmony.

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]]> http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/how-web-hosting-aids-in-seo/feed/ 0 SEM Basics and Beyondhttp://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/sem-basics-and-beyond/ http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/sem-basics-and-beyond/#comments Thu, 15 Jan 2009 20:20:04 +0000 Art http://webhostinggeeks.com/blog/?p=154 Regardless of the industry, online business is one of the most competitive fields in existence.  More than likely, thousands and possibility millions of other business owners have an ideal similar to your own and are working diligently to outdo you.  Competition is fierce but you don’t necessarily have to generate a million hits each month to be successful.  Believe it or not, there are many sites that bring in steady traffic but you couldn’t tell by the lack of sales.  In the end, succeeding at any online business requires continuous profits because this is what ensures longevity.  The best way to get the traffic you want – people who are more likely to actually buy what you’re selling, is engaging in targeted marketing – you need to learn the basics of SEM.

Short for search engine marketing, SEM is a method of devising your marketing strategy around search engine traffic.  Everyday, millions of web surfers are relying on search engines to find what they need whether its software or airline tickets.  The key to SEM is determining your niche market before you actually start marketing.  The niche market is the people you are looking for, potential customers that have a keen interest in your particular product or service.  You need to figure out where your ideal customers are located and most importantly, how you are going to use the search engines to attract them to your site.  It is critical to determine these factors in advance because delving into marketing without a sound strategy usually ends in failed results.

On the surface, SEM appears to be a strategy that calls for you to limit yourself.  After all, why restrict yourself to a niche market when your product or service can benefit almost anyone?  Despite how it looks, SEM is actually the exact opposite.  This method has been so successful because it qualifies your visitors by automatically disqualifying those who are not interested in your offerings.  Although this particular strategy is web-based, the goal is the same are any type of marketing plan – find the people who are looking for you and convert them into customers.  On the web, reaching this goal is about knowing how they go about searching as well as where they hangout online.

Thinking Outside the Box

While SEM is primarily based on leveraging traffic from the search engines, you don’t have to limit your marketing efforts to Google.  When optimizing your website for a niche audience, you are better assuring the possibility of generating traffic consisting of potential customers.  This can be increased by bringing in visitors by way of special invite.  These are people you find in discussion groups, blogs and other social networking communities.  Whereas traffic from the search engine is likely to stumble across your site and many others like it, these are visitors who took you up on your invitation.  They come in pre-qualified and very interested in what you have to offer.  When utilizing genuine SEM tactics and going beyond the basics, you have a much better chance of bringing in the traffic looking to find you.

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