Friday, September 12, 2008

Painless Web Hosting Provider Transfer

By Ricardo d Argence


Perhaps your business is growing faster than your web hosting company can keep up with or maybe your chosen site just isn't up to par with your sites' needs. In any case, the best solution to this conundrum is to switch web hosting companies. Before you dive blindly into what can be a sea of confusion, there are a few steps you should take to ensure the transition from one site provider to another is seamless and worry-free.

As with any type of renovation project, embarking on a web hosting company change will go much easier if you develop a plan and then stick to it. In order to ensure a smooth and efficient transfer from one web hosting company to another, you should allow yourself enough time to complete each step and then run tests for accuracy and accessibility.

Generally this type of transition requires at least three to four weeks from the initial planning stage to the date your new site is up and running. Once you have completed your research and determined which site you will do business with, you can have your new site activated usually within 24-48 hours.

Before doing anything else get a complete backup of the files being hosted by your provider, even if you have copies of them already stored locally. Backups are like insurance, you never appreciate having them until a catastrophe strikes. So, even though it may be tempting to eliminate this step, you may live to regret it.

It is strongly recommended that you have backup copies of script, database and server log files, as well as the HTML files. The mirrors the one on your web server makes downloading files easier and the transition is easy to transfer.

Once you receive confirmation from your new web hosting company that your account has been activated, you can upload your files to the new server.

Since you have already saved your files in a familiar directory structure, uploading your information to the new site should progress without a hitch.

After following the above steps you may now run some tests on the other website to be able to verify that all modules are working perfectly.

When everything is flawless and working smoothly you are prepared to change your old Domain Name Server (DNS)r to the one that has been provided to you by the current web hosting company. All that you must do now is relax and wait for the hits to begin.

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