What to look for in an E-commerce hosting Services Provider?

by Eva Maris Web Hosting

Ecommerce has truly changed the way in which we look at the world. The entire world has become one large marketplace for every global citizen. While this means tremendous convenience and a plethora of choices for the buyer, it also means cut throat competition for the seller. In order to remain at the top of his game, an ecommerce retailer needs to maintain the best prices, offer great services and above all, provide a top class experience to the customer. And this is where an e-commerce hosting services provider has a role to play.

Before choosing an e-commerce hosting services provider, there are several aspects to be taken into account. To start with, the service level agreement or SLA has to be read or referred to with great care. Each point has to be checked before signing on the dotted line. Some of the most important aspects that need to be stressed upon in the service level agreement have been discussed here.

Uptime

As an ecommerce store, your website needs to be up and running, round the clock, all the days of the week. Imagine your website going down on a Friday evening when all others are up and running! You end up losing humungous revenues through the weekend, when online shopping rates are at its peak! This could spell doom for your business prospects. Besides, most ecommerce businesses will have investors. And such loses would mean driving them away to some other profitable proposition.

Considering the multiple ripple effects of downtime, it is important to choose e-commerce hosting services provider that provides maximum uptime. In most cases, a hosting provider promises 99.8% uptime, and nothing less than this should be acceptable. Downtime should be less than 90 minutes a week.

In order to ensure maximum uptime, the e-commerce hosting services provider should be able to provide continued support for server maintenance of management. Troubleshooting services should be made available round the clock. Any problem that occurs should be attended to within the quickest turnaround time.

SSL Encryption

Remember, when you are dealing with an ecommerce site, customers will be sharing sensitive details like credit card information and bank related data for processing transaction. A single act of phishing that is linked to transactions made from your site can ruin your business prospects forever. This is why an ecommerce hosting services provider has to install a SSL or Secure Sockets Layer certificate on your website for supporting encryption and authenticating the identity of your business to customers.

Hosts will install the certificate and also provide you with a dedicated IP address for a price. So, before choosing a hosting service for your site, ensure that the service provider will grant you such a certificate and also a specifically dedicated IP address.

Besides, price is also one of the trickiest points to consider. Private hosting services for ecommerce can be quite expensive. Affordable services for nop-Commerce hosting in India are also available for you to choose from. Make sure you also refer to reputation and past performances before you choose.