As with everything in life all the choices we make have
distinct advantages and disadvantages. The problem is that
we don't often see the disadvantages until after we have
made our decision. This can also happen when we choose a web
hosting provider. There are many web hosts that provide free
hosting. Why pay for something you can get free? Free is
great for hosting personal sites.

Are free web hosting accounts really free? They may not cost
you money, but why is the provider giving it to you free?
It's not out of the goodness of his heart. Free web hosting
providers are in business. So how do they get paid? They do
this by advertising on your site. You get the traffic to
your site and they get paid from your traffic that click and
buy from the ads.

If you want to run an internet business from your site,
these ads can conflict with your product or service. Your
free service may now become a hindrance.

If you are promoting a product it is important to come
across as a professional and not as a rank amateur. A free
site will make your product look cheap. Then there is the
problem of focusing on your product. You will need to get
your message across to your potential customer. You don't
need them to become distracted by the ads that are on your
site. In the end your "free site" may in fact be costing you
money in sales, but attracting sales for your free web
hosting provider.

If you need to run a web site as a commercial enterprise you
will be far better off choosing paid web hosting. You will
also need to choose the hosting package that will best suit
your needs. Look at some of the benefits of a paid site.

1. Can create your own email accounts. This means that
emails can look like this: yourname@yoursite.com. This is
much better than yourname@yahoo.com or some other free email
service. This will give you a more professional look.

2. You will be able to use PHP and CGI scripts

3. You will also have access to MySql databases

4. You will have greater resources available such as plenty
of disk space.

5. You will have access to a powerful and easy to use
control panel which will allow you to do things behind the
scenes such as set up emails, databases and many other
things.

There are many reasons to choose a paid web host provider.
These are just a few.

You can start out small and grow. Your web hosting provider
should be able to increase the limits to your account
painlessly. So when the package you chose first becomes too
restrictive you can get the limits increased. By this time
you will already be making an income.

So looking back to our question to pay or not to pay. Free
web hosting is great for personal and family sites. They are
not great for anyone that wants to set up a serious internet
business.