Practically anyone who spends time on the Internet, as well as many who don't, are familiar with the popular social networking site, MySpace.com. Free of charge, this web host invites individuals and groups of all ages, types and styles, to start a web page and interact on its service. The reason it is free, of course, is that it relies paid banner advertising to support it. Many have postulated that MySpace may also someday emerge as a viable platform for small business web hosting.

MySpace music fans are able buy and sell from each other, for what some believe are as many as three million music bands. Most of the bands are unsigned to a commercial music label. MySpace Co-founder Chris DeWolfe, recently told Reuters, ''The goal is to be one of the biggest digital music stores out there. Everyone we've spoken to definitely wants an alternative to iTunes and the iPod. MySpace could be that alternative.''

Many have speculated that eBay's PayPal online payment system will be used to process the MySpace financial transactions. However, it may make more sense for MySpace to partner with Google's new online payment system. Google has just cut a deal managing search advertising for MySpace, reportedly in the range of $900 million a year, with a minimum guarantee. The MySpace ''distribution fee'' (read: how much you pay for each song) has yet to be fixed, but it is anticipated to be minimal.

While many independent bands and musicians have used the site successfully to develop a fan base, traditional e-commerce business sites are rare on MySpace. While individuals who have e-commerce interests do have personal pages, very few seem to be attempting to generate interest in the products and services they are selling. This could be due to the fact that time-consuming promotion and advertising opportunities are really only appropriate for a very limited group of businesses within that environment.

Additionally, several extended outages that MySpace has experienced, have brought to light the fact that every business - large and small - should have a disaster preparedness plan in place. Power protection for critical equipment such as computers, cash machines, network routers, hubs and servers should be engaged by any business web hosting companies, in order to ensure an effectively run, profitable online business.

MySpace has yet to truly materialize as a small business web hosting company with a substantial and active small business customer base. With so many reasonable, affordable and competent paid services for small businesses, that offer more comprehensive tools, software and support, it seems far more prudent for a serious small business entrepreneur to utilize a web host that specializes in e-commerce, rather than rely solely upon the limited resources of a predominantly social networking service, such as MySpace.

Many web hosting companies use a combination of business web hosting, along with internal blog pages, for small and medium sized businesses. There are a great many reputable web hosts that offer the small business entrepreneur, the opportunity to establish, maintain and grow their businesses, with resources that are flexible, reliable, secure and affordable.

Two companies that offer excellent small business web hosting as an alternative to MySpace are www.gate.com and www.hostmysite.com.

Gate.com is a professional web hosting brand developed and managed by Affinity Internet, Inc. This web host offers both Linux and Windows hosting packages designed to accomodate small online business needs. The company has also launched a new line of VPS web hosting products, as well.

HostMySite.com has built its reputation on outstanding customer service and support. Many small business owners are experts in their business - and not necessarily in running and managing a website. HostMySite.com can help these business owners make sense of even the most complex hosting issues. Additionally, the company also offers coldfusion web hosting and .net web hosting.

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Published on: 2006-10-25 (7923 reads)