Finding a good host has become a tricky business of late. It is primarily due to the vast number of companies that have sprouted in the past few years. Finding a good host does not involve just statistics about performance. Instead, it also involves finding the best affordable hosting company. This is because every penny you save from choosing affordable web hosting plans means that you will be having that little bit extra for investing in your website. Yes, you can opt for cheap shared hosting option. However, it has to be the most reliable option and it does not take long before you notice that it is very difficult to get both.

Shared Web Hosting is the kind most people start off with. These review websites would often like to have you believe that there is actually a "top 10" list of web hosts. The truth is there are probably only around five quality shared hosting companies around!

Windows or Linux: Do you know if your site needs to run on a MS Windows server with FrontPage extensions or does it need PERL, PHP or MySQL? These things you will need to find out if you intent to run a successful small business Shared Web Hosting UK site.

Unfortunately there is no real way around this problem if you are already caught up in it other than move your hosting to an ISP that is actually based in the Country that they claim to be on all advertising etc. Always check beforehand if you are looking at a non .co.uk domain name for your site, as you do risk never getting the 100's or 1000's of search engine referrals that http://www.google.co.uk can provide you.

If this is your first website and you are just getting started on the Web (Internet) you may be confused by all the web hosting offers on the internet. A good rule of thumb would be to do a web search for the term Affordable Web Hosting and from the results returned, go to each company and see what they have to offer and then use the company which you feel has the most Affordable Web Hosting package. It is that simple.

Another thing you need to consider is the facilities and the features of the cheap web hosting plan you want to buy. For example consider the following; will my site be available for my visitors to see and access at any time and any day of the week? Will I get up to 99% up time as a minimum requirement for hosting my site? Do not just jump at any web hosting service just because it is very cheap without considering the facilities on ground. Search carefully for what you want.

99.99% more active: Many web hosts are to ensure the time to 99. 99%, but then they are more expensive and must be chosen if required as commercial web sites.