HostGator is one of the largest web hosting companies in the world. It hosts more than 2,500,000 domains across the world. When talking about one of the most profitable web hosting ventures started in 2002, hosting industry can’t afford to miss the rise of HostGator in web hosting business particularly reseller hosting. Host gator is a privately owned profitable webhosting company and has grown rapidly over the years.
HostGator works with an efficient team of over four hundred employees to their credit. Thus, they provide their customers with efficient and 24 X 7 round the clock support throughout the year. HostGator has emerged as a perfect choice for web hosting for each and everyone, be it business, personal, or even Fortune 500 hosting.
Each and every web hosting plan at HostGator is accompanied with a 45 day money back guarantee. Further it also comes with 99.9% uptime guarantee, and is fully guaranteed by the owner himself. In case of a problem with the regular support, customer can just ask that their ticket be assigned to Brent, the Chairman of HostGator, and he personally takes the time to give the customer the VIP attention that they deserve.
HostGator gives three options to its customers:
1. Hatchling Plan
2. Baby Plan
3. Business Plan
The Major Features of HostGator Web Hosting
HostGator is known to be the world leader for web hosting services. HostGator has now become the best reseller host in a short period of time and has set examples for others to follow in this highly competitive hosting business. The biggest strength of HostGator is its huge reseller base. HostGator offers very fast and prompt support to its resellers which have resulted in more than 10,000 webhosting resellers putting faith in HostGator as a web host. This has been one of the major contributors to its success which other web hosting companies have not been able to replicate so far. By keeping the best interests of resellers in mind, the company has been providing 24 × 7 support to all its web hosting resellers, customers and end users round over the year. The quality of their support can be checked by just sending an email to their live support. The request sender can expect to get a response within an hour and usually within minutes. And this fast response is not limited to just pre-sales support; even the after sales support at the HostGator is equally fast.
HostGator’s web hosting plans come with the luxuries of unlimited disk space, unlimited bandwidth, access to flexible and easy to use control panel to have effective control over the plan facilities, unlimited sub domain creation freedom, facility of creating FTP accounts and E-Mail Accounts and moreover 99.99% up-time guarantee to ensure the best use of the web applications of its clients by their customers. But the good things never end here only. Adding more luxuries, HostGator allows it clients to try using its services with a 45 days money back guarantee with no contract in this period. The customer can make use of this time to create more confidence in its investment with HostGator. Above that, the web hosting services at HostGator are Safe Harbor Certified.
The European Commission’s Directive on Data Protection went into effect in October of 1998, and would prohibit the transfer of personal data to non-European Union nations that do not meet the European “adequacy” standard for privacy protection. While the United States and the European Union share the goal of enhancing privacy protection for their citizens, the United States takes a different approach to privacy from that taken by the European Union. In order to bridge these different privacy approaches and provide a streamlined means for U.S. organizations to comply with the Directive, the U.S. Department of Commerce in consultation with the European Commission developed a “Safe Harbor” framework and this website to provide the information an organization should need to evaluate – and then join – the Safe Harbor. Similarly, the U.S. Department of Commerce in consultation with the Federal Data Protection and Information Commission of Switzerland developed a “Safe Harbor” framework to bridge the different privacy approaches between the two countries and provide a streamlined means for U.S. organizations to comply with the Swiss data protection law.
The Hatchling Plan
The Hatching Plan of HostGator’s Web Hosting Services is a Linux Web hosting plan. This plan is one of the three shared hosting packages offered by Host Gator. This plan comes with a satisfaction guarantee, and the customer has 45 days to decide if the purchase has met its expectations. Whether the customer is looking for Web hosting to suit for its business needs, personal or even the Fortune 500 level, HostGator has a plan for it.
The HostGator Hatchling plan offers a plethora of options and features, although it is one of the most modest plans in their shared webhosting lineup. It has ample (but limited) disk space of 350 gigabytes and bandwidth of three thousand gigabytes. The plan allows hosting only one domain in it.
In addition to the money-back guarantee, the Hatchling package offers a 99.9 percent uptime guarantee, free instant setup, no contract, instant backups, Twenty Four hours Seven days a week customer support round the year, and an easy to use site builder. There are also unlimited sub domains and FTP accounts permitted to setup in this plan. Web hosting features seem endless for this small price or only $4.95 per month. The buyer of this plan can chose to pay upfront the cost of $6.95 per month for one year plan or $5.95 per month for two year plan or $4.95 per month for three year plan. HostGator’s this plan is devoid of any Chilisoft ASP for its customer.
The Hatchling package includes:
* Unlimited Bandwidth
* Unlimited Disk Space
* Unlimited MySQL databases
* CGI
* PHP 5, Ruby on Rails, SSH, Perl, Python, SSI, and Cron
* FrontPage
* Curl
* GD and Image Magick
* Streaming audio and video
The Hatchling web host plan even makes email convent and secure with features like the Spam Assassin. The customers of this plan are also offered with the facilities of Web mail, email alias, auto responders, mailing lists, catch alls, mail forwarding, IMAP support and SMTP. The control panel features are also impressive. They include phpMyAdmin, Web based file manager, Instant Counter and many other offerings. Web site and FTP stats have Webalizer, real-time updates for AWStats, and a log manager. For those who are interested in e-commerce, this inexpensive plan also has options in that area, including shared SSL, Agora Cart, osCommerce, ZenCart and Cube Cart.
If the customer is running on a tight budget, the Hatchling hosting service of HostGator comes as a blessing to the business with cheapest cost solutions equipped with all desired high end features of web hosting. It is inexpensive, guaranteed, and backed by great customer support.
The Baby Plan
HostGator offers several different web hosting plan options for Linux. The Baby plan is one of them which offer many convenient features for its customers having great experience. The “Baby” plan comes with money back guarantees for forty five days and it guarantees 99.9% uptime rates. HostGator Baby plan offers its customers a bundled package of six hundred gigabytes of disk space, six thousand gigabytes of bandwidth, and unlimited domains just for a cost as low as $7.95 US Dollars to get up and running. The impressive package also includes an easy to use site builder, round the clock support services, instant backups, the freedom of no contract, and an instant setup that is at no cost to the buyer.
There also are unlimited add on and parked domains, sub domains and FTP accounts. Additional features of the Baby plan include, but are not limited to, MySQL databases, CGI, PHP 5, Ruby on Rails, SSH, Perl, Python, SSI, Cron, FrontPage, Curl, GD, Image Magick, streaming audio and video, and free installation of modules. Email accounts also come with the Host Gator’s Baby plan and are widely accessible, with unlimited features such as POP3 accounts. This plan also includes the features of Web mail, email alias, auto responders, mailing lists, and catch alls, Spam Assassin for security, mail forwarding, IMAP support and SMTP.
As for the control panel facility, The Baby Plan has Fantastico, Soholaunch, and Hotlink Protection among others. The Web site and FTP statistics include real time updates for AWStats, and other features include Webalizer, Raw Log Manager, Referrer and Error Logs. Finally, e-commerce options included in the Baby plan are Shared SSL, Private SSL, Agora Cart, osCommerce, ZenCart and CubeCart. Those who purchase any of the HostGator Web hosting plans will be treated on an individual client basis, and not just like a number. Their 24 X 7 support assists the customers in any problems they might have and all the issues are typically resolved quickly. HostGator’s this plan is devoid of any Chilisoft ASP for its customer.
Salient features of this hosting plan include the following:
* Unlimited Bandwidth
* Unlimited Disk space
* Unlimited Add On Domains
* Unlimited Parked Domains
* Dedicated IP for a cost as low as $2.00 per month
* Flexibility to the customer to pay upfront charges of $9.95 per month for one year plan or $8.95 per month for two year plan or $7.95 per month for three year plan.
Business Plan
The Business Plan of HostGator Web Hosting Service is a Linux hosting package. This is the top shared Web hosting package in their lineup. The Business account currently costs between $14.95 and $12.95 per month depending on the upfront payment for duration of the service. This includes a 45 day money back guarantee and a 99.9% uptime guarantee. As with all of the other Host Gator website hosting packages, 24 X 7 tech support is included in the package and the buyer can enjoy knowing that the hosted sites and applications are being monitored round the clock by one of the top Web hosts available today. The Business package allows the user for unlimited bandwidth and domains, and this also includes a generous one thousand gigabytes of disk space. The business web host account comes with a free site builder, instant backups and does not bind the service buyer down with any contractual terms and conditions. The service buyer can also enjoy free and instant set up. All of the domain and FTP features are unlimited, including add-on and parked domains, sub domains, FTP accounts and also anonymous FTP.
Unlimited MySQL databases are included in this business package for the user. The luxuries bucket does not end here but also include the exciting facilities of CGI, PHP 5, Ruby on Rails, SSH, Chillisoft ASP, Python, Curl and several others. The CiliSoft ASP feature is available only with this package. Like the other plans of HostGator, there is streaming audio and video and module installation, which is absolutely free of cost included in this service package.
HostGator extends the luxuries with free E-Mail accounts offered in this service, and also makes it secure to use with features like Spam Assassin to avoid flooded In-boxes with messages that may contain viruses. There are also unlimited POP3 accounts to access outside email, mail forwarding and auto responders, along with other features. The control panel is impressive with offerings like the Fantastico, Soholaunch, Hotlink protection, and the “Instant” features: guestbook, blogs, portals, PHPnuke, forums, counter and FormMail. Ecommerce is also made convenient, with shared and private SSL, osCommerce and a few other features. The Web site and FTP statistics features complete the package with real-time updates for AWStats, Webalizer, and tools like Raw Log Manager, referrer and error logs.
For only a few more extra cost, the HostGator Business hosting plan has the most to offer out of the shared hosting lineup. With all of the great features and guarantees it comes with, this package is a great deal for all business types.
Salient features of this hosting plan include the following:
* Unlimited Bandwidth
* Unlimited Disk space
* Unlimited Add On Domains
* Unlimited Parked Domains
* Dedicated IP for no extra charges
* One Toll Free Number for no extra cost
* Private SSL
* Anonymous FTP Account
* CiliSoft ASP combined
* Flexibility to the customer to pay upfront charges of $14.95 per month for one year plan or $13.95 per month for two year plan or $12.95 per month for three year plan.
Comparing Hosting Plans of HostGator
| Web Hosting Packages | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plans –> | Hatchling | Baby | Business | |
| 1. | Disk Space | UNLIMITED | UNLIMITED | UNLIMITED |
| 2. | Bandwidth | UNLIMITED | UNLIMITED | UNLIMITED |
| 3. | Domains Allowed | 1 | UNLIMITED | UNLIMITED |
| 4. | Your Own Toll-Free Number | Not Included | Not Included | FREE |
| 5. | Free Dedicated IP | Not Included | Not Included | Included |
| 6. | Free Private SSL | Not Included | Not Included | Included |
| Package Details | ||||
| 7. | Site Builder | Included | Included | Included |
| 8. | 24×7 Support | Included | Included | Included |
| 9. | Instant Backups | Included | Included | Included |
| 10. | No Contract! | Included | Included | Included |
| 11. | 99.9% Uptime Guarantee | Included | Included | Included |
| 12. | 45 Day Money Back Guarantee | Included | Included | Included |
| 13. | Google AdWords | $100 Credit | $100 Credit | $100 Credit |
| 14. | Free / Instant Setup | Included | Included | Included |
| Domain / FTP Features | ||||
| 15. | Add on / Parked Domains | Not Included | UNLIMITED | UNLIMITED |
| 16. | Anonymous FTP | Not Included | Not Included | Included |
| 17. | Sub Domains | UNLIMITED | UNLIMITED | UNLIMITED |
| 18. | FTP Accounts | UNLIMITED | UNLIMITED | UNLIMITED |
| Supported Web Hosting Features | ||||
| 19. | WordPress Hosting | Included | Included | Included |
| 20. | MySQL Databases | UNLIMITED | UNLIMITED | UNLIMITED |
| 21. | CGI | Included | Included | Included |
| 22. | Fast CGI | Included | Included | Included |
| 23. | PHP 5 | Included | Included | Included |
| 24. | Ruby On Rails | Included | Included | Included |
| 25. | SSH | Included | Included | Included |
| 26. | Perl | Included | Included | Included |
| 27. | Python | Included | Included | Included |
| 28. | SSI | Included | Included | Included |
| 29. | Cron | Included | Included | Included |
| 30. | FrontPage | Included | Included | Included |
| 31. | Curl | Included | Included | Included |
| 32. | GD 2 | Included | Included | Included |
| 33. | Image Magick | Included | Included | Included |
| 34. | Streaming Audio/Video | Included | Included | Included |
| 35. | Free Module Installation | Included | Included | Included |
| E-mail Hosting | ||||
| 36. | POP3 Accounts | UNLIMITED | UNLIMITED | UNLIMITED |
| 37. | Web Mail | Included | Included | Included |
| 38. | E-mail Alias | Included | Included | Included |
| 39. | Auto Responders | Included | Included | Included |
| 40. | Mailing Lists | Included | Included | Included |
| 41. | Catch Alls | Included | Included | Included |
| 42. | Spam Assassin | Included | Included | Included |
| 43. | Mail Forwarding | Included | Included | Included |
| 44. | IMAP Support | Included | Included | Included |
| 45. | SMTP | Included | Included | Included |
| Control Panel Features | ||||
| 46. | Latest cPanel | Included | Included | Included |
| 47. | Fantastico | Included | Included | Included |
| 48. | Soholaunch | Included | Included | Included |
| 49. | Hotlink Protection | Included | Included | Included |
| 50. | IP Deny Manager | Included | Included | Included |
| 51. | Custom Error Pages | Included | Included | Included |
| 52. | Instant Blogs | Included | Included | Included |
| 53. | Instant Portals | Included | Included | Included |
| 54. | Instant PHPnuke | Included | Included | Included |
| 55. | Instant Forums | Included | Included | Included |
| 56. | Instant Guestbook | Included | Included | Included |
| 57. | Instant Counter | Included | Included | Included |
| 58. | Instant FormMail | Included | Included | Included |
| 59. | Redirect URL | Included | Included | Included |
| 60. | Web Based File Manager | Included | Included | Included |
| 61. | PW Protected Directories | Included | Included | Included |
| 62. | phpMyAdmin | Included | Included | Included |
| Website FTP Statistics | ||||
| 63. | AWStats (Real Time Updates) | Included | Included | Included |
| 64. | Webalizer | Included | Included | Included |
| 65. | Raw Log Manager | Included | Included | Included |
| 66. | Referrer Logs | Included | Included | Included |
| 67. | Error Logs | Included | Included | Included |
| E-Commerce Features | ||||
| 68. | Toll Free Number of the customer | Not Included | Not Included | FREE |
| 69. | Private SSL Allowed | Not Included | Included | Included |
| 70. | Dedicated IP | Not Included | $2.00/Monthly | FREE |
| 71. | Shared SSL | Included | Included | Included |
| 72. | osCommerce | Included | Included | Included |
| 73. | ZenCart | Included | Included | Included |
| 74. | Cube Cart | Included | Included | Included |
Choosing the Right Plan
HostGator offers three types of web hosting plans to its customers to their custom needs and budgetary limits. Before purchasing any of these service plans, one needs to do analysis for its needs and financial things to confirm the best suiting choice for its business needs. HostGator is offering three plans with different specifications and pricing for the users to choose from. The comparison chart is provided in earlier sections of this text by which the user can have a comparative look on the features and prices of these plans. To compare the plans, one needs to pay attention to the following major issues:
1. Budgetary Limits: The three plans of HostGator Web Hosting Services are provided with some differences in their prices. The service buyer should first notice that the biggest difference in the service is in fact in their pricing. Based on their prices, one need to analyze about which plan it should choose whether the Hatchling, Baby or the Business plan. Hatchling Plan is relative cheaper and it is the better option for customers with only one website. However, in long term the Hatchling Plan may not be very practical and not recommendable to those who are serious with their website and are thinking about staying long.
2. Number of Hosting Sites: Another major difference in the hosting plans of HostGator is the ability to host multiple domains or sites within the same account. Hatchling is the traditional single domain per account type of hosting. The user can only host a single site with it. With domain names being so cheap today, anyone would have a very high chance of owning more than one domain. This is why a single domain per account can really be considered as a huge limit in the account. Time to time, one may need to have a second website in the same plan. A new business idea, a forum, a website for their family members, a charity website for the community, a personal blog – there are unlimited reasons for second domains/websites. If customers have more than one domain Hatchling Plan is not recommended but they can have it as the starting point in their Internet venture but never stick too long with it. That is why at least the Baby plan can be highly recommendable because the users are allowed to host unlimited websites under the same account in this plan. The next main question may be if the user really needs the Business plan. One needs to now analyze if the Baby plan is enough for its business needs. The answer may be simple for many users and may be complex in some senses. Business plan should be considered only if someone is trying to sell something online and if its web applications are offering to take credit card payments to its users. If the hosted applications are not likely to be in e-commerce applications, there is in fact no need of the Business Plan and the things can be accommodated in Baby Plan itself. HostGator Business Plan is most suited when customer need all add on E-Commerce features (toll free number, dedicated IP, ChiliSoft ASP, and private SSL). This Plan is recommended for medium-large business websites owners where processing of money transactions take place.
3. Need of a Toll Free Number: With the Business Plan of HostGator web hosting service, the user gets a free of cost Toll Free Number from Voipo VOIP Toll Free Number Service of HostGator. If the user is interested to provide its customers with the Toll Free Number Service, it can be availed with the little more expensive Business Plan. With a toll-free number, the customers in the US and Canada can call the business unit without any long distance charges. The calls will be forwarded to the existing phone number of the business unit, so the service buyer does not need any new phone lines or equipment. The service is provided by Voipo, which is a HostGator associated company. The buyer of the service will have one hundred initial minutes for free. After that, it will need to pay 4.9 cents for each minute call receiving from US callers and 6.9 cents for each minute call receiving from Canada callers. This service is offered to the customer for no extra charges with the Business plan of Web Hosting. The same service can also be availed independently (with or without other hosting plans) for a cost of $4.95 per month or $36 per year (averaged $3 per month). That means the buyer may also get a better deal if it signs up just the Baby plan and then go to Voipo to subscribe the toll free service for $36 for a year.
4. Need of Anonymous FTP Account: With an anonymous FTP Account, anyone without identification can connect to the public area of the hosting account to upload and download files. This feature usually is not required and needs to pay significant consideration while turning this feature on as this may have a risk if many of the unintended people out there may connect to the account and upload a huge bunch of files which may even contain porn and pirated contents and hereby they can share it with others through this account. It will cost the service buyer a lot of bandwidth and there is a significant probability of getting the account suspended. The feature should be taken up only for very specific and unavoidable reasons otherwise, recommended is to have authenticated FTP Accounts only. If the Anonymous FTP Account is an unavoidable need of the business, one can chose for the Business Plan as this facility is included in the Business Plan Package. Otherwise, the Baby plan does meet the requirement.
5. Need of SSL Certificate: The SSL certificate is needed when the user needs to make secured connections. When a secure connection is made, the user will see in the address bar of the browser, and the connection protocol will change to “https://” instead of “http://”. The ‘s’ here refers to secured HTTP connection. In this type of connection, all data packets are encrypted for security purposes and this is important when the users are trying to transfer sensitive information. They are most widely used in transferring credit card information. There are two types of SSL certificate, the private SSLC and the public SSLC. Public certificate are also known as shared certificate because it is shared among all other HostGator customers. It is available free to all hosting plans of HostGator the Hatchling, Baby, and Business Plan. Both private and public certificate are fully encrypted and secured. However, public certificate are hosted under HostGator domain and it will pop up a warning message to the customer. Even when it is secure, the customer may feel very uncomfortable submitting their credit card information to the site due t the warning message and hence the may lose some sales and customers. The applications hereby may need a private SSL certificate that is stored in the own domain of the service buyer and hence it will not popup any warning message and make the web application more trustworthy to the online users and customers. The private SSL Certificate is included in the Business Plan of HostGator Web Hosting.
6. Need of Dedicated IP: A dedicated IP address (also known as static IP address or unique IP address) is required when the customer needs to use its own private SSL certificate. This is in fact a technical requirement and hence the service buyer has not much choice on this. If the private SSL Certificate is required, the Dedicated IP comes as an attached requirement to it. Dedicated IP Address is included in the Business Plan of HostGator Web Hosting Service.
7. General Consideration: The differences between Baby and Hatchling Plan is that Baby Plan is slightly more expensive and it allows unlimited add on domains; the main differences between Baby and Business Plan is that it doesn’t provide Toll Free Number, Anonymous FTP, and Chilisoft ASP. If these extra features are not absolutely needed, there is no reason why customers should pay $60 extra every year for the Business Hosting Plan. The Business Plan is generally recommended only when customer is going to use all add on E-Commerce. It is not advised to pay extra $60 per year if user only needs an extra dedicated IP address or the private SSL. These features can be bought at a nominal cost of $2 for each dedicated IP address for a year or substituted with other web services like PayPal to bypass the need of a private SSL. Web hosting plans can be changed anytime customer wants. All upgrades with HostGator are free of charge. All customer need to pay is the pro-rated price after upgrades and user are done. On the other hand, downgrading to a lower level plan requires a $10 processing fees. If the buyer is paying month to month, maybe the savings from picking Hatchling plan instead of Baby plan is quite insignificant like $1 for a month. But if it pays twelve month, the price difference is quite significant to $3 for a month. So it might be a good strategy to initially use the Hatchling plan and then upgrade it later when needed.