The F1™ season has started off with a bang. 5 races, 5 different winners and still all to play for. The event organisers have come up with some great ideas to make Formula One™ interesting, ranging from KERS (Kinetic Energy Recovery System), DRS and Pirelli have also gotten in on the action by making their tyres a talking point in every race. It really is the most exciting start to a Formula One™ Season that I have ever seen and I’ve been following motorsport now for over 15 years.

As many of you already know, UK2.NET are sponsoring the Marussia F1 Team this season and it’s great to be part of the action and we are thoroughly enjoying giving our support to the team as they fight for places on the track. They had a solid start to the season and the new MR01 has done well so far. Timo Glock and Charles Pic, the Marussia F1 Team drivers, have been working hard with the engineers to build on their race pace and improve the overall balance of the car, so far with great results.

The Marussia F1 Team have a strategy in place which will see them competing for a podium spot by 2014 so they are hard at work trying to get the team and the car ready for then. At the moment Timo and Charles are sitting in P19 & P20 respectively and the Marussia F1 Team is sitting in 10th spot on the constructors table.

To keep up to date with the Marussia F1 Team, Follow our Marussia F1 Blog.

UK2.NET is sponsoring the Maurissa F1 team and to celebrate this event, they are  giving away a pair of tickets to the main race day as well as another runner up pair to the qualifying day at Silverstone in July. Business hosting or Business Sitebuilder customers  from now until the end of June will be automatically entered. (No purchase necessary – see T&C’s)

Each affiliate sale you make in May will automatically add you an entry in the prize draw too. The more sales you make the more chance you have of attending the F1 championship in July at Silverstone.

UK2.NET’s powerful packages are designed with the SME’s and start ups in mind and if you buy Business, or Business Cloud package before June 30th you will also be sent vouchers to upgrade your package and receive our state of the art SEO tools, Stats 2 to help you analyse and optimise and free Facebook integration to enable your web site to be viewed from within your Facebook page.

All this and our 24/7 support for as little as £.4.95/m

Or ditch your designer and win F1 tickets with UK2 SiteBuilder Business

If you want to design your own site and ditch your designer, you can also sign up to our SiteBuilder Business package and receive a free entry into the draw for 2 pairs of tickets. (No purchase necessary – see T&C’s)

Our SiteBuilder Business packages come with :-

-           Free Domain

-           Unlimited pages and bandwidth

-           Unlimited email

-           Google Analytics

-           Ecommerce

100 gorgeous, fully customable templates

-           24/7 support

-           30 day money back guarantee

Only £6.95/month (no contract)

Read the May Affiliate email for more information and a full list of UK2.NET offers to promote

UK2,NET MAY VOUCHER CODES

CLOUD10%– 10% off all business cloud hosting packages. Only £8.95/month on a two year plan with voucher. (ends 2.6.2012)

VPN1FREE – Get 1 month free VPN (new customers only) Stay secure and browse anonymously from all devices. Endpoints inUSA,UK,Japan orNetherlands –ends 2.6.2012

UK2SERVER30 – £30 off any server package (new customers only) ends 2.6.2012

USEFUL TO READ

Optimising your web presence and security for Smartphones  

SiteBuilder How to Video

Shared hosting is simply when a lot of web sites get hosted on the same server space, which ultimately reduces the server cost.   It’s important to understand the features and limitations of this hosting infrastructure, especially as you start to grow your online business.

This is often the first type of hosting service to be offered by most hosting service providers and it is suitable for personal websites, small businesses and some medium-sized businesses that require minimal hosting resources.

A primary advantage of shared hosting is the cost; it is the most affordable type of hosting and as a result very popular. Most shared hosting providers also offer substantially more hosting space, data transfer and email accounts than most businesses or customers need. This works out nicely since not all the websites or businesses would be using up their quota, in fact only a very few ever do.

It is also very important to show the difference between shared/virtual hosting from VPS Cloud hosting. Shared hosting entails the hosting of many websites all on one server while VPS Cloud Hosting consists of hosting a few websites and their applications on an individual server with electronic partitions separating each of the sites into reserved zones on the server space.

Shared hosting is best as an entry-level hosting service, it is easy to maintain and even with a limited understanding of hosting technology, one can easily run a successful shared hosting account.

The shared hosting provider undertakes the bulk of the server management and administration. You will also enjoy server-side scripting assistance e.g. PHP and ASP.net

You will also find that a shared hosting provider will offer different levels of shared hosting which affect the final package of features and costs. This may include offering business shared hosting which lists unlimited disk space, traffic and websites.

As with anything that comes with advantages, there are also disadvantages. Shared hosting services are notorious for unreliability even when proactive steps like load balancing are in place. Hosting thousands of websites on a single server machine will always make the server susceptible to failure.

Security is another concern in a shared hosting environment. There is always the threat of sharing a server space with a hacker looking to compromise unknown users.

The architecture of a shared hosting environment easily makes it vulnerable to such attacks. Also, the website owners PHP based web applications when developed by immature webmasters can be left open and insecure, giving opportunity to intruders to have access to your data.

Your final choice of a hosting server will largely depend on your budget, your website’s server requirements, the security requirements of your web applications and your expected server speed. However, a lot of shared hosting service providers offer services that are generally very good for the cost you are expected to pay.

–

Guest Blogger: Jason Stevens from jason-stevens.com / Freelance web developer, tech writer and follower of cloud computing trends. Follow him on Twitter @_jason_stevens_

*UK2.net reserve the right to agree or disagree with our guest bloggers. Call it freedom of speech, but our guest bloggers are entitled to have an opinion. If you wish to agree or disagree, then feel free to leave a comment. Thanks for visiting our blog! If you wish to become a Guest Blogger for UK2, please contact our marketing department.

I stumbled upon this great INFOGRAPHIC – 22 Ways to Create Compelling Content – which will help you to create regular and interesting content for your website which in turn will help to increase your SEO (search engine optimisation), boost your traffic and improve your engagement.

This ’22 Ways to Create Compelling Content Infographic’ was is courtesy of CopyBlogger.

We are currently running an offer for SME’s and Start-ups on our business web hosting and sitebuilder business packages. Aside from all the great technical specifications our business hosting packages offer, customers who purchase business hosting* will benefit from Free Stats 2*, Free SEO Tools* and Free Facebook Integration* (for 1 month only). Plus we’ll enter your details into a prize draw to win tickets to the British Formula 1™ Grand Prix at Silverstone!

SME’s and Startups need an affordable and reliable hosting solution for their businesses websites. Our Business Hosting packages are just that and are packed with features including free domain names, Google Adwords vouchers plus unlimited hosting space**, traffic**, POP Email** and my SQL databases** – everything you will need to host your business website.

We also offer SiteBuilder Business for SME’s and Start-ups who do not have the technical expertise to design and code their own websites. The SiteBuilder hosting incorporates easy-to-use drag and drop design software which means that you can select one of the 75 business templates you like then edit it to customise it – or if you prefer you can start from a blank canvas and add the images and backgrounds you desire. There also a number of widgets you can add such as the social media icons so your website can be shared, liked and followed.

Click here to visit the Business Web Hosting page.

Click here to visit the Business SiteBuilder page.

Plus if you buy any business hosting package from UK2 you could win tickets to the British Formula 1™ Grand Prix at Silverstone***

*Please see terms and conditions for requirements for the free vouchers
**Unlimited to the extent of the server capacity
***See Terms and Conditions for F1 promo.

A recent Intuit infographic reports that at least 15% of small businesses do not yet have a website and roughly 31% are unhappy with their current website.  Both these statistics indirectly point to the difficulties a small business or SME faces in choosing a reliable hosting service.   In many cases, the perceived difficulty, cost or limited features found under typical shared hosting plans may be a deterrent in either kick starting a new website or moving away from an existing shaky hosting provider.   However, in recent years a small minority of web hosting companies has introduced compelling new features at affordable pricing levels that are redefining the quality of services available to an Individual, SME or SMB.

Lets focus on the TOP 5 benefits.  (By the way, you can compare web hosting packages here.).

Affordability

An SMB or individual can now leverage a UK2 monthly plan for as little as 99p per month.   While basic, it has everything a small business needs to get started, including 500 MB of disk space and 1 GB of monthly traffic.

Choice

A business or individual can choose from a variety of UK2 plans including Starter, Personal and Business.  The Business plan offers the best value including 16 free months on a two-year contract.

Social Media Integration

Intuit reported last year that 44% of businesses now use social media to attract new customers.  But, how many hosts offer automated Facebook integration directly from your shared hosting account?  Watch this YouTube video to see how quick and easy it is to marry a Facebook URL to your UK2 shared hosting platform.

Google Adwords Voucher

Both the Personal and Business shared hosting packages offer a free £20 and £30 Google Adwords Voucher respectively, that allow you to launch a small marketing campaign in tandem with your new website.  Every bit counts, as you keep costs low and pursue new marketing angles.

cPanel & Softaculous

Together they form the Holy Grail of hosting dashboards and wizard-driven software installation. cPanel is an industry leader in offering smooth, easy, intuitive control panels to handle diverse hosting tasks including backups, redirects and sub-domain administration. Softaculous offers 1-click installs of famous software including WordPress.

Host multiple websites

The Business package, considered best value, allows an unlimited amount of websites (plus unlimited disk space). This is a perfect vehicle for running business sites and adding on additional services such as mobile sites, GoMobi, and secure VPN services.

–

Guest Blogger: Jason Stevens from jason-stevens.com / Freelance web developer, tech writer and follower of cloud computing trends. Follow him on Twitter @_jason_stevens_

*UK2.net reserve the right to agree or disagree with our guest bloggers. Call it freedom of speech, but our guest bloggers are entitled to have an opinion. If you wish to agree or disagree, then feel free to leave a comment. Thanks for visiting our blog! If you wish to become a Guest Blogger for UK2, please contact our marketing department.

By 2013, most of the planet will be using their Smartphone, not laptop, to access your web page or e-commerce storefront.   This raises issue with regards functionality, security and user Interface design.  Recent studies show that a mobile-friendly website can increase overall traffic by nearly 13%.

Here are four avenues you can leverage to quickly smartify your web presence and security during sporting events and busy online shopping periods, including Christmas and Easter.

E-commerce sites optimized for mobile

A new generation of drag-and-drop web interfaces allows a website owner to deploy attractive theme-based sites which including shopping cart and checkout functionality.

Not only are these sites optimized for search engines but they also display extremely well on all Smartphones including Android and Apple.  Plus, you need NO coding experience.

Specialist mobile websites with GoMobi

While the e-commerce products above are great to get you started broadly in shopping cart configurations and mobile-ready sites, GoMobi, takes you to an entirely new level with regards creating knock-out mobile sites that are designed to be functional and high-impact.

Within 5 minutes a friendly online wizard will help you customize your site that loads 6x faster than non-mobile optimized sites.

VPN services to secure privacy

While eyeballs migrate to a Smartphones, so too do hackers and spammers.    New VPN services allow web-hosting customers to protect consumers who visit e-commerce sites to complete an online transaction.    An inbuilt firewall blocks malicious software before it reaches your laptop.  Anytime you browse the Internet, your IP address remains hidden and all communications you undertake remain confidential.

Speed up website with a CDN

Boost your website page loading speeds by as much as 70% with an instant, global content delivery network  (CDN) that brings content closer to your customers, worldwide.

A CDN is by nature, optimized for ANY device, including mobile.  This means you can focus less on infrastructural issues with regards streaming content and focus more on generating revenue.   CDN’s work exclusively to speed up your website which is becoming a key metric in search engine rankings.

Conclusion

By engaging all four products above you ensure your website and security is Smartphone-ready. This gives you the greatest chance of generating more traffic, lead conversions and ultimately e-commerce sales.

–

Guest Blogger: Jason Stevens from jason-stevens.com / Freelance web developer, tech writer and follower of cloud computing trends. Follow him on Twitter @_jason_stevens_

*UK2.net reserve the right to agree or disagree with our guest bloggers. Call it freedom of speech, but our guest bloggers are entitled to have an opinion. If you wish to agree or disagree, then feel free to leave a comment. Thanks for visiting our blog! If you wish to become a Guest Blogger for UK2, please contact our marketing department.

If you’re currently a web designer, programmer, developer (or generally involved in broad IT activities) you may not yet have considered opening a reseller hosting package to generate extra cash for your business or role as an independent contractor.

In today’s downturned economy and extremely competitive business environment you may be losing out on a unique opportunity to earn residual monthly income.

Here are five roadblocks that may be holding you back

• It benefits the hosting company; not me
• It’s too complicated. I cannot risk the time and expense of managing physical resources for my future web hosting client(s)
• Security is a concern. I don’t want to deal with the risk overhead
• I will not be able to keep up with new web apps or services demanded by my client(s)

These are valid concerns but usually attached to hosting providers who cannot deliver on all five areas.   By selecting the right hosting provider you will discover that reseller-hosting packages can be friendly, simple, powerful and cost-effective. It also makes your company or operation look more reputable and tech-savvy.

White Label Firepower

UK2 web hosting for instance, offers white label and private label solutions for your company. This means all hosting services; products and features are branded under your logo and letterhead. Even nameservers are devoid of the hosting provider name enabling end-end-end brandability.  This means your marketing firepower is enhanced dramatically the moment you open up a web hosting reseller account.

The power of Automation

The latest reseller packages allow you to automate manual tasks including billing, invoicing, account creation and nameserver configuration.    A range of reseller packages is available for you to choose from to match your appetite for control, risk, cost and profit,

Locking down security

The leading web hosting companies are constantly innovating their infrastructure, including security. Consider for instance UK2’s new VPN feature which will allow your future clients to secure both mobile and laptop data.   In fact, all hosting plans include additional firewall protection, backup and 24/7/365 support for customers.  Also remember you have additional options to sell SSL certificates to your future hosting clients at a 100% profit.

Marketing new web applications

You don’t need to keep up with the latest trends, releases or advances in web applications or website scripts. Instead, web-hosting companies like UK2 do this on your behalf.  In fact, you will notice that UK2 has recently released a number of groundbreaking apps for customers including GoMobi and automated website creation packages such as SiteBuilder.

By combining reseller marketing scalability with white-label branding you should immediately grasp the additional ways a reseller hosting account can benefit you from both a marketing and financial perspective.

–

Guest Blogger: Jason Stevens from jason-stevens.com / Freelance web developer, tech writer and follower of cloud computing trends. Follow him on Twitter @_jason_stevens_

*UK2.net reserve the right to agree or disagree with our guest bloggers. Call it freedom of speech, but our guest bloggers are entitled to have an opinion. If you wish to agree or disagree, then feel free to leave a comment. Thanks for visiting our blog! If you wish to become a Guest Blogger for UK2, please contact our marketing department.

Web host directory is a popular online web hosting directory which helps people who are interested in web hosting to select the right provider based on their technical specifications. They have introduced a review systems and have encouraged us to inform our customers so that you can review our services

If you would like to review us please click here.

If you are currently experiencing problems or have any outstanding issues please submit them to our technical support team so that we can assist you further.

Barring unforeseen catastrophes such as extreme weather events, natural disasters or terrorist attack, we do not see that the obstacles above will overcome the ability of the colocation datacentre industry to record double-digit growth for several years. ~ ~International Data Corporation (IDC) Colocation Opinion Report.

In the last decade there has been a uniform trend towards small and large businesses offshoring their IT requirements to more stable and secure web hosting datacentres in the form of cloud computing and colocation hosting.

Even when SMEs decide to use cloud services, usually VPS cloud, over a colocated model, their hosted infrastructure probably resides in colocation facilities — a perfect fit for the popular cloud computing paradigm.

In recent years, a number of pundits have suggested that colocated web servers may BE threatened by growing environmental concerns encompassed by government regulation and green taxes on IT datacentres.

“However, datacentre companies would be in a strong position to argue their case based on greater energy and space efficiency compared with most corporate datacentres, and that regulation or green taxes should encourage rather than discourage datacentre outsourcing and collocation,” said the IDC.

The net result is that colocation offers a number of benefits over expensive, on-premise datacentres, which require frequent upgrades, staff overhead plus costly operating models.

In terms of resources, including networks, security, power and control, colocation offers a superior business environment for growth and reduced IT complexity.

While it may take years for your IT administrators to achieve the necessary economies of scale to power your business using on-premise servers, web hosting companies like UK2 have been it for nearly 12 years now.   That’s a tough benchmark to beat!

Sophisticated datacentre networks utilizing advanced configurations of Cisco routers and underground fibre interconnect allow 10 gigabit line cards and links offering up to 480GB of bandwidth when necessary.

Add in advanced perimeter alarm systems, 40GB redundant fibre networks and 24/7/365 monitoring and you can see the level of sophistication, expense and firepower that has been loaded into UK2 remote datacentres.

The net result is that the IDC report highlighted further above, suggests that certain colocation infrastructure providers may grow at a rate of 25-30% indefinitely, or almost 10 fold over the next several years.

This leaves you with a clear choice: Get left behind using the costly, complex on-premise IT model or focus on revenue, growth and simplicity by shipping your remote servers to UK colocation data centres.

–

Guest Blogger: Jason Stevens from jason-stevens.com / Freelance web developer, tech writer and follower of cloud computing trends. Follow him on Twitter @_jason_stevens_

*UK2.net reserve the right to agree or disagree with our guest bloggers. Call it freedom of speech, but our guest bloggers are entitled to have an opinion. If you wish to agree or disagree, then feel free to leave a comment. Thanks for visiting our blog! If you wish to become a Guest Blogger for UK2, please contact our marketing department.