Web Space or Bandwidth: Finding the Right Balance
Before you choose a hosting plan, there are many things to consider. Two of
the most important are the Web Server Space and the
Data Transfer Allowance (also called
bandwidth) that you will need. Web hosts will usually try to
lure you with either a large amount of Web Space or monthly Data Transfer
Allowance. Though the best case scenario would be to have plenty of both, most
hosts tend to offer more of one and less of the other, so you will have to find
the right balance.
To decide how much Web Space and Data Transfer you need, you must first
decide what kind of site you will have. Small business sites generally fall into
one of three categories:
- One-product website (mini-site): Usually a very small site
with two or three pages; its focus is to sell just one product, or to collect
visitors' email addresses to try to sell them at a later date. This kind of site
is usually just a long sales letter plus an order page and a contact page.
- Company brochure site: Usually around 10 or so pages
describing what the company does, its products or services, its location, the
markets it targets, an about us page, a contact page, etc. It is basically an
online brochure of the company.
- Theme-based site: Revolves around a very specific topic or
market niche (for example: work-at-home moms), and is updated frequently with
new articles, tutorials and resources. These sites can also sell products from
affiliate companies, or sell their own products.
Each of these sites has different web space and bandwidth requirements.
- A one product website doesn't need a lot of web space.
However, if the site ranks well with the search engines or has a large number of
affiliates promoting it, it will generate a lot of traffic and the data transfer
allowance will become very important.
- A company brochure site doesn't need a lot of web space or
bandwidth. For this kind of site, a basic package offered by a reputable host is
usually more than enough.
- A theme-based site won't probably need a lot of web space
or bandwidth at the beginning. However, if the site is updated frequently with
new articles and resources, its web space requirements will increase. Also, as
the site gets more traffic and offers more content, the data transfer allowance
will also become important. You must plan for the future from day one, and get
more web space and data transfer than you seem to need at the beginning.
Here are some expamples of how you can estimate and calculate your web space
and data transfer requirements (we will assume that the average size of a web
page, including pictures, is 50 Kilobytes).
One-product Site
If your one product site has just three pages, it will just need 150
Kilobytes of web space (a drop in the bucket considering that basic packages
nowadays offer upwards of 50 Megabytes of space). However, if it receives
150,000 page views per month it will require approximately 7.5 Gibabytes / month
of data transfer.
Company Brochure Site
If your company brochure site has 10 pages, it will only need 500 Kilobytes
(aprox. 0.5 Megabytes) of web space. If it has 5000 page views per month, it
will need 250 Megabytes (aprox. 0.25 Gigabytes) of data transfer per month.
Theme Based Site
If your theme-based site starts off with 50 web pages of content, it will
need 2.5MB of web space. However, if you add ten pages of new content per week,
you will need 26 Megabytes more in your first year. After two years, you will
need 52 Megabytes, and so forth. As you see, your need for space may add up
pretty quickly. If we estimate that your site will have 30000 page views per
month, its monthly bandwidth consumption will be 1,500 Megabytes (aproximately
1.5 Gigabytes). This figure will most likely grow as you add more pages.
Your space and data transfer needs will also grow dramatically if you offer
large files for download. For example, if you give away a 1 Megabyte PDF Ebook
and 1,000 people download it in a given month, you will need 1 Gigabyte of data
transfer just for that one particular download (and you still haven't accounted
for the data transfer consumed when users access and browse your site!).
Since web hosts will usually charge you fees if you use more than your
alloted web space and bandwidth, you must carefully monitor your consumption of
both. However, you should pay extra attention to your bandwidth.
The reason is that it is easier to control your web space use (after all, it
is you who decide how many files to load up to your host's server). Data
transfer, on the other hand, is not as easily controlled. For example, your site
may suddenly get a good search engine ranking for a popular search term and
receive a traffic boost, which will consume more bandwidth than you had
originally planned. Or, unscrupulous webmasters may "steal" bandwidth from you
by linking directly to images on your server, instead of saving them in their
own web server space.
Therefore, it is wise to plan for the unexpected, by making sure that your
host doesn't charge unreasonable fees every time you exceed your web space and
data transfer allowance, and that it offers a free and easy way to upgrade to a
better hosting package whenever the need arises.
Mario Sanchez is a Miami
based freelance writer who focuses on Internet marketing and web design topics.Â
He publishes The Internet Digest (
a growing collection of web design and Internet marketing articles, tips and
resources. You can freely reprint his weekly articles in your website, ezine,
or ebook.
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