I’ve been dealing with several clients whose websites have been down or not functioning properly due to server issues at their various web hosts.

No host can provide a 100% uptime, but what DO you look for when shopping for a host?  First, they should publicize some sort of “uptime guarantee.” Without a guarantee, you have no assurances that they are at least trying or providing due diligence in keeping your website available.  I’ve recently seen a popular host REMOVE their guarantee from their sales pages.  Not a good sign of things to come for their clients.

So what kind of uptime guarantee is good enough? This depends on your needs and, honestly, your budget.  Of course, no one wants to have their website DOWN ever, but what do these numbers mean?  Here are some common guarantees in the industry today and the actual amount of downtime per month involved.

• 99.5% uptime = Over 3 HOURS (216 minutes) of downtime in a month
• 99.8% uptime = 86.4 minutes of downtime in a month
• 99.9% uptime = 43.2 minutes of downtime in a month
• 99.99% uptime = 4.32 minutes of downtime in a month
• 99.999% uptime = 0.432 minutes (26 seconds) in a month

Based on these numbers, I would never recommend a host with less than a 99.9% uptime guarantee and I would rather see my clients on a 99.99% uptime server.  I only know one host, Rackspace, that gives a 99.9999% uptime guarantee and they only do managed server hosting and is much more expensive than standard hosting.

So check for an uptime guarantee as one of the necessary elements when shopping for a web host.

YNot Web is once again sponsoring the Fair Oaks Metric Century Ride which takes place Sunday August 27, 2006.  This event is a great familing biking day put on by the Fair Oaks Chamber of Commerce and sponsored by many great local businesses.  Check it out at http://www.fairoaksmetriccentury.org (we also donated the website).

YNot Web has added a blog option to both our Enhanced Site Design and Professional Site Design packages. This will allow our clients to easily have blogging capabilities added to their new websites.  Blog software can be customized to match the “look” you want and gives you the ability to change and add content and pages as you please.

Check out our complete Enhanced Site Design and Professional Site Design package definitions under our Web Site Design and Site Builds services.

Clean and Sober Living

Great news for one of my SEO clients, York Law Corporation. We have succeeded in breaking into the top 10 (first page) results for their most important but highly competitive keyword phrase “sacramento lawyer“. This keyword phrase has 6-9 million competing websites and pages on any given day. Due to the ever changing nature of search engine positioning, there is no guarantee York Law will stay on top, but it is nice to have our current work validated with great results.
Congratulations York Law Corporation!

Recently, I’ve been a victim of spam by several local businesses.? I am pretty sure these small local businesses are not really cognizant of the fact that they are, in fact, spamming.? Somehow these business got the email addresses from the local Chamber of Commerce and they must think its “okay”.? Its not okay- it is spam and most of them have been in violation of the FTC’s CAN-SPAM Act (U.S. law in effect since January 2004).

For those with “fuzzy” definitions of what spam is, here is a reality check.? The definition of spam:

spam noun?
electronic junk mail: an unsolicited, often commercial, message transmitted through the Internet as a mass mailing to a large number of recipients

to spam transitive and intransitive verb?
to send unwanted e-mail: to send an unsolicited e-mail message, often an advertisement, to many people

Are you a spammer?? When you send commercial or advertising?email are you following the CAN-SPAM legal requirements?? For more information on spam, and what you can do if you receive it, see the Federal Trade Commission’s website.