Choosing a Web Site Server (host) & URL
associated costs, "free" web sites, domain names, etc.

If your nonprofit absolutely cannot afford five bucks a month, then find a board member, volunteer or other supporter willing to pay this fee for you, OR, create a profile of your organization on MySpace and use that for your temporary web site until you can afford one.

I do NOT recommend free web site hosts, because:

• free web site hosts usually require you to host a myriad of advertisements on your web site. You have no control over these advertisements. That means services that you really don't want to be associated with may appear on your web site, and many users will have a very bad impression of your organization as a result.

• the advertisements that are usually required of a free web host to be put on your web site give visitors every reason to click away from your web site.

• free web sites can go away with no warning, leaving you with no web site at all.

• free web site hosts offer little or no customer support.

• free web space offered by, say, the company one of your board members represent, may not allow you to make changes directly; you may have to submit your changes to someone at the company and hope that they eventually get around to making the change eventually.

If you want your organization's Web site to have advanced functions, like interactive databases, dynamic content (that automatically updates itself), etc., you will need a server that can provide you with these functions. DON'T attempt to buy your own server! The cost of staff time to keep the server up and functional is TREMENDOUS. Instead, use a "virtual" server -- a company that provides you with Web server space. This will be about $25 a month. The company that hosts my web site, Hostgator, has packages that allow your web site to have all these advanced functions.

When considering your Web address (also called a domain name or URL), your Web address should be:

• not use an "underscore" (my_nonprofit) or a "tilde" (my~nonprofit); it's difficult to say such addresses over the phone, and many people will get your address VERBALLY from a staff member

• as short as possible

• easy to say over the phone (sometimes, this is more important than keeping it short)

If you still need more help in finding a web host, visit TechSoup, an initiative by CompuMentor designed especially to help mission-based organizations with computer and Internet issues.

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