While it is important that you have a sensible, secure and reliable hosting solution for your business’ website it doesn’t mean you have to pay through the nose for it. In a time when cutting costs and saving money to make that year-end profit target is a must, it wouldn’t make sense to have your website be one of the reasons you are bleeding money.

With a little tact and some clever forethought, you can save money on your web hosting. Below, in no particular order, we will see 10 ways that you can cut your web hosting expenses:

1. Try Free Hosting – Yes, the world is against free hosting when it comes to business web hosting because it could be taken as a sign that you are not serious about your venture or are blind to the fact that you could lose it all in case your site goes down simply because the providers decide to shut you down. But there are instances where free hosting could be used. For example, you could be just starting out on your first site. Or, you could be using the free hosting to test out a new page or application to compliment your main production site.

The main point here is, don’t outright deny that you have the option.

2. Hunt for Coupons and Promo Codes – If you take the time to search for coupons and codes you will be pleasantly surprised at how much you can actually save on your hosting fees. If you are lucky enough (and know where to look) you will be able to find offers that allow you to buy hosting packages for mere cents a month.
3. Shared Hosting – The cheapest packages out there are those that offer shared hosting solutions. If you aren’t a big business, don’t waste money on downright owning your own server just for the sake of it. Start small and once you have outgrown your package you can look into buying a more flamboyant solution.
4. Opt for Longer Terms – Just like in any deal, hosting providers too want to keep their customers and offer packages that become cheaper as you increase the time you are with them. If you are a business you too will want to commit to a longer time as it will reduce the hassle of having to move domains every few months (or even years) or so. At the very least, try to pay for two years’ worth of hosting.
5. Look for the Perfect Package – Before you go out and pay for a hosting package make sure you know what exactly it is you need, and what you might need in the near future. A little foresight will help with having to later pay for extras, which will most certainly be a more expensive than if they had been included in your package.
6. When Needed, Downgrade – Some hosting clients would rather keep using a package that has features which they don’t even need than downgrade to a smaller option. Don’t be too proud to accept that you made a mistake and overspent on your contract – cut your costs as soon as you realize that you don’t need all that extra disk space or the unlimited bandwidth option.
7. Refer your Hosting – Some hosting providers have a scheme where you can actually make money or cut down on your expenses whenever you refer their hosting packages to new clients. Set up an ad or a link on your page where people that visit your website can click on to sign up with your hosting provider. Convince a good number of people and you could actually end up covering most, if not all, of your hosting costs.
8. Go Linux – In case you didn’t know, Linux hosting solutions are much cheaper than comparative Windows hosting ones. Unless you have a very specific reason why you can’t opt for Linux solutions (maybe your website or any features on it are non-compatible with Unix-based systems or you simply have a phobia for it) there really isn’t a good reason why you shouldn’t use this cheaper and much more secure operating system.
9. Know when to Shop – The online market, just like the ones in the real world, have seasons where merchandises are on offer at cut prices. A good example is Black Friday. Hosting providers drive their prices down on this day to attract new customers. Take advantage of these offers and see your hosting bills drop.
10. Become a Webhosting Reseller – Ok, this might sound like an extreme step to take towards saving money on your hosting, but it really is an effort worth taking. Consider this: you will be a hosting provider yourself and hence won’t need to pay for your own site’s package. Then there is the fact that you will have a business on the side that will serve as an income generator. Finally, being the “owner” of the server you will be able to manage your package much more effectively and can tweak and configure your solution much more easily, thus bypassing tech support fees.

And there you have it: your 10 ways of saving on your hosting solution.