This hub is a review of the HostMonster web hosting service. I am a real customer of HostMonster, so this is my personal opinion on how well the service has been working for me. Take that for what it's worth.

I have used three web hosting services in my entire life:

• WiredHub
• FullControl
• HostMonster

WiredHub let me down too many times. A co-worker still uses them and says they have been doing better recently, but too frequently my mail would stop working, or the site would be down for 15 minutes, back for 15, and down again, and this happened all too often.

So I switched to FullControl. Talk about a novel concept! They actually provide a full Microsoft Windows virtual machine. In fact I still have a hosting account with FullControl and use it for my personal sites and e-mail. I work in the IT sector, so having my own server (even if it is a virtual one) is great.

However 6 months ago I purchased some eBay affiliate software called Build A Niche Store (BANS), and it only runs on Linux based hosts that support PHP. This meant that I couldn't run it on my FullControl server, which to be honest really bothered me (and still does kinda... I got Movable Type working on Windows... why not BANS?). I actually waited a couple months to buy the BANS software because it wouldn't run under Windows and IIS.

Eventually I decided that I wanted the Build A Niche Store software no matter what, so that meant I had to find a Linux web hosting package, and that package had to have the following features:

• Inexpensive - I pay $80 per month for FullControl, so I couldn't afford to pay a lot for a second web host
• Linux platform and PHP support - so I could run the Build a Niche Store software
• Multiple SQL databases - the BANS software requires a SQL database per store site, so I had to have the flexibility to create a ton of databases
• Multiple domains - having your own domain per BANS store site is pretty common, so I needed a web host that would support this.
• Reliable - no brainer here. I can't run an online store from a host that has a lot of problems or downtime.
• Cheap - I can't stress this enough. My budget it pretty tight with that $80 per month bill from FullControl. In order to keep my virtual machine, I need to save money elsewhere. I do not want to be in a situation where my wife demands I choose one or the other. =)

Obviously I chose HostMonster to meet those requirements. So how did I discover HostMonster and why did I choose them?

Initially I discovered HostMonster because of a recommendation made by a fellow member of the Wealthy Affiliate forum I was participating in. I knew I needed a web host, so I did a search on the forum to see if people had been discussing web hosts. I discovered that a fellow member (who I had interacted with quite a bit on other topics already) had recommended HostMonster in a few threads, so I gave it serious consideration.

I did some Google searching to see if there were any good competitors, but unfortunately if you do a Google search for "web hosting" or any similar term, you'll just about a zillion results. There are literally thousands of web hosts out there.

So in the end, my decision to go with HostMonster hinged greatly on the recommendation I got from the forum. That was 6 months ago, and so far, so good.

I realize that's not a glowing review, but let's get real, how excited am I going to get over a web host? =)

Seriously, I have my account with HostMonster and it just works. I don't have to think about it. I don't have to check to see if my site is up. It just works, and that's the whole point!

I got a free domain when I signed up, which is becoming more standard these days but still something I appreciated. They support plenty of traffic and disk space, a ton of e-mail accounts, addon domains, databases, etc. I'm not going to list out the specifics because you can find all of that on their web site, but trust me, it's more than you'll probably ever need. (If you need more, you're looking for a dedicated hosting solution anyway...)

HostMonster has a control panel to manage your hosting account, and it's a version of cPanel so it's pretty standard, easy to use, and very straightforward.

When you sign-up, HostMonster gives you a coupon to get $50 free at both Google Adwords and Yahoo Search Services. So if you're marketing your business online that's a nice bonus. You can only use the coupons on new Adwords or Yahoo accounts though, so keep that in mind if you're already using those services.

I get all of that for $6.95 per month, which I consider to be a really great price (a.k.a. cheap, inexpensive, I can keep FullControl, woo hoo).

I also have experience with HostMonster's help desk. I had a question about setting up one of the scripts that is auto-installed from inside of the cPanel, and was very impressed with the response I got. Their online ticket system is very professional, and I got a response with the answer I needed within a few hours (this wasn't an urgent ticket so I never expected an instant response).

The best thing I can say about HostMonster--besides the cheap price and good feature set--is that it just works. I have all of my Build A Niche Store sites setup there, and have had zero problems with any of them. Remember that I'm trying to earn money from my BANS sites and have occassionally run advertising for them from Adwords. I can't afford to pay Google money for clicks that go nowhere because my site is down. Trust me, if HostMonster wasn't reliable, I'd drop them in a heartbeat. I stayed with WiredHub for way too long (waaaaaaaay too long), and I just won't make that mistake again.

Conclusion: HostMonster works for me, and I consider that the upmost compliment for any web hosting service.

(PS. If you have any questions about HostMonster that I haven't addressed here, leave a comment and I'll try to answer the best I can.)