A complex business site requires a business hosting package that provides a business hosting service with database support and application platforms (e.g. ASP.NET, PHP, Java, ColdFusion, and others) for web page development and site management. These applications allow the customers to write and install scripts for specific applications like forums and content management.

To find the best business hosting there are important issues you need to concern yourself with when choosing a business hosting company and choosing between their different business hosting plans before entering into your final SLA (Service Level Agreement). Major issues to address include uptime, storage space, bandwidth, available applications, and a user friendly control panel. In addition, you must choose between either a shared web hosting service, a dedicated hosting service, a managed hosting service, or a colocation service. Other services to consider, if relevant to your companies needs, are special file hosting (files, not web pages), image hosting, video hosting, blog hosting, e-mail hosting, and shopping cart software.

Hosts often claim uptimes of 99.9 % or slightly lower numbers and some hosting services offer rebates for downtime but none will compensate you for lost sales or other negative effects on your business. The host should also provide a control panel for managing web pages through the host for installing scripts as well as e-mail and other services.

Storage and bandwidth are important issues. Storage of course should include more than the web pages but also FTP files and storage of various types of data files. Some hosts sites claim unlimited space. Bandwidth is the "traffic" your website is allowed to handle and is typically measured in Gigabytes. Both of these factors are especially important if your site includes many photos, videos, or other multimedia files that can require millions of bytes of storage and bandwidth.

Some common types of business hosting plans are:

• Shared web hosting services place your site on a server along with many other sites all sharing the same server resources, such as RAM and the CPU. However, features including bandwidth and disk space provided can be extensive and relatively inexpensive making this the ideal choice for small to medium sized business. Just compare rates, features, and reliability then select the best one of the lot.

• Dedicated hosting services provide a package where you have your own web server but you do not own the server. It is more expensive than shared hosting. Another type of dedicated hosting is self-managed or unmanaged hosting and this is usually the least expensive form; however, with access to the box you become responsible for security and maintenance.

• Managed business hosting services provide your own web server but you do not have full control over it; however, data management via FTP or remote management tools is allowed.

• Colocation web hosting services are the most powerful and expensive business hosting choice. The hosting company provides space for the server and maintains it, but the you own the server.
In your search for online business hosting check out business hosting reviews. If they are truly independent reviews, they will point out deficiencies in features and save you the trouble of investigating the thousands of web hosting companies available, of course if the price is very low and the features offered are few even a small company should be beware.

Besides issues mentioned above, other questions you should ask a potential hosting company are:
• Will I be assigned a dedicated account customer relations manager or will everything have to be via e-mail?
• Will I be assigned or be able to talk to a technical contact (24/7) if there are problems?
• Can the server hardware be upgraded or even a new server put in if needed when there is increased (seasonable for example) traffic?
• Is there a network and security team working 24 hours a day?