Hello,

Most web hosts as does BizOHost provide some type of backup service. In our case we provide weekly backups. Whether or not your host provides a backup it is always a good idea to make a backup of your account and store it locally on your computer. If your site is static such as plain text site using no databases doing a simple backup each time you make major changes will be sufficient. However, if you have a site using technology such as MySQL databases where your stored information is frequently changing. Depending on how frequently your information is changing you may want to at least make a weekly manual backup of your own. Lets look into why it’s a good idea to make your own weekly backups.

In one example lets say your host makes backups each Sunday. On Tuesday you make major changes to your site. On Wednesday however when making additional changes you accidently delete some important files. Now your host of course may restore your account. However, as this would be from the backup on Sunday the important changes you made would not be included. As a precaution it would have been helpful to make a backup prior to initial changes on Tuesday and then another backup after you have found that your site is now stable and running smoothly.

In another example lets look at the stability of your host. BizOHost as any other reputable host that provides backups will make every attempt to ensure your backup is available when needed. However in an imperfect world there are issues that occur. We do backups on several levels so this shouldn’t ever be an issue with us. However, lets say your host only provides backups on one level. This being the same server your web site is stored on. Now lets say there is an error with that drive and the data is lost. At that point there wouldn’t be any backup of your data available and if you didn’t manually create one all information for your site would be lost. That’s a pretty extreme case, but the point we are trying to emphasize is when dealing with sensitive information you typically want to eliminate any doubt.

When using Cpanel which is the control panel we provide you will login at yourdomain/cpanel. Once logged in you will select the “Backups” link.

From there you may either download a Full Backup which would include your emails, site files, databases, etc.. in one file, or you may download a partial backup of specific information.

In most cases as with us only the host would be able to restore the Full Backup. You may however provide this file to us if needed and we will restore for no charge. For a partial backup you would be able to restore file(s) on your own.

It is never a good idea to have anyone open an account for you using their information. We have seen this cause several problems in the past. Whenever an account is opened the person who’s name is entered in the billing system as the primary contact is technically the account owner whether or not this is what was actually meant. Now lets look at how this can cause problems:

1) Many times a customer who is not so familiar with maintaining their site will have their web designer or site admin open account in the name of the web designer or admin. Later on the actual domain owner may want to fire the admin or web designer. However, if the admin or web designer is not doing business honestly they may not hand over your account so easily or they may even attempt to do something to damage your site such as taking down your files or deleting the account all together.

2) It is very common for a web designer or admin to purchase and account in their own name and use their credit card information to pay for account as you the customer have already paid them directly. In most of these case the person will pay in advance for a year or so although this can apply to any billing cycle. Your site will run fine within that period but once it’s time for renewal you may have lost contact with the person who setup account for you. Account would then become suspended as no payment was made and you would be unable to access account as you are not listed as owner or a contact.

There are several other scenarios that could take place.

The best way to go about this is the following:

Setup account in your name and if needed when going through the order process list your web design or admin as a secondary contact. This way they may still contact us for support or sales request buy all major changes must be done by the primary contact which would be you. As primary contact should the need arise you will also always have access to remove the secondary contact.

Another thing to be aware of is account password. In most cases the web designer will only need access to upload your web site. From that point on your site would either be static or updates would be done through a Blog such as wordpress or joomla where you would be the one writing the content. In these cases after your web designer has done their job it is best to update your password so they no longer have access. If they need to do future work you may provide them the current password and once they are done once again change password to something new. If you have an admin who is constantly updating your web site I wouldn’t advise on changing on changing the password as they would obviously need access, but I do advise on two things:

1) You should always have the current password for your site and make sure it wasn’t updated to something you are not aware of.

2) You should familiarize yourself with how to update your password should the need arise.

Account security is a never ending process. Stay tuned for the next tip.

Many times customers submit support requests for an issue they may be having with their web site. We may however not be able to immediately assist them due to not providing valid domains details. For example a customer may say:

“Hi, my domains is ‘A Great Flower Shop’ and I can’t access it, please help.” Now lets look into why this is not good.

First, “A Great Flower Shop” is not a valid domain. A valid domain can only contain letters and or numbers and no special characters other then a dash symbol. A valid domain also must end with a valid TLD such as .com .net .org, etc..

agreatflowershop.com would be a valid domain name. If domain was specified as “A Great Flower Shop” this would also be the first domain we would guess as the correct domain.

However, in most cases the actual domain is something different such as a-great-flower-shop.us, agreat-flowershop-in-usa.com, good-flowersshop-buy.mobi, or domain may be completely unrelated such as bobsrosegarden.co.uk.

The more valid the information you provide. The faster we are able to assist you. It is also best to contact us from the email address on file for your account. That way your account information will automatically come up once you contact us.