Even if you understand the benefits of outsourced Web hosting, there is a stigma of fear associated with letting go of the internal management of your Web hosting infrastructure and outsourcing it to a managed services provider. The truth is, common sense planning and proper due diligence will allow you to achieve a level of satisfaction with your outsourced IT environment that will exceed what you are able to do on your own, no matter how modest or elaborate your current in-house infrastructure may be.

For many small businesses and associations, the value of outsourced Web hosting is easily realized because the requirements of their Web sites are not that intricate. For larger groups whose Web sites require a great deal of bandwidth, certain application-specific monitoring, or a great deal of maintenance of the infrastructure, outsourced managed Web hosting can be the key to a successful IT architecture.

Many people turn to outsourcing their Web architectures because running a fully managed Web hosting infrastructure requires more in-house staff and resources than are available. Whether it is personnel and budget that restrict you, or just your ability to build out a proper facility, you know if your architecture requires a level of service that you simply cannot support internally.

Recognize your limitations
Many organizations host in-house when it requires modest resources. Unfortunately, too many try to keep going even after it becomes unbearable. Associations need to know when to allow themselves to let go of what they have implemented to date.

The first instinct for most IT managers is to retain control of their network architectures. When thoughts begin to turn to outsourcing, IT managers often have a number of concerns: Will they find a competent hosting partner, and will that hosting provider be successful with their Web site?

If your association is like many organizations that are growing out of their internally hosted infrastructure, then it’s likely a number of small events—for example, a number of 3 a.m. emergencies with your system—may lead to your ultimate decision to try outsourcing

Pick your partner
So now you have decided to outsource your hosted infrastructure. There are a number of qualities you should look for in a successful hosting partner. Some would recommend you begin by looking at the hosting company’s infrastructure. But is it always true that a company with a world-class hosting facility will lead to hassle-free service for you? Others would recommend you examine the services offered by the hosting company. But are those specific services in alignment with the services that you need? Finally, many would recommend you consider your budget and then find a provider that can support your needs.

While there may be many other factors that will be specific to your environment, you would be remiss if you did not look at all three of the factors presented here: infrastructure, services, and budget. Let’s examine each of these factors to learn how they are relevant to your final decision-making process.

Determine your budget
Budget is always a primary concern that must factor into your decision. But it should also be noted that while you consider the cost of any solution, you should also examine the costs associated with the risks of not choosing a particular, more expensive, solution.

Hosting companies know that budget is foremost on the mind of many IT professionals, and the approach they take to remedy that concern usually puts price over services. Ted Chamberlin, an analyst with Gartner, Inc., of Stamford, Connecticut, put it best when he said, “[Hosting companies] tend to compete on price, and the managed hosting business is not a business that can compete on price. It’s a value-add service.…” The value in a service-based business is truly found in the people providing the services.

The real key is knowing how to ask the right questions to cut through the marketing speak and get you real answers to the important questions you will use to determine which provider is right for you. As you consider all of the factors, each will have value and importance in different ways to your organization. What will get you past the wondering if a provider is right for you and into the realm of knowing a provider is right for you will be found in the questions that you ask.

Examine the infrastructure
Of course, infrastructure is one of the more important features when looking to find an outsourced hosting provider. Does this mean that all quality hosts have to be in a world-class, bullet-resistant datacenter? Remember that infrastructure refers not only to the facility where the equipment is housed, but also to the servers, firewalls, switches, and other appliances that constitute the physical architecture of any particular provider. You need to make sure you can validate the operational capacity of your provider. Marketing materials can be very detailed and will surely feature all of the things you want to hear. To ensure your assessment of the company’s infrastructure is accurate, you should take the extra step to tour the company’s facility to see the equipment that will be working with and supporting your infrastructure.

Take note of what you see when visiting a hosting provider’s facility. How is the security within the facility? Do unauthorized workers have physical access to this environment? How neat are the wiring and the labeling of the wires? Neatness is a commonality among many high-end and well-run datacenters. Make sure the facility is organized, with color-coded, labeled cables and wiring. A hosting provider that adheres to high standards with regard to neatness and organization has a good chance of being just as neat and organized in other facets of its business.

Study the services
When considering the managed services provided by a company, it’s again important to look past the company’s marketing materials. It goes without saying that you will have a list of the services that you absolutely need to have and then an alternate list of the services that you want, or would like to have.

Avoid speculation when evaluating the services the host company promises to deliver; instead, find out who will be providing those services and how. For example, many hosting companies that maintain and operate world-class facilities may lack the capacity and knowledge to provide fully managed services. In these cases, they contract out the managed services of your hosted environment to a third-party company, often charging you additional and sometimes exorbitant fees for those services.

What are some of the most important services? The maintenance and monitoring services on your hosted servers are places where many IT professionals can be misled. Make sure your hosting company considers managed services to include not only informing you about security vulnerabilities and patches or upgrades that are necessary, but actually performing the necessary work to ensure that your systems are patched and secured. All too often, you will find that monitoring is 95 percent of the service offering, while maintenance is 5 percent of the service offering. You should be able to find a hosting partner that will provide you the full range of services necessary to properly support your hosted environment.

Another place where IT professionals have experienced problems is with backup services. Doesn’t it seem like whenever a backup or restore for a portion of your externally hosted environment is necessary, there always seems to be some sort of problem? Maybe the most current version of the backup was not available and you had data restored from six months ago. Maybe there was a total failure and the particular tape that you were on just happened to go bad, and restoration was not successful.

Either way, data recovery in the event of a disaster is a critical service. Many hosting providers will happily tell you all about the hardware and the software that constitute their backup systems. They will also tell you the schedule, detailing daily, weekly, and perhaps monthly intervals at which your system will be backed up. The real key here is to ask about the success rate of the system. Has the hosting company had to use the system? What is its success ratio with restorations? Is the system flexible? For example, if you deploy a full-site revision on a Monday morning, and your next scheduled backup will not occur until sometime on Tuesday, can you initiate a special backup to ensure your new data are saved right away? Will there be any charges for these special backups? Asking these types of questions will not only give you a great window into the company’s system, but will also get the hosting provider to speak to the actual performance of the system.

See the bigger picture
Even with all of the hard work and effort by so many IT professionals to gather the appropriate information and make the right decisions, there is always the potential that you’ll find a hosting provider that sounds good and looks good but comes up short on delivery. By asking the right questions and delving past the marketing materials that are presented to you, you will be able to make a close connection with the employees with whom you will be working.

Salespeople cannot answer all of your questions. They usually cannot take you on a full tour of a facility and tell you about the intricacies of the systems. It’s important to communicate early on with those employees with whom you will be working closely. Identifying individuals with whom you can foster a good working relationship will help make the people within your hosting company an extension of your internal IT staff.

Make your decision
When you examine all of the information you have gathered, you will have a comprehensive understanding of the capabilities of each particular hosting company. Your final step should be to verify this information by checking client references.

IT professionals are always excited to see an impressive client list featuring several Fortune 500 companies, all in alphabetical order. What does this really mean, though? Again, ask the right questions. Does the hosting provider currently work with all of these companies? Are the relationships successful, or are some of the clients on the list because they signed a multiyear contract and are forced to be clients?

References and testimonials from clients with needs similar to your own can be extremely helpful. The true measure of a quality company can be directly related to the satisfaction of its customers. A happy customer will give you insight into the operations of a potential hosting partner and will answer many of your questions, sometimes in greater detail than you expect.

Final words
Once you’ve decided to outsource your Web hosting needs, you will certainly need to address your infrastructure, service, and budget needs with potential hosting companies.

In determining which is the ideal host for you, you must value the communication you receive directly from the hosts. Is the company thorough in answering your questions? Is it forthright in dealing with you? Does it communicate with you in marketing speak, or does it give you real answers to your real questions?

There are many excellent providers out there. Some will fit your needs and some won’t. No matter what, you need to feel confident with the people at your hosting company. Whether your need is to interact with these people on a daily basis, or to let them do their jobs and never need to speak with them again, your confidence in them is paramount.

Make sure to ask the right questions, and pay attention to the companies that provide thorough, thoughtful answers. Once you find the provider that’s right for you, you’ll know it—and the benefits of moving your hosting operation to an external provider will be great.

Richard Feller works at Hedgehog Hosting, Fairfax, Virginia. E-mail: richard@hedgehoghosting.com.