RJS Solutions was recently interviewed by Denise J. Deveau of Tech News World magazine for a piece on How to Build a Small-Business Web Site, Part 5: Outsource or DIY?. Here is an excerpt from the article.

It’s not that the notion of outsourcing is a foreign concept to small-business owners. However, “it’s growing more than ever because a lot of people are downsizing what IT staff they have,” noted Rodney Jones, principal of RJS Solutions, a provider of hosting and outsourced IT solutions.

As far as checking out a supplier for hosting and/or managing your Web services, the rules are pretty simple. Ask the right questions and you’ll be sure to make the right choice.

Jones offered his take on the criteria business owners should consider when looking for the host with the most for your Web site needs:

Network bandwidth and availability are key considerations. “You don’t want people coming to your site and having to wait for a response. The performance and [high] availability has to be there.”

Look for a reliable, reputable and stable server/service provider. Ensure that they have secure backup processes in place.

Check out their value added services for current or future reference (e.g. consulting, search engine marketing, analytics, online marketing tools, content distribution, etc.).

Understand your needs before you commit. “Yes, you can get a host that only charges US$3.99 a month, but your site may be hosted on the same server as 10,000 other sites,” Jones explained. “If you’re not using your site to generate a ton of business that might be OK. But if you have any sort of multimedia-heavy site or are conducting e-commerce, you probably need to look at a more stable environment where the costs can run from $98 and up.”

Talk to those in the know. Ask your IT person or colleague where they host their stuff, and if they’re happy with the service.

Check out what type of service and support coverage they offer (online, email or on-site) and average response times. Many lower-end services may leave you waiting longer than you can afford when you need tech support. Also, confirm how scalable services are, and the incremental fees for upgrading.

Security is absolutely critical, especially when running an e-commerce site. Does your service provider have the tools to verify your checkout processes? Can they be trusted? If they also host your email (often offered hand in hand with Web hosting services) do they have enterprise-level spam filtering?

You can read the full series of articles here.