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	HOME	BUSINESS
PRICE	£5/month (payable annually)	£10/month (payable annually)
	These are the actual prices - We don't charge VAT
Aimed at...	Personal websites, charities and 1-page business websites.	Anything! And can use CMS packages such as Wordpress and Joomla and Ecommerce such as OS-Commerce. See the 1-Click tab above.
Web Space	500 Mb	5,000 Mb
Data Transfer/ month	5Gb / month	50Gb / month
FTP Accounts	1	50
Sub Domains	-	50
MySQL Databases (with phpMyAdmin)	-	50
Mail Boxes	5	50
Autoresponders	5	50
Mailing Lists	5	50
Mail Forwarding	5	50
WEB BUILDER
CONTROL PANEL
FILE MANAGEMENT FEATURES
EMAIL FEATURES
WEB STATS AND LOGS
WEB RESOURCES (FREE SOFTWARE)
1-CLICK INSTALL	-
E-COMMERCE TOOLS	-
WEB TOOLS	-
WEB DIAGNOSTICS	-

Why Choose Us?

We're friendly, professional and our hosting is high quality (fast, reliable and has plenty of features)

Look at some of the nice things our customers have said about us. Testimonials Page.

We have been in business since 1997, we are located in Oxfordshire and so is our Technical Support.

As a bonus - we also do Wordpress and Website Design www.firstideas.co.uk - so if you do get stuck, maybe we can help out.

6 reasons to choose us for your web hosting

	1. Quality Hosting Our purpose built web hosting infrastructure is unrivalled in the UK for stability and reliability.
	2. Technical Support Our support database provides the answers to the majority of web hosting related questions and if you need to get in touch we are on hand to answer any questions you may have.
	3. Value for Money Because all of our hosting technology has been developed by us in-house we don't have any expensive licensing fees to pass on to our customers. That means we can offer you more for less!
	4. Control We believe in developing highly automated systems giving customers complete control of their web hosting. Our web hosting control panel is one of the most advanced available today.
	5. Growth Our web hosting is ideal for a beginner starting their first website through to SME's demanding their own powerful ecommerce solution.
	6. Monitoring and Security Upgrades We take our customer's security very seriously and all software is upgraded within 24 hours of new patches being released.

Website Hosting Control Panel

Standard with all of our hosting packages

Our web hosting control panel has been created to provide you with all the tools you need to make the most of your website. This guide will provide you with an over view of the great features available to our web hosting customers in their web hosting control.

Control Panel Home Page

Once you log in you will be presented with our web hosting Control Panel Home Page. From here you can access all the various tools and features to manage your website.

You can also quickly access details about your account (e.g. hosting package name, server type, and your FTP details) and how much of your account's allowance you have used (web space, bandwidth, Email accounts etc).

Files

We provide you with full access to upload and download your website's files with our easy to use file manager.

To ensure you never lose any of your work, backing up and restoring your website is all done in just a few clicks with the files stored on your local machine.?

Email

We offer one of the most powerful and flexible WebMail systems, features include your own address book, search features, customisable interface and scheduling.

You can also set up new mail boxes and delete any that you no longer need all in just a few clicks. In keeping with our ethos of giving you control you can decide how aggressive you want your junk filter to be and which email addresses it applies to on a box by box case or choose all emails attached to a domain name. You can also add specific addresses to your white list and to your black list.

Web stats & Logs

Check the performance and data usage of your website with our extensive analysis tools.

We have also automated the creation of a Google Site Map for your website to increase the likelihood of being found by their spiders. So you don't have to manually submit your site multiple times you can submit to the major search engines (Google, Yahoo, Microsoft etc) from here with just a couple of clicks.

Web tools

The 'Web Tools' area provides you with access to a raft of great features for those with a bit more technical knowledge than the average user.

MySQL Databases: From this area you can also manage your database by using phpMyAdmin, an easy to use web based interface for managing MySQL databases.

Password Protection: Website Password Protection allows you to password protect a directory on your website. Only people who have the password will be able to access the area.

Scheduled Tasks: Scheduled tasks allows you to enable programs to run automatically on the server at specific intervals.

Sub domains: Have a new web address for separate areas of your website e.g. news.bbc.co.uk

IP Address blocking: IP blocking allows you to block certain IP addresses or ranges from accessing your website. For example, you may wish to prevent a competitor from viewing your site or a known threat.

Switch PHP Version: Switch to PHP5 with just one click

Website help & diagnostics

Make sure your website is performing at optimal levels with our free diagnostic tools.

Ecommerce

Your web hosting is fully ecommerce enabled and comes packed with advanced ecommerce features and scripts.

You can provide your customer with a secure online shopping experience by using our free secure server (SSL) which allows you to accept data securely via your website. Choose from a collection of the most advanced ecommerce solutions available including Zen Shopping Cart, osCommerce Shopping Cart, CubeCart and Agora Shooping Cart.

CGI scripts

Our customers can choose to install as many scripts they want from one of the UKs most compressive list of one click install scripts.

WordPress, BuddyPress, Joomla, phpBB, Drupal, OpenAds and much more are all available in a just a matter of clicks.

	WordPress is arguably the most popular blogging software available today! It's easy to install and use and will allow you to have a great looking blog in minutes.
	BuddyPress is a suite of WordPressMU social networking plugins and themes to empower you to create your own social network.
	Joomla! is one of the most powerful Open Source Content Management Systems on the planet. It is used all over the world for everything from simple websites to complex corporate applications. Joomla! is easy to install, simple to manage, and reliable.
	phpBB is a high powered, fully scalable, and highly customisable open-source bulletin board package. phpBB3 has a user-friendly interface, simple and straightforward administration panel, and helpful FAQ.
	Drupal is a free software package that allows an individual or a community of users easily to publish, manage and organize a wide variety of content on a website.
	Openads is a hugely popular advert server designed for web publishers. It gives you the tools you need to make the most from online advertising. With Openads you will be able to manage sophisticated advertising programs and stay in control of all the advertising on your websites.

Other features

Our control panel is one of the world's most advanced web hosting control panels, here is a quick summary of the other great features available...

£300 free software 50 premium web templates 500 extra web templates 22,500 images Tracewatch Website redirection FrontPage extensions Banner templates Photo gallery Form to Email JavaScript maker And much more!

Manage your website on the go

100% free for all our customers our iPhone control panel provides exactly the same level of functionality as the normal control panel, but optimised for internet enabled mobile phones.

Your entire Control Panel can now be accessed with easy to use iPhone icons How? 1. Go to www.firstideas.co.uk or www.firstideas.com on your iPhone 2. Click on the Control Panel icon (blue circle, top right) 3. Your iPhone Control Panel appears automatically 4. Save it to your home screen (there is an icon at the bottom of your iPhone Safari screen to do this)

1-Click Install Software

Available with our Business Hosting (they're in your Control Panel)

Choose from our huge range of one click install scripts to get your website online in just a few clicks of your mouse. Whether you are building a brochure website, ecommerce store, blog, forum, or even a social network, you will find software to create a professional looking site using the latest technology.

With our one click install software you don't need to worry about Zip files, programming or setting up databases. All you have to do is click on the relevant icon and you are done. It is as easy as that!

Choose from our huge range of one click install scripts, ideal for any type of website...

WordPress WordPress is the world's most popular open source blogging platform, perfect for both commercial and personal use. Thanks to a massive community of designers and developers there are literally tens of thousands of themes, widgets and plugins available to download, meaning no two websites are ever the same. WordPress can be easily adapted for use as a standard CMS (content management system), so even if you don't need a blog, you can use WordPress to power your e-shop, photo gallery, video webpage, article-based site, directory or any other type of website you can think of.
Joomla Joomla is a user-friendly content management system with a huge range of features ready to use. The software is database-driven and ideal for web masters looking to develop, manage and edit web content without much technical knowledge. With a wide range of modules, components, plugins and languages available for free, you can customise and enhance your Joomla CMS to your specific requirements.
Drupal Drupal is a highly customisable content management system with thousands of modules, themes and plugins to extend and alter its capabilities. Winner of multiple Open Source CMS awards Drupal is ideal for those wanting a versatile and expandable web content solution. Drupal CMS can be used for a wide range of sites, including single and multiple user blogs, forums, communities, magazines, e-commerce solutions, photography showcases, galleries and much more.
Concrete5 Concrete5 is a powerful CMS built with every level of web design experience in mind. The easy to use WYSIWYG style editing features make it easy for site owners to make changes on the fly with no previous web design experience. The software is also perfect for web designers and developers looking for a purpose built CMS designed to be as flexible as you need it to be. Concrete5 can be used for a wide range of sites, including personal and business websites, forums, communities, magazines, e-commerce solutions, photography showcases, galleries and much more.
phpBB Create your online community using the market leading forum software. With an extensive community of designers and developers creating and sharing modifications and styles to customise your forum, you can create a unique forum quickly and easily.
bbPress Using WordPress as its platform, bbPress is open source forum software focused on speed and security, meaning you don't have to worry about slow loading pages or the risk of being hacked. The streamlined software is also lightweight and efficient for better use of space and bandwidth. bbPress enjoys many similar customisation elements to WordPress so you can develop and install themes and plugins (e.g. for ratings, video and private forums) to customise your forums.
OpenAds OpenAds gives you the tools you need to make the most from online advertising. With OpenAds you will be able to manage sophisticated advertising programs and stay in control of all the advertising on your websites. You can also give your advertisers their own control panel where they can monitor the performance of their advertising.
Elgg Elgg is an award-winning social networking engine, giving you the tools to create your own fully-featured social networks and applications. Elgg allows you to take full advantage of the power of social technology with elegant, flexible solutions for organisations, groups and individuals.

Other one click install software we offer includes:

	Nucleus: The building blocks you need to create a web presence. Whether you want to create a personal blog, a family page, or an online business site, Nucleus CMS can help you achieve your goals.
	Geeklog: Allows you to create your own virtual community area, complete with user administration, story posting, messaging, comments, polls, calendar, weblinks, and more.
	SugarCRM: Lets a business keep track of its relationships with its customers. Users can manage customer accounts, contacts, sales leads, calls, meetings etc. A dashboard showing the most successful leads, the sales pipeline, and the month-by-month outcomes for opportunities in the pipeline can be displayed.
	MediaWiki: A collaborative technology for organising information on websites. Work with others to maintain information. For example if you run a business you can share information with your colleagues at the same time as documenting it for yourself.
	Mambo: fully featured content management system that can be used for everything from simple websites to complex corporate applications.
	CMS made simple: Helps experienced web developers and designers to create sites of power and beauty in a fraction of the normal time.

Free Website Creation Guides

These beginner's guides can be downloaded to help you plan and build your first website, market it to increase traffic, and then make website improvements using visitor data.

The guides are completely free of charge.

Planning your website

This guide covers the planning stages of building your website including: identifying your target audience, choosing a domain name and hosting, developing site maps and wire frames, and conducting competitor research.

download planning guide (340K PDF)

Building your website

(HTML & CSS) This guide will introduce you to the concepts behind building a website, including looking at available software, using HTML & CSS and writing a basic web page.

download building guide (710Kb PDF)

Marketing your website

This guide provides practical online and offline marketing ideas to help you drive traffic to your site. Areas covered include search engine optimisation (SEO), pay per click (PPC) advertising, affiliate marketing, directories, email marketing, advertising networks, social media, PR, and print advertising.

download marketing guide (576 Kb PDF)

Improving your website

This guide will introduce you to the methods, tools and resources available for you to analyse your website. Find out how to collect and use data from web analytics, heat maps, user feedback and testing & optimisation to improve your website.

download improving guide (464 Kb PDF)

 

Website Builder

Included FREE with all of our hosting accounts (its in your Control Panel)

Our Website Builder is a fully featured website-building tool designed to let anyone create multi-page websites.

Some hosting companies limit the number of pages you can publish - not us!

You can create as many pages as you like and update them as often as you like.

Simple to use

Your website can be up and running in 5 easy steps

	1. Select your lay out and colour scheme
	2. Enter your details and information for the search engines
	3. Choose the topic of the page e.g. home page, about us, contact us etc.
	4. Add your content
	5. Click 'Publish'!

Packed full of great features

Website Builder guides you step-by-step, providing simple choices regarding colour, style and images. There is no software to buy, and no code to learn. In addition, there is no need to use programs such as FTP or Telnet.

	Content and Design Separation The content of the website is stored separately from the layout. This way, you can completely change the look and feel of your website in six clicks of the mouse, without ever having to retype any information.
	Complete Control over Colour Schemes Website Builder includes a number of built-in colour combinations that look great with any layout. But if a user wants to add a little originality to their site, all the colours can be changed, either by using a point-and-click colour picker, or, for even more control, typing in the colour as a hex number.
	On-The-Fly Image Generation Website Builder dynamically generates the images it needs for each website design, so each time you decide to change the colour combination for a page, the layout, or just a button caption, the necessary image is automatically created. You need not ever bother with complex and expensive programs such as Photoshop to create Websites with clean and professional-looking graphics: our designers have already done it for you!
	Variety of Pages Website Builder can be used to make many different pages. You can create an online CV, or build a personal photo album. Everything is done in a simple step-by-step process that is easy to learn and to follow.
	One-Click Publishing Your website is published with one easy click. But even after publishing, you can go back and change it as much as you wish. Clicking the publish button again will instantly reflect all the changes on the "live" version of your site.
	Autosave All your information is saved the moment it is entered. If you decide to log out, you can come back and continue building your website from the very point from where you left off.

Over 200 templates to choose from!

There are plenty of pre-designed templates to choose from and it is completely free to use with your account. Some examples include...

It features vibrant, professional designs and pre-built templates to speed your website development. Get your website online today!

Domain Names

Domain Names

We register domains as part of our Home or Business Hosting.

Domains	Prices
.co.uk org.uk .me.uk	£5.00 per year
.com .net .org .biz .info .eu .tel .name	£15.00 per year
	These are the actual prices We don't charge VAT

If you want to buy your own domain elsewhere, or use one you already have, then that's fine.

The advantage of us doing it, is that we do any configuration that's needed, and you only have 1 invoice to pay.

Check Domain Availability

whois.domaintools.com

Tips on choosing a domain name

Keep it short, keep it simple

To find your site people need to be able to remember your address and easily type it into their browser. Aim to register the shortest name that your customers and visitors will associate with your website.

Consider common typos

If you have a domain name that can easily by pluralised or miss-spelled consider registering those as well to stop traffic going elsewhere.

Don't shell out large amounts of money

Some companies still sell domain names for as much as £100 per year. Make sure you are getting a good deal!

Register your domain now!

You must register as soon as possible, or risk getting stuck with "the-domain-name-that-no-one-wanted.net". You do not have to have a Webmaster or an ecommerce department or a web design consultant... you don't even need a web page. Simply search for your domain name and register it yourself. Simple!

FAQs

How long will it take for my new domain name to become active?

Once your domain is registered, it can take between 24 and 72 hours for a domain name to become visible on the Internet as each DNS updates its database of domain names. This process is called propagation.

Do I own the domain name?

Yes - the domain is registered in your name.