I didn’t expect regional interest on United States based hosting company Hostgator is much higher in Singapore than in United States.

Much, much more higher.

From Google Insights, it seems that Hostgator related searches (such as Hostgator hosting, Hostgator coupons, and Hostgator reviews) are mainly coming from Asia countries like Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines, Indonesia, and India. Singapore – a small nation with 4.5 millions population, topped the table for Hostgator’s regional interest for year 2008. (Google Insights data shown here)

Why is Hostgator much wanted in Singapore, and other Asia countries?

I was searching around Asia based forums and articles but couldn’t draw any solid conclusion on the question. However, I do come up with a few explanations based on my searches, Hostgator’s much interested in Asia countries might because of:

1. Load time factor vs website targeted audience

One, websites hosted in United States load faster for United States users.

Two, while globalization’s already reshuffling world’s economic standings; United States remain as the biggest spenders for online shopping.  Affiliate network (like CJ.com and ShareASale.com), Google Adsense, AdBrite – major e-commerce networks are based in United States.

Combining the factors above, it’s reasonable to believe that Asians who wish to start their home based business would focus on U.S. market and hosting with a U.S. based web host.

2. Hosting cost

Check this out, a Baby-Gator hosting package at Hostgator cost $7.95/mo for 600GB/6,000GB disk storage/bandwidth, unlimited addon domains; a standard hosting plan at Singapore based PozNet cost $9.5/mo (S$160/yr) for 350MB/35GB disk storage/bandwidth.

That’s right, you gotta pay extra for less features for Singapore hosting. The pricing is more or less the same with other Singapore based hosting, for example: Vodien cost $17/mo (S$24/mo) for 10GB/unlimited disk storage space/bandwidth; CyberSite cost $10.5/mo (S$15/mo) for 200MB/unlimited disk storage/bandwidth, HostSG cost $8.5 (S$12/mo) for 2GB/20GB disk storage/bandwidth.

So should you go with Hostgator if you’re from Singapore, or Malaysia, or Indonesia?

It’s obvious that hosting with Hostgator save you more money. Unless your website’s targeted audience are mainly local (for better loadtime); else I don’t see why you should limit your hosting choice within the local region.

$7.95/mo for 600GB/6,000GB disk storage/bandwidth, reliable web hosting server with long uptime, strong customer supports – I don’t see why you shouldn’t go with Hostgator – regardless which part of the globe you’re staying at.

The quick answer is ‘YES’. In fact, any ftp client or using the cPanel file manager will do.

How to upload files directly from Dreamweaver?

To upload files directly from Dreamweaver, you have to first configure the server settings in your Dreamweaver file manager. You can do this either by creating a new ‘FTP & RDS Server’ or creating a new ‘site’ that linked to your server via FTP.

Configuration for FTP & RDS Server

Working on the FTP & RDS Server environment allows you to work directly on the files at your server.

Any changes saved will be visible at your website immediately.

Setting up a new ‘FTP & RDS Server’ all you need is to fill in the necessary details like your host FTP address, folder that you wished to FTP, your login details, and the name you wish to put for the server.

Configuration at the ‘Site’ option

On the other hand, you can configure the FTP connection in Dreamweaver while setting up your site at the File Manager. Simply select ‘FTP’ on the remote server connection, fill in all the details like the host FTP address, folder that you wished to FTP as well as your login details and you’re ready to go.

A quick screen cap for your reference:

FTP at Hostgator is easy!

I hope this solved your doubts in FTP-ing files to Hostgator. Do leave your comment in case you have other related questions.

How popular is Hostgator when compare to iPower hosting and Hostmonster?

Well the answer is “not much different” according to Google Insights. A quick check on these three hosting companies for the past four years draw a conclusion that all three of these web hosts are interested by searchers more or less the same recently.

It’s obvious that iPower was leading in the beginning of year 2004 (as they were one of the pioneer); Hostgator and Hostmonster grew exponentially quick and hence, the search trend shown in the graphic below.

Where will Hostgator be in the next 2 years?

Summing up with Hostgator’s recent move in Going Green (using renewable energy to power their servers); I’m expecting the hosting company to continue its strong grow trend and leave the other two behind in one or two year time.

“Does it matter what forum software I use for my site, what won’t Hostgator accept?”

I saw the question not long ago at Hostgator support forum and was very surprise that to learn that there’s certain hosting companies are limiting software usage on their shared hosting servers. I guess these guys are just too afraid that the custom software might eats up all their limited server memory huh?

Well, back to the question, as a user, you can actually install all sort of forum software into your hosting account.

It’s, of course, prohibited if you’re planning to install trojans/viruses into the server but most web applications are acceptable at Hostgator. In our case here, the user wanted to use MyBB for his/her forum and that’s totally fine with Hostgator.

On top of the issue, I actually noticed some other things at Hostgator.

Here’s a screen cap on the dialouge.

Noticed how fast the question got a response at Hostgator forum? It’s 2 minutes away, and you got your question answered! That’s the fastest response I ever seen – and this shows how active is Hostgator forum.

Why does this matter to you?

An active forum matters a lot because this means there’s help whenever you need it.

Imagine that you are stucked or you’re having problem with your web host, you do not want the problem hang halfway there for days! With an active forum around the community, Hostgator customers are sharing their knowledge and helping each other.

Yes. Minority Hostgator accounts might experienced a short server outage on 22nd September as I read outage reports on Hostgator “Server Gator352″.

As Hostgator staffs (Gator David) reported, it seems the outage is caused by networking issue and they were taking immediate action in resolving the issues.

The server didn’t took long to come back as the problem is fixed within half and hour. Referring to the screen-cap below, the Server Gator352 is now back to operational.