Hosting Package:  

Their Netfirms Plus package offers 10 GB in storage space and 500 GB in monthly bandwidth, which is good for starting out.  Most websites can outgrow these totals within a few months though.  Luckily, the Netfirms Advantage package is only a few dollars extra and offers a lot more storage space and monthly bandwidth.  There are other features added and increased to justify the larger price tag.

Ease of Use:  

Netfirms has easy to use features.  If you have any issues, you can consult their knowledgebase and reference guide for answers.  If you're still having problems once you've perused those two tomes, you can contact their customer service.  According to their website, 90% of inquiries are responded to within 8 hours and 95% of all inquiries are resolved during the first contact with them.

Support and Service:  

You can contact Netfirms through email, telephone or their live chat service.  Live chat is always helpful because you can talk to customer service representatives quickly.  The other two methods aren't too bad though.  We had no problem getting a quick answer using any of the three contact methods.

Site Creation Tools:  

Netfirms offers a site builder tool, but it's strange.  Even if you upgrade to the deluxe version of this tool, you're only allowed to have a website that has up to 10 pages.  For those who want to turn their website into a store, they're limited to 500 items.  If you look past these odd limitations, you will see their site builder is one of the best in the business.

Server Access:  

You have to get the Netfirms Advantage package to even be allowed to have multiple FTP accounts.  The most you can get total is 50 with the Business package.  Allowing users to have more FTP accounts when they buy the Plus package would be helpful.

Marketing Tools:  

Netfirms offers vouchers for Google and Facebook ads in addition to Google Webmaster Tools.  The vouchers are smaller in the Plus package.

Reporting and Statistics:  

Netfirms has the ability to let you monitor how many visitors you're getting, what times are the busiest, where your visitors are coming from and the levels of traffic search engines are sending to your site.

Overall, Netfirms has a good track record in providing simple, quality web hosting plans at reasonable cost. Customer service is above average.  It's a safe option.  You won't be disappointed if you decide to go with them.