Choosing a hosting company

Your choice of hosting management company is one of the most crucial decisions you can make regarding your website.

Price shouldn’t be the deciding factor

It is often the case that when choosing a website hosting provider, that choice is based largely on price. While this is most certainly an extremely valid consideration, it should not be the only consideration. Here’s why.

Hosting companies are not created equal

Many hosting companies – particularly the cheaper ones – operate a low price, high volume business model. They ensure maximum profit by only providing basic hardware and software. In addition, they often have inexperienced, low-paid technical support staff.

The result for you is a slow, under-performing website that is prone to server outages and support staff who are unavailable or unable to assist you.

Cheap hosting costs you money

Cheap hosting companies often cost you more money over time. Consider the following exercise:

As best you can, estimate how much revenue your website generates your organisation per hour. Take into account lead generation, brand awareness, affiliate marketing etc. Now imagine your website is offline for an hour. Does the lost revenue exceed the cost of monthly hosting? For most organisations, it does.

Website outages negatively affect your brand

Websites using cheaper hosting are often slower because the hosting company has overburdened their IT infrastructure to maximise profits. This can also result in the server going offline and your website becoming unavailable.

In the same way that a customer will become frustrated by slow service in a physical store or arriving at your store to find that it is closed, so too will they experience that frustration online. In essence, the customer has a negative experience of your brand.

Limited hosting packages restrict your growth

In their desire to be both appealing yet extremely profitable, some hosting companies will create hosting packages that seem to offer you many “features”. Examples of these are, “20 databases” or “unlimited email aliases”. They are enticing users with “big numbers”.

The truth of the matter is that most – if not all – of their customers will never require more than 1 or 2 databases. These packages are invariably locked down, either preventing you from adding additional functionality or charging you exorbitant fees for creating a “bespoke package”.

Our approach is less about hosting and more about peace-of-mind

For us, it’s about providing you with all the tools you need to achieve your goals, keeping a watchful eye over your website and assisting you whenever you need it.

To that end we are working with WP Engine – the world’s premier WordPress hosting company. We then add a layer of our own tools and exemplary customer support. For ultimate peace-of-mind, we have a monthly service level agreement (SLA) in place that allows us to assist you with the maintenance of your website.