We approach building our online business differently. There are no exact steps to take to ensure success. But we can at least mitigate the risks and prevent problems from happening with our WordPress sites. Deciding on a hosting provider might not be one of the most exciting tasks of putting up your online presence, but it is one of the most important processes you cannot take lightly.
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Below is a list of mistakes that some website owners do when starting. Avoid these, and you’re off to a good start.
Not Checking on Hosting Provider Reputation
In truth, most of the hosting solutions are not much different from each other. Some of them have the same offering and even the same price points. However, the similarities stop there. For sure, they will differ in performance, and clients are not afraid to let others know of good or bad points. One can easily find reviews for hosting providers. In addition, it’s not enough to read one or two reviews. Diligently find out what the sentiment is towards the prospect hosting provider you are eyeing.
Not Clarifying Fine Prints
Before signing up, be meticulous and read through everything about the service. There are marketing traps that are lurking around set in fine prints. Fine prints are made so small, customers skip through them. At times, these fine prints are restrictions or limitations of services that may not suit your needs. Because these are printed in small fonts, some just scan through. Don’t make that mistake.
Settling for the Lowest Package
It’s tempting to decide on the hosting provider with the lowest cost. We all want to save whenever we can. But is the cheapest really the best choice? Not all the time. You may be paying for the cheapest package but the service or value may be less.
In the end, it might not be the cheapest but the most expensive because of additional services or features that you need to include. Solving technical issues, when you can be focusing on more important things like content and selling, is just too much of a hassle, so a bit of price increase is a little price to pay for peace of mind. Also, there are service extras that sometimes come as a part of a premium product. For example, some providers offer WordPress hosting perks such as free SSL protection, so it is also a good idea to check out other promotions & extra features that complement your intended package.
Forgetting about Scalability
Your aim is to do well someday. If you do things right, your next big sale might come tomorrow. However, are you equipped or prepared for your online opportunity? Some website owners fail to future-proof their website plans, hence their hosting solution packages cannot keep up. Lag time, insufficient storage, failed backups, lost analytics, problems go on. You might have prepared for your current setup, but not for the distant future. On the other hand, forecasting how your site will grow can be difficult. Choose a hosting solution that knows your system is to ease the burden of forecasting.
Mediocre Customer Service
Ensuring that you have the best people to back you up when something goes wrong means you have prepared well. Failure to do this is simply bad planning. No system or process is perfect. In some instances, a previously working system will bog down. When this happens, your support team should be able to bring things back up and running. This is no different with your website. When your site goes down, putting it back up as fast as you can depends on the customer service support of your hosting provider. In short, they are in a way. your failover solution. However, some hosting providers focus on product and forget about after-sales support. Testing customer service gives you an idea of hour hosting provider’s approach to risks, emergencies and business recovery and continuity.
Proceed with Caution
Choosing a hosting solution is part and parcel of your online plans. It should not be an afterthought forcing you to be careless about choosing a hosting provider. Your hosting solution is an integral part of what you do online and proceeding cautiously is the correct approach.