What is the Best Web Hosting for Your Business?

You've got a website, that's great! Did you know that just as important as having a website is where it's hosted? What about the best web hosting for your home business and what about the costs incurred if you choose a sub-par service to save a couple of dollars a month?

Are a couple of dollars of savings per month really worth it when you have a serious ambition to build a thriving home based business? I think not.

You get what you pay for and it's no different when it comes to getting a decent hosting service for your website. What is the best web hosting for WordPress? Let's find out.

WPX Hosting

WPX Hosting is the fastest web hosting I've ever experienced. I've had it with Hostgator and their sloppy service. I had many a run in with the hosting provider and was ignored mostly when I tried to contact their support system.

I was actually getting to be quite disgusted at the lack of care and attention to detail that I needed. I went with Hostgator to save a few pennies, in the end, though, I lost more in terms of downtime and lost revenues plus the stress element involved. I do not recommend Hostgator any longer. Here's why!

Name: WPX (formerly known as: Traffic Planet Hosting)
Type: Web Hosting Company
Cost: Check Current Pricing Here
Pros: Free SSL Certificates and SSD Storage
Cons: Slightly higher cost
Recommended?: Definitely

Hostgator is a Dinosaur but it's Not Snappy!

I had many an issue with Hostgator and each time it got worse. Their support sucks. They did not care about my website issues that were consequences of their own sloppy support and incompetence.

I was frequently left on hold in the "live" chat with HostGator's support while they "checked with someone" about something. On no less than 3 occasions I was left "on hold" for over an hour and then the communication was dropped.

I had to start fresh and go through it all again, and repeat everything I'd already asked about. No way will I EVER go back to Hostgator even if they PAID ME to go back and gave me free hosting.

I can get free hosting in lots of places, including Wealthy Affiliate where I can get 10 sites hosted and the cost is included in my membership there.

At Wealthy Affiliate I even get to watch training on how to build websites and how to monetize them. I'm straying off topic, though, which is why I changed to WPX Hosting.

Dexter asked me why I wanted to change my hosting so I let rip about Hostgator and the crappy service I was experiencing. Here's what that conversation went like. I've edited out my cursing of HostGator in case there are any kids reading. This is meant to be a family friendly site. 🙂

The Following Conversation Changed My Mind Forever About Hosting!

Dexter: So, James, What issues are you having with your current provider?

Me: Well, I'm with Hostgator and every time I try to contact support they leave me on hold for long periods of time and the issue is never resolved.

I've been pulling my hair out for over 2 months now and I get the impression they're laughing behind my back while taking my money each month.

Dexter: Ah, yes we've had a lot of people transfer their sites to WPX for that reason. Hostgator is not as good as it used to be because a new company bought HostGator and seems to be letting the quality of hosting and support slip to low levels. It's taken a nose dive over the past year.

Me: Oh, so I'm not the only one then?

Dexter: You're not alone, lots of people have left Hostgator for the same reasons you want to leave. Not all of them have come to WPX but there are a lot of ex Hostgator websites here.

The Cost of WPX Hosting Compared to Hostgator

Me: Hmmm. But the price here is a bit more than at Hostgator!

Dexter: That's because here at WPX we use SSD which is much faster and our hosting is specially optimized for WordPress websites. Also, You get to have 5 websites hosted here for the same price.

Me: Ah, is that the $24.99 a month option?

Dexter: Yes. Also included should you require it is free SSL certification.

What is SSL?

Me: What's SSL certification?

Dexter: It's a more secure version of a website that turns your site from HTTP into HTTPS which is what PayPal and others use to better secure their sites against hackers.

Dexter: Very useful if you're wanting to run an e-commerce website that has a buy now button or a shopping cart.

Me: Ah, Yes, I know, I have noticed a lot of websites online that had HTTPS instead of just HTTP. Thanks for the lesson! Hmm.

So, what to do, Dexter? How easy is the migration of a site? I've never done that before.

What About Site Migration?

​Dexter: It's easy, all you have to do is give us the details such as domain name and a couple of numbers and things and we do the rest.

Dexter: A full migration usually takes less than 24 hours but can take up to 72 hours, which is not really something that is in our hands.

Dexter: It's the same for any hosting provider and depends on geographical elements that hosting companies have no control over.

What the heck is SSD?

Me: What's SSD?

Dexter: SSD means solid state drive. Solid state drive simply means no hard disks which are slower technology which is more prone to break down than SSD. You may have noticed SSD disks are also available for computer owners. SSD is storage for websites not on hard disks, which can be slow and break down easily.

Me: Ah yes, I know what SSD is, all my friends with SSD storage say it's super fast. Okay, Dexter, let me think for a minute. $24.99 a month for 5 sites hosted on SSD storage which will make my sites faster AND there is the option for SSL certificates for all my sites for free, is that right? That comes to about $5 per site, which isn't bad, actually.

Go Away and Think About it, James!

Dexter: Yes, that's right, James. If you'd like to go away and think about it, that's fine.

Me: And migration is easy and free too, right? Are there any hidden costs I should know about before I decide to buy?

Dexter: No, there are no hidden extra fees for you to worry about. The cost is zero dollars for site migration, James.

Me: Done! Take my money and shut up already, lol. My mind's made up, what do I do now, Dexter?

Dexter: Great to hear that, James! Okay, click this link and enter your details and you can pay with PayPal. Site migration can be started as soon as your site details are submitted to our support staff.

Dexter: They will send you an email when your site is migrated. You can log in as usual once your site is fully migrated and propagated.

Cutting a Long Story Short

And that's the true story of how I ended up hosting 5 of my sites at WPX Hosting. After the migration was complete I got to testing the so called speed improvements and I was astounded by the results. I used pingdom.com, GTmetrix.com and website.grader.com to test my site speed for all my websites.

Site Speed is Good for SEO!

All of my sites were loading in less than two seconds without any plugins. I activated my database and cache plugins and refreshed my site speed test! Wow.

All my sites were now loading in at less than one second. That's incredibly fast, and as you may already know, that's very good for SEO in ranking terms.

Slow sites don't get ranked well. People don't want to visit a site that takes 5 seconds to load. That's lost visitors by the hundreds for me at Hostgator.

What's the Support like at WPX Hosting?

Impressive, to say the least. I was worried that once I'd transferred my sites and paid up for the first month my first contact with support would be a miserable experience like at Hostgator.

I was pleasantly surprised by the speed of their reply to me. It took them minutes to get back to me and they quickly fixed my minor issues.

WPX live chat support were very polite and professional. The overall time from me discovering a problem to them fixing it was about 20 minutes.

I guess that few extra dollars per month for superior hosting and support was definitely worth doing. All of my websites are now snappier and happier than they ever were with you know who!

Having a home business is a serious matter and you need to keep your website up and running as close to 100% as is humanly possible.

Should You Move Your Websites to WPX Hosting?

You should only move your website if you're having major issues or you've had enough of bad service with your current hosting provider.

Hosting is just as important as the website you build. It can have a serious impact on your earnings when you consider site speed and site maintenance.

If you're happy with the service you're currently getting from providers like Hostgator or Bluehost I see no need to change, just yet.

So, What About the Best Web Hosting for Your Business?

You should get the best you can get for your own business if you want your business to stay in business, period.

Spending a couple of dollars extra per month will improve your return on investment. Be smart, get good hosting.

Get SSD storage, it's super fast and get free SSL for added security on your site.

UPDATE:

WPX Hosting has improved even more. WPX are now implementing extra security measures from Incapsula and the roll out of these measures should be complete by Friday 22nd July 2016.

Here is a copy of the email I received which explains the situation that is going to be a huge benefit to anyone with a site hosted at WPX. It's about the increasing occurrence of DDoS attacks on websites and how that impacts any online business.

As a part of our ongoing high-performance evolution of WPX Hosting we are about to add Enterprise level DDOS protection to all WPX Hosting customers’ websites. Incapsula, is an industry leader in DDOS protection.

This would normally be in the region of $10 per website per month with Incapsula directly.

You can read about Incapsula’s DDOS protection service here:
https://www.incapsula.com/ddos-protection-services.html

This significant change should be completed for you by Friday July 22 2016.

DDOS attacks are an increasingly common frustration for online businesses as illustrated by these VERY recent real-life horror stories:
http://www.fastcompany.com/3044460/fast-feed/github-is-still-under-the-biggest-ddos-attack-in-its-history
http://www.cbronline.com/news/mobility/security/massive-ddos-cyber-attack-takes-down-pokmon-go-4952177
https://www.hackread.com/hsbc-website-suffers-ddos-attack/

My Conclusion of WPX Hosting

Hostgator is a dinosaur that doesn't know it's extinct yet so it has lost its credibility in my eyes. I will never go back there again even if it were completely free.

Don't use sub-standard hosting if you want to build a serious home based online business that brings in your daily bread. Remember, the ROI will pay for that extra couple of dollars increase. 

Check out the Latest Pricing of WPX Hosting Here 

What is Your Experience with Hosting Providers?

I'd love to hear about your about your experiences at whatever hosting company you are with. Maybe you're at Hostgator or another provider and you're having major issues with sloppy and slow support that can't fix the simplest of things.

Maybe you have SSD hosting with WPX Hosting and you love it too. Either way, let me know below!

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Read more about me and the purpose of this website here.