When it comes to web hosting, you get what you pay for, right? It should be like that, but for my sites the $50/month I was paying for a virtual dedicated server was a painful experience. (Hint: I don't blame the host. I blame myself.)
More web hosting isn't always better. And more control over that hosting isn't always better, either. I learned that the hard way.
My web hosting for this website, 2004 to 2009-ish
I've hosted this website with three different companies over the past 14 years. The first deal I got way back with 1and1 was too good to pass up. It was free for at least a year; I want to say it was free for three years but I could be mistaken. In addition, I got a free domain with that hosting. (This was before I learned that it's better not to have your domain and hosting at the same place, just in case.)
Eventually, as WordPress got more and more involved, and the database for the site grew, I needed more, so I got a virtual dedicated server for web hosting for this site. I kept this hosting from 1and1 until a few years ago; it had some other sites hosted on it until I finally pulled the plug, mainly to consolidate. It was low-maintenance hosting and as good a choice as any.
My web hosting for this website: 2009 to 2015
The next step I took was to get a virtual dedicated server from HostGator. The server was fully managed and ready to go. (There were other options for even cheaper dedicated servers, but that would mean installing everything from a blank directory myself, and I knew I wasn't up to that.)
The site worked fine for a while, but after that, it got slow and sometimes would go out completely on me. HostGator got me up and running again each time, but the website seemed to limp along a lot more than I would have liked.
What I learned from this was that there's a lot more to maintaining dedicated web hosting — even on a fully managed web server — than with shared hosting (which was what I had before, and what I have now). Had I known how to do this properly, I'm sure it would have flown.
The reason why this kind of web hosting may make sense for some people is that what you can do with a dedicated server is more flexible than what you can do with shared hosting. And to be fair, I didn't really need flexibility. WordPress, the blogging software I've used for more than a decade now, is pretty vanilla.
Web hosting: 2015 to today
So, tail tucked between my legs, I went back to shared hosting. Fortunately, in the meantime, hardware had gotten a lot faster and I happened onto SiteGround, my current web hosting.
It was a relief, actually. At the time when I signed up they migrated everything from my old hosting account, and, frankly, my sites flew after they did. I know that part of the magic is that they had servers with solid-state drives, which are way faster than spindle hard drives.
When I renewed, I took advantage of the 30% discount they offered for paying for three years at a time. The service has been that good, and I've had almost no reason to contact tech support over the year and a half I've used them. The times I have used tech support, they're fast and usually chatting with me in seconds.
The real kicker? My SiteGround hosting costs me less than half of what HostGator did.
Now, again, this isn't meaning to speak ill of HostGator! I'm chalking it up to the fact that I didn't have the desire to learn how to tune a very flexible hosting package so that it purred like a kitten. They gave me the server space, and then let me sink or swim.
There is some benefit to not having all the control you want!
As a blogger, here are some other features that I really like about SiteGround:
- Integrated caching and content delivery network. Caching web pages improves performance by not generating each page each time it's requested. And content delivery networks (CDNs) distribute the resources to servers all over the world, making it a shorter jump to get to people's home computers. Translation: These are two integrated tools to make the web pages faster for people viewing them.
- Auto-updating of WordPress. I don't have to lift a finger to get the newest installation on my sites. It just happens. (SiteGround is taking care of themselves, too; if sites are running off of the newest version, they're likely more secure. Win-win!)
- Integration of free Let's Encrypt SSL certificates. There's likely a bit of a search engine boost for that https. There's a nonprofit called the Internet Security Research Group that offers free SSL certificates — real ones, not self-generated ones that throw up all kinds of “Unclean! Unclean!” warnings in web browsers — through Let's Encrypt. In fact, if I start up a new site on the hosting now, it's HTTPS by default. How cool is that?!
- Simplified user dashboard. When I started using SiteGround, they used cPanel for the dashboard, which is largely easy enough to work with. Recently, though, they've really streamlined the dashboard (probably to save money, but no matter) and it's pretty slick.
- Incredibly helpful tech support. And fast, too–rarely have I had to wait more than a couple of minutes to get someone helping me.
Web hosting doesn't have to break the bank to be great
When I was just starting out and had no traffic at all, the hosted plan from 1and1 was plenty. There are any number of web hosting companies that offer plans for next to nothing ($5/month or thereabouts).
But the point I learned was that there are really fantastic, easy to manage, and still-inexpensive web hosts like SiteGround that can handle moderate traffic, but don't require the ongoing attention and maintenance of a private server, virtual or otherwise.
More expensive isn't always better for everyone. Less expensive was actually better for me, and for my websites.
