SEO Web Hosting

We often get asked if there is a hosting company that we recommend to people in Guelph that are looking to rank locally. The answer is always the same. Go for hosting that you have full control of. Don’t be locked into hosting from your web developer, designer, or search engine optimization company. The reason for this is because if you ever decide to leave, you don’t have the freedom of taking back control of your website without someone that has a financial interest in locking you up in their hosting packages having the ultimate decision.

For this reason, always sign up for hosting using a regular hosting company, not a reseller. Do that first and then contact your SEO company and tell them that this is where your website is hosted. Be the owner of your own domain, it’s find to lend them the logins and passwords to implement the website and make the changes that are needed, but be in control of your own website. You don’t want to risk an angry developer locking your website up over a financial squabble or anything else for that matter.

Good Hosting Features

Here are a list of great features to look for in a hosting company.

Always look for a hosting company that performs regular, automated backups of your website. Even if you don’t have a virus, sometimes wordpress or the CMS that you use will automatically update plugins which aren’t compatible with your website, causing it to crash. The ability to click a few buttons and access a website backup from a few days before is extremely valuable.

I always recommend VPS hosting. VPS stands for virtual private server. The reason for this is because you aren’t sharing your server and ip with other unknown websites. A typical shared hosting package will make your website share its server with hundreds of other websites. If one of those websites does blackhat things such as email spamming, it can affect your ability to email clients without the email bouncing. VPS costs a bit more than regular shared hosting, but is worth it. I use Dreamhost VPS which costs $15 USD a month.

Look for a hosting company that does regular virus, and malware scans on your server. If you have to pay a bit etra, do so. A virus, or malware can cause Google to remove your website from searches. Google doesn’t rank websites that have a virus on them. You don’t want to find out when it’s too late.

The last thing to look for is a hosting company that has great support. Must be 24/7 phone and live chat for obvious reasons.

If you have any questions or concerns about your current hosting provider, please contact us and we will give you a free analysis of your current hosting platform from an SEO perspective.