The majority of our websites are developed on the WordPress platform, so there were levels of quality to consider when we chose our website hosting provider. The good news is that the options for managed WordPress hosting services have improved significantly in the past 10 years. That means a lot of good options have become available, but that doesn’t make the decision process any easier. To help, we have come up with seven criteria to guide you.
At Driftpoint Media, we have tried many different platforms before settling with the Goldilocks of managed WordPress hosting at Liquid Web.
01 Uptime
Unfortunately, every website is doomed to some downtime within its lifetime due to factors that are sometimes beyond our control (i.e., automatic WordPress, theme or plugin updates). When your website is down, that means loss of traffic and, consequently, loss of revenue. Having the right web hosting provider means having one with an average uptime greater than 99.9%. Not only does Liquid Web have an uptime of 99.99%, but they also have a “plugin performance monitor” that watches your site’s performance and tells us when plugins or themes have been updated and if/why your site is running slow. That brings us to speed.
02 Speed
Have you ever visited a website that takes more than 30 seconds to load? Did you consider leaving out of frustration? Load times should actually be 3 seconds or less, especially on mobile devices. Liquid Web runs on the latest technologies (PHP7) and provides an image optimization plugin to improve page speed.
03 Support
Driftpoint Media handles any troubleshooting when there are technical issues with your website, and that’s included in your contract with us. That’s why a hosting provider with efficient and knowledgeable customer support matters. If we submit a ticket, we expect an almost immediate response because downtime for you affects your bottom line and reflects on us. Liquid Web experts are available 24/7/365 and are famous for their fast and high-quality support.
04 Storage
Storage matters especially for sites that include a lot of content – images, videos, databases, etc. The more storage and bandwidth, the better. Bandwidth, the amount of content a website can deliver to a user during the time of their visit, should be unlimited. Liquid Web has no restrictions on traffic or page views.
05 Security
Did you know that around 91,000 WordPress hacking attempts happen every minute? Liquid Web monitors your site for suspicious activity and also provides a free SSL certificate. An SSL certificate provides an encrypted connection and establishes trust with your audience. If your site is secure, you’ll see the padlock icon before the URL in your browser, and an “s” in “https”.
06 Backups
Website backups should happen regularly, and a good hosting provider will do this on an automatic schedule. Backups keep a copy of your website and prevent you from losing all of your data if something unfortunate occurs. Liquid Web schedules daily backups that are stored for 30 days and are easily downloadable and restorable.
07 Pricing
We don’t need you to break the bank with an extravagant hosting plan, but we also don’t want you to cheap out on a service that can’t meet your needs. Liquid Web pricing is very fair compared to other hosting providers like WPEngine, GoDaddy, Bluehost, Dreamhost, etc. and is included with your annual contract with Driftpoint Media.
Along with these 7 features, we also love Liquid Web for their one-click WordPress installation, automatic updates and staging sites. But we’re not the only ones that love Liquid Web. According to wpbeginner.com, top companies like Motorola, Red Bull, ESPN, Audi and FedEx use Liquid Web as well.
If you’d like to know more or would like Driftpoint Media to help with hosting, designing or developing your website, reach out. We’d love to be part of your next project.
