WordPress sites are very popular in today’s age, comprising over 41% of websites on the internet. Thus it’s safe to assume we will pick it out as the basis for our sites. For further maintenance and support of our sites, we turn to web hosting providers. Web hosting providers are service providers that possess servers, connectivity, and other associated services that allow us to put up a site and maintain it.
This is a much easier way of setting up a site, usually being cheaper than obtaining all the necessary parts and employees yourself.
However, it can result in negative experiences. Web hosting providers not fulfilling their duties or neglecting our complaints can put a real dent in the everyday operations of the business site is tied to. Thankfully, multitude of businesses provide this service, this makes switching from your current provider a viable option. While providers being flooded with a sudden surge of work is to be expected, it shouldn’t detract from our experience long term.
Here are some examples of bad web hosting provider behavior that you should avoid by switching to another service.
1. Lack of customer support
The most-wide reaching issue you can happen upon is lack of customer support. Customer support is the first place where we look for resolutions to our current issues and it should be consistently available to concerned customers. Bad customer support usually leads to a lot of other issues, the first one being more server downtime as sudden bugs and malfunctions may force us to shut the site down until it’s fixed.
Being unable to contact technical support also adds to our everyday stress, having us spend a lot of energy and time on being frustrated. Improper support may not be felt in the initial few months or even a whole year but can become apparent later down the line. If it does it is most likely the time to move on from that provider, as fixing this category is rather difficult without providers spending ample time equipping their employees or hiring new people.
In case you still haven’t picked out your provider or have recently cut ties with one due to other negative behavior make sure that your new provider has 24/7 support. You should also read up any reviews posted about them to make sure they are doing proper tech support for their customers.
2. Frequent downtime
Of course, we want our website to be up as frequently as possible. While some downtime has to happen for the sake of maintenance and fixes it should never keep our site down for more than an hour or two.
The downtime could also happen during hours where traffic on your site is unusually large, heavily reducing interaction with your site.
However, this same traffic can cause downtime if the web hosting provider’s servers aren’t capable of handling the number coming in. This can be due to the business package you opted for, choosing less formidable servers to put your site on rather than shilling additional money for more potent ones, but it can also be purely from providers neglecting their part of the deal.
Needless to say, this behavior shouldn’t be tolerated. If you are paying for a service it should be readily available and operating at full functionality.
3. Slow website
The key to building up your presence online is having a site that loads quickly. People don’t want to wait around for more than a few seconds for the site to load and may consider looking for other sites that offer the same services instead if your site is performing slowly.
This goes double for sites that rely on frequent visits or possess multiple pages that the user has to access before getting wanted information. While WordPress possesses some inherent speed issues due to the plugin numbers that operate in the background, the true issues set in when your provider isn’t offering proper speeds for your site.
The problems inherent to WordPress can be lessened through optimizing your site but bad web hosting provider services can’t. The servers your site is hosted on are most likely at fault here. Just like with the high traffic issue we’ve mentioned in the previous category, slow loading times may be caused by a lack of power or it could be due to providers not offering proper services.
If it’s a lack of power we can simply upgrade to a higher business package, usually resolving the problem.
However, if the issue stems from our provider being unable to forward speeds we’ve paid for it’s time to pack up and leave. This doesn’t happen frequently but will tank your capabilities down considerably. Another aspect that may impact your speed is the location of the server. The distance between the servers and your consumer base is very important, as access to the site could have considerable latency involved.
Make sure to research what areas are the best for your site. Also, in case you are planning to broaden your businesses’ reach to other countries, it is fruitful to purchase web hosting services from a provider in that area.
For example, if you were to open your business to the Asian market you could use xxiwebhosting.com which currently offers servers in Thailand. Having a server that’s that much closer to your new consumer base is extremely useful.
4. Bad security
We’ve covered speed, downtime, customer support, but now we will take a peek at a category you really don’t want to be lacking in. The security of your site is important not only because it protects your private information but also the information of all users of your site. Those sites that use excessive personal information should be especially mindful of their security.
Compromised security has a high chance of triggering chain reactions that could include more server downtime, loss of users, and loss of integrity.
Make sure your provider can offer the best backend and frontend protection before signing up for their services. After all, we expect professional support and performance for the money we invest. In case your provider doesn’t have formidable security you should make the jump as soon as possible.
While good security isn’t something you’ll frequently notice, as one does server speed, it’s very important as getting hit with a cyberattack could jeopardize our entire service. If one such attack happens it could be too late to upgrade our security measures so it’s always better to take preemptive actions.
Conclusion
The sheer number of options and simple, online nature of web hosting providers affords us the benefit of choice. With this benefit, we shouldn’t stand for anything but stellar service that reflects the price of the business package we’ve signed up for. If any of the aforementioned issues occur on your site talk with your provider. In case they don’t offer better service after you’ve brought up your complaints to them, leave for another service that’ll fulfill your needs.
