As a small business owner, you likely know how important it is to own a website. With more than 3 billion internet users–well over half of the world’s population is now online an online presence is essential. Yet, a standalone website isn’t enough. Your competitors are also on the internet and if their websites are easier to find and faster than yours, visitors will quickly go to them instead.
Why is web hosting important?
Reliable web hosting (where your website lives) is an essential aspect of business. Most basic, entry-level hosting plans with the lowest prices are typically shared hosting. Shared hosting plans designate an assigned space on a single web server whose resources you’ll share with other websites. You won’t know who those neighbors are but should their sites overload the server and use too many resources, it will significantly reduce the performance and speed of your site.
In contrast, with a virtual private server (VPS) you are assigned space on a server owned and operated by a hosting company. Unlike shared hosting, you get a partitioned part of the VPS server that comes with its own operating system, bandwidth, and disk space and you don’t share it with anyone. VPS hosting will work like a dedicated server, without the cost, and can be customized to your business needs.
Why VPS hosting is best for small businesses
While shared hosting might be the perfect, affordable solution for a personal blog or small website with low traffic, most fast-growth businesses need more. Here are 6 business benefits of VPS hosting:
Speed
On average, most people will leave a website that doesn’t load within 3 seconds. If you opt for shared hosting, your site will load as fast as it can depending on what’s going on with your neighbor sites. Since you’re unable to predict how your site will perform and how fast it will load it can present a huge disadvantage, especially when an online visitor leaves your site for a quicker loading competitive site.
When you choose VPS hosting for your small business you aren’t sharing resources with anyone else. As a result, your website will load faster which will improve your bounce rate and keep customers on your website.
Faster page load times can also improve your search engine ranking. Website peed is a very important SEO factor. Google, in particular, loves fast-loading websites and rewards sites that make speed a priority. The higher your site is ranked on search engines, the more traffic, and business you’ll potentially receive.
Scale
VPS hosting plans are completely scalable (in most cases). They can grow with your business. That’s a huge advantage because you’ll simply be able to request and pay for more resources when you need them as opposed to experiencing downtime when you have to move your site to another provider or upgrade your hosting package.
Flexibility
VPS hosting and dedicated hosting can be customized to your business needs. However, VPS hosting makes this option far more affordable. Even though you might not be technically inclined, should you need custom features for your website, a developer will likely find what they need to implement those features within VPS hosting.
Security
One of the advantages of virtual private servers is customization which includes security measures. If you purchase managed VPS hosting, the good news is your hosting company will handle server security configurations for you. If your VPS hosting account is not managed, the good news is that with a little research, you can implement security measures needed to keep your account safe. If you have questions customer support will usually be happy to help.
Customer support
The support you receive for VPS and dedicated hosting usually surpasses what you’d receive with shared hosting fast. A good web host will help you troubleshoot issues right away to keep your site functioning as it should.
Cost
VPS hosting costs far less than dedicated server hosting. While some argue the cost variance between shared and VPS hosting is much higher, you get what you pay for. Greater speed and website performance generally equates to more traffic, better SEO rankings, and an improved bottom line.
Virtual private server hosting is a great option for small business websites. It’s a robust, full-featured web hosting solution that can grow along with your business at an affordable price. A website with improved speed and performance can hold its own alongside the competition and serve the needs of a growing online audience.
Caroline Bird is a writer with years of experience in business administration, who is currently sharing VPS web hosting tips on behalf of VPS HiSpeed. She enjoys meeting new people and reading more books to gain inspiration to write her own book. Connect with @BCarolinebird12 on Twitter.
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