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How to Choose The Best Hosting for Magento Store
It is true that finding a perfect hosting service for your Magento online store is not an easy thing to do. Magento is a flexible E-commerce platform, but you need to know how to use it properly if you want to get the most benefit out of it. There are probably several hosting services out there that can meet the minimum requirements for your Magento online store, but you may want to consider some things first before you make your choice.
1. Hosting servers types
The performance of your website will depend on the type of the server and the hardware resources that is available for the website to work. The type of your hosting server is especially important for your store active hours when the load is higher than usual (like in Holiday shopping time). There are several popular types of hosting solutions that available out there:
•Shared resources
In the shared hosting option, the system resources are located inside one server that is used for several websites at once. That is mean, the performance level will be lower than what you can get from the dedicated server. However, if the shared hosting is Magento optimized (it has all the required configuration for Magento), then this kind of hosting can work fairly well for a small online store with a few products inside, depends on the available resources on the server.
•Virtual Private Server (VPS)
This server is a bit similar with shared hosting. It also uses shared system but in a different kind of way. The performance in VPS hosting is better than shared hosting because the resources are dedicated to the users more compared than what you can get from shared resources. This kind of hosting is the best choice if you have a middle size store with a decent amount of products inside.
•Dedicated server
With this hosting choice, you will have your own dedicated server/computer that separated from the others. All of the available resources will be used solely for your website's needs. This kind of hosting server also implements different configuration on the server in order to improve the website performance, which did not always work if you decided to use shared server. While it is true that dedicated server is particularly fast compared to another kind of hosting, it usually far more expensive than the others.
•Cloud solution
This is the most flexible solution for your hosting problem. This kind of hosting based on shared resource but it can be scaled based on your own needs. Cloud solution is equal with a dedicated server, or even better. This hosting solution is the best choice if you plan to increase your sales in the future later. With this hosting, you can have all the required resources without the need to move out to another server when your store keep growing bigger and bigger. Cloud hosting is a complex set of cluster system that allows sharing a specific amount of resources required for a website. The cost that you need to pay for cloud hosting will depend on the amount of resources you want to use.
2. Ensure they have an experience in Magento hosting
A web hosting company who specialized in Magento might be a live-saver when a serious issue appears. Due to the fact that Magento is an open source platform, it will be a bit harder for you to look for help unless you are a Magento Enterprise client. Asking for your web hosting service for help when an error appears in your Magento store or simply asking them for help to configure something can save you hours of searching to look for someone who can help you with that problem.
Getting an easy help is not the only benefit that you can get from hiring a specialized Magento hosting. A web host that know about Magento also can help you to avoid all common mistakes, helps you to set up your online store properly from the very beginning so you can optimize your store early, and also ensure the security of your online store.
3. Good support
It will be the best if you can get a 24 hours support from your hosting provider. If you get an unexpected critical issue, you do not have to worry because you know you can always email them or call them anytime and they will help you to fix the problem.
The hosting company who is not willing to help you when a problem arises it is like an unavailable girlfriend. They do not call you. They do not answer your call. They just want your money and then disappear somewhere. They always know how to make excuses to avoid all the problems. Eventually, you will lose your patience and decide to break up with them.
It is very important to get a full 24 hours of support from your hosting provider. If you call them or send an email to them, the provider should have a knowledgeable staff member ready to answer all of your questions.
When you are searching for a hosting provider, you need to look for a company with uptime guarantees and service level agreements, also an online tech support or live chat.
4. Bigger size is not always better
Choosing the most popular and biggest hosting service may not be always in your favor. If you want to get a personal attention from your hosting provider then you better avoid huge companies. It will be better if you choose a rather smaller hosting company which provides the more managed approach to hosting service for your Magento online store.
You can try to send them an email and ask all the questions related to the specific service which you think is required for your store management. See how they react with your email.
5. Know your own requirements
This is one of the main steps that you need to go through when selecting the right hosting for your Magento store. There are three fundamental steps in this process. They are disk spaces, bandwidth, and processing capacity.
Most people make a common mistake because they use average values for those key metrics. This is also the main reason why stores fail to perform during rush hours when the demand often exceed those average numbers.
6. Do they provide backup service?
Anything can happen to your online store. That is why backup is always needed no matter what. You must pay attention to the backup service which provided by your hosting. It will be better if you can get a fresh daily, weekly or at least monthly backup plan. A good hosting provider should be able to help you with that. The backup plan is either included in the hosting plan or offered as a separate service.
7. Choose the right hosting type
Now, the next thing to consider is the type of hosting solution. This is a very important decision because it pertains to the day-to-day management in your online store.
The first hosting type to consider is the self-managed hosting solution. This hosting type option is the best choice if you are a savvy person who understands the underlying works of server hardware and software. You will have a complete control of your server, so you can coax out high performance from your server.
The con is, this kind of server will need a continues and undivided attention from you. Usually, it is possible for a store owner or an administrator who has to see and manage other crucial aspects at the same time to be able to run their store properly while they need to manage their server too.
The second hosting type that you can use is the managed hosting solution. This hosting solution is provided by a vendor who will take care of all aspects of server management, including updates and backups. That is mean, you only need to worry about manage the store while at the same time the hosting provider will take care of all hardware and software issues.
8. Hosting security
A good hosting company should care about the privacy and security of the data stored on their servers. All of your information needs to be highly secured. If a data leak happens, it will cause critical security issue that affects your business greatly.
So, the hosting company should confirm to you that they follow all the security standards and their servers are protected. You can ask them to show you their security policies.
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