People start blogs for various reasons. They may want to use a blog as an extension of their social media, or they are planning on building a sustainable business from it. Starting a blog is actually quite a simple process. Choose a domain name, register it, find a decent web host and install WordPress, and you are ready to go. If you have no experience in any of this, you may be a little nervous, especially if you are not a technical person. One of the questions you will have, is “what is the best host for a blog?”.
In this post, I am going to tell you how to choose a web host by giving you some things to look out for. I will also give you a great recommendation.
Why It Is Important To Use A Good Host?
In general, starting an online business is cheaper than traditional bricks and mortar businesses, but there are a few upfront expenses that you need to make, even for a blog.
The one thing that you really should get right is your web host. The reason is that if your website hosting goes down, your website is offline. If your host is too slow, people won’t wait for pages to load and it will harm your search engine rankings.
Therefore, it is worth spending a bit of time working out which host is reliable and fast enough, while giving you good value for money.
But.......
Before I get on with talking you about hosting, there is something else you need to be aware of.
You need to know about WordPress, which is the easiest way bloggers and website owners can build and manage their websites.
WordPress is a content management platform that is designed for people with no coding skills to build and manage a great looking website. It does this with a vast selection of plugins that can give your website the features and functions you want it to have. WordPress also has thousands of beautiful themes and templates to make it easy to customise the appearance of your website.
Things To Look Out For In A Good Website Host
There are quite a lot of factors that determine what a good website host is. But, I am going to go through the main ones without getting too techy and confusing.
SSL Certificates
A big priority of Google is security, especially if your website collects personal data or credit card information. Therefore, your website host should have SSL Certificates, which help to encrypt data. The easiest way to tell if a website has an SSL certificate is by looking at the URL. If there is an SSL certificate, the URL will start with HTTPS, rather than HTTP. If your website uses e-commerce, you have to use a host with SSL certificates.
Cost
Choosing the cheapest website host isn’t always the best thing to do. This is because they can be unreliable and slow. I will give you some good recommendations later on in this post that are good value for money.
Backups
Backing up your website regularly is super important. It should be done every few days, especially if you Crete lots of content. I also recommend backing up before doing any theme or WordPress updates. But, a good website host should give you some backup options.
Customer Service
There will be occasions when you have problems with your website. This can be off-putting for someone that doesn’t have experience in managing websites. Therefore it is important to choose a web host with good customer service to dig you out of any holes you find yourself in.
As a blogger or business owner, you don’t want to use the email address you were using at school ([email protected] isn’t very professional). Therefore, you need to make sure that your email address is on the same domain as your URL. So make sure your web host gives you this option.
Reliability
You never want your website to go down, as it That means it’s important to work with a hosting company that is reliable and keeps downtimes to a minimum.
With all this said, you may want to go with a web host that is affordable, with some good features and offers great customer service.
If this is the case, I recommend that you go with Bluehost. It is good value for money, and their customer service has always been fantastic, which is a very important thing if you’re just starting out, or you just want to concentrate on developing your blog/website.
Avoid Free Website Hosts If You Are Serious About Your Website
Sites like Wix or Weebly, offer “free online website builders,”. The problem with these is that you don’t have any flexibility, which makes it very difficult to run a business from.
The only time these are useful is when you want to try something out, or you have the most basic of blogs where you are honing your skills.
The biggest reason why you want to avoid free website hosting is that you have no control. It is quite common for people to create loads of great content, and then one day it has been taken down because you have inadvertently posted something that’s against the terms of service.
Different Types Of Web Hosting
When you start researching web hosting options, you will find that there are several of different types of hosting options. This is can seem a bit complicated, and it is easy to end up with a more powerful hosting option than you need.
Dedicated
Dedicated hosting gives you an entire server just to yourself. This means your hosting is super fast, but it is also super expensive. If you are looking t hosting your blog, this shouldn’t even be on your radar, so move along..
VPS (Virtual Private Server)
The best way to look at a VPS host is, to imagine having your own little mini-server within a server, that is dedicated to you. This is still a bit overkill and expensive for a blog, so you probably won’t be considering VPS at this stage.
Shared
If cost is an issue for you, shared hosting is what you are more likely to be looking at using. With shared hosting, your website is hosted on the same servers as many other websites, making it more affordable.
Shared hosting is definitely the cheapest option ($3-15/month), so you should check out a few things before committing to a shared host.
- Site speed
- Email deliverability
- Security issues.
There are quite a few benefits on top of their value for money. For example, most shared hosting providers make it very easy to install WordPress with just one click.
Bluehost also makes it very easy to install WordPress, so you can get started with creating a fantastic blog straight away.
The Best Hosting For Most Bloggers
I have given you quite a lot of information there, but you probably just want a short answer to the question of “What Is The Best Host For A Blog?”.
In my opinion and experience, if you want a good reliable host that is fast and secure, you can’t go wrong with Bluehost. This is a common host that people use when starting a new website or blog. One of the most significant selling points of Bluehost is their fantastic customer service. They have great response times when you have done something wrong and broken your website.
What Is The Best Host For A Blog? - Answered!
Follow these rules, and you will have no problem finding a decent host for your blog. If you have any questions, leave them in the comments section below.