Technology is advancing even faster than we can keep up. If your business does anything online, it’s essential to make changes to stay up-to-date with the latest trends in a constantly evolving world. Everything from eCommerce platforms to web hosting needs to be re-evaluated if you want to stay current and keep up with customers’ demands.
Not sure where to start? We highly recommend taking a look at your web hosting first and foremost. Technology is changing how we treat web hosting, and even if you’ve been with your current web host for years, it’s worth doing a bit of a self-audit and considering whether or not you need to make a change to keep up with the latest tech.
Next-generation web hosting is a step above the old traditional types. There are many more factors to consider now, but also more features available to suit every need. Regardless of whether you’re a huge online enterprise, a small business, or a solopreneur, choosing the right web hosting is critical for the smooth running of your business.
The Covid pandemic also significantly boosted the need for better, safer web hosting. The number of people doing business online has increased exponentially, significantly improving online business opportunities but also increases the need for excellent web hosts.
So what should you look for in a web host by today’s standards? Here’s how technology is changing how we treat web hosting and how you should adjust accordingly to ensure you stay relevant and covered in terms of security and performance.
Start With the Purpose
The need for website hosting that can fulfill specific purposes is greater as technology has progressed. A single type of web host can no longer fulfill the needs of multiple types of websites; for example, a small site advertising service might be able to get by with shared hosting, but a large, popular eCommerce store can’t afford to share resources and deal with slow loading times and excessive downtime.
The Covid-19 pandemic saw a monumental leap in the number of people doing business online. But the divide between website types and features is larger than ever before—there’s a wide chasm between a simple one-page website and a detailed multi-page website with multiple payment gateways, for example.
A good example is WordPress hosting, which is created specifically for WordPress sites (of which there are tons). You can also find web hosting dedicated to gaming experiences, sizable websites, and eCommerce sites.
Tech has advanced to this point, so there’s truly something for every kind of website. However, it falls largely on the shoulders of the consumer to assess the needs of their business and choose their web hosting accordingly.
It’s important to note that there is no one web host that covers every type of business at a reasonable cost. This kind of hosting technology is in the works, though! We can expect to see a single hosting service at an affordable price replacing the traditional tiered systems of today, which would significantly expand the possibilities for all types of businesses.
Type of Website Hosting
Shared web hosting used to be the most accessible type of hosting for small businesses and entrepreneurs. However, those who needed a higher level of security and stability were presented with the option of dedicated hosting, which is significantly more secure and reliable than shared hosting, thanks to the lack of shared resources.
As tech progressed, VPS hosting was added to the mix, which hosted your website on a virtual private server. This was a hybrid of shared and dedicated hosting, with multiple sites hosted on separate “virtual servers”, giving you better security, increased uptime, and more control over your own server at a lower cost than dedicated hosting.
The latest technological advance is cloud hosting. It takes full advantage of the latest tech, hosting your website across multiple servers around the world, all in the cloud. It’s not as complicated as it sounds, and it has some noticeable benefits.
One, no matter where your traffic comes from, there’s a server nearby, which boosts your speed by quite a bit. As for security, this is where the tech shines, featuring automatic backups, disaster recovery, and layered security features that can put your mind at ease.
Unlike most another hosting, cloud hosting is also surprisingly scalable. Thanks to new tech, you can host all-sized businesses on the cloud, and if you outgrow where you currently are, it’s as simple as upgrading your CPU or RAM to suit your business.
It’s not cheap, though. But with this level of security, speed, and scalability, it’s worth it for many businesses.
Related: Emerging Web Hosting Technology Trends
The Pricing Dilemma
Web hosting price is the major factor when choosing plans. Shared hosting is still popular thanks to its low cost, which overshadows its lack of advanced features in many a business person’s minds.
On the other hand, while cloud hosting is at the top of the technological pile, its cost makes it inaccessible for many. Dedicated hosting and VPS are the middle ground, but that may still leave website owners in a tough spot as their business grows or when they run into problems.
So what’s the solution? While still in progress, a single hosting service providing features across the board at a reasonable price would make a huge difference to smaller sites and younger businesses for whom cloud hosting is simply too expensive.
One of the best outcomes of technological innovations is increased accessibility for a range of different website owners. In a way, this could level the playing field to an extent and pave the way for new businesses to come to the forefront with the support and backing of a reliable and secure web host.
Managed Hosting Is Popular
With the recent rise in businesses coming online, it’s bound to happen—many website owners just don’t have the technological expertise to operate the backend of a website. Despite there being multiple no-code website options available, they’re not quite right for everybody, and business people may find themselves stuck between a rock and a hard place.
Managed web hosting not only provides hosting services but also handles all website-related operations, including things like optimizing it for performance and ensuring that all updates go smoothly.
This frees up the website owner to focus on the things that they can control—the front end of the business or blog. Managed hosting is the natural solution to ensuring that a website functions optimally without tech input from the owner, which is a hugely popular choice at this point in time, considering the influx of newcomers with little to no technical knowledge.
It’s a step up from shared hosting, in which you can host your site cheaply and effectively but leave the backend to the hosting company. For those for whom dedicated hosting is too high-level in terms of control over your site, managed website hosting is the perfect option.
Research Has Stepped Up
One of the best things about technological innovations in website hosting is the level of research. Thanks to tech, we now have the means to monitor statistics and calculate important metrics such as uptime, security data, and what our site visitors are doing.
This information gives both website owners and website hosting companies insight into the custom journey, what’s popular, where the clicks are happening, and other valuable information that can make a difference to your website design, funnels, and even advertising.
While this might not sound like something relevant to website hosting, the host you choose can make a significant difference to these factors. We have information and data at our fingertips, which makes it noticeably easier to choose a host that suits your needs.
It’s as simple as making use of Google features like Analytics or using one of the many free resources online to monitor things like your traffic, website speed, and other valuable metrics.
Focus on the Essentials
As technology moves upwards, so does the amount of time spent using the technology. We spend inordinate amounts of time online, and the internet never sleeps—thanks to different time zones, there are always millions of people online at any given time.
This means that there’s a lot more traffic that’s fair game. But choosing a poor web host can impact your traffic—or lead to a lack of it. So how do you know if a web host will be a good choice for your website or not?
Focusing on the essentials is the best way to figure out if a web host is worthwhile, and while it may take some time to research, you’ll save yourself potential heartache and stress if you put a little effort into making sure each of these factors is suitable for you before going all in.
Individual Website Needs
No two websites are the same, but many websites have the same needs in terms of serving their purpose. Things like reliability, uptime and a price that fits the company or individual’s budget are features that span across all websites.
However, it goes without saying that a one-page website dedicated to providing information on a specific service will have vastly different needs to a multi-page, interactive website with various offerings.
Modern technology has made it easier to pick the right kind of hosting for your website based on your needs. This will cover things like the purpose and function of your website, security needs, third-party integrations, the need for customer service, and the customer journey.
Whereas website hosting choices in the past were largely dependent on the price the business could afford, today’s tech innovations have made it possible to find affordable options for every type of website’s needs.
This should be at the heart of every website hosting choice, and modern innovations are making it far easier for us to select an appropriate web host based on these factors rather than price alone.
Related: Web Hosting Services on its Way for a Colossal Growth
Website Speed
Poor website speed can drive traffic away from your website before you even get a chance to convert them. The average visitor to any website is likely to get impatient and click away if the site doesn’t load fully within 3 seconds, so you can’t afford to neglect the website speed aspect of web hosting.
As tech has progressed—and as more advanced hosting solutions have become available—website speed has improved. In most cases, you can safely assume that shared hosting will have a negative effect on your page loading speed due to sharing resources across multiple sites at one time. On the other hand, dedicated servers have a noticeably faster load time.
There are many other steps you can take to speed up your website, but a good website host with technologically advanced features is the foundation for every other measure.
Choosing a poor web host will underscore every other step you take in an attempt to make your website faster, so this is absolutely worth considering if you want to provide your visitors with the fastest web page load time.
Security Solutions
Even more important than speed is security. Not only is this essential for your own peace of mind in terms of preventing your website from being hacked into, but it’s also extremely important for your visitors and, more specifically, your paying customers.
Any website that requires customers to put in credit card or Paypal details needs rigorous security measures to ensure that nobody’s credentials are stolen. Nothing can sink a business faster than a security breach, so it’s absolutely in your best interest to choose a web host with exceptional security.
Like speed, security has improved drastically as web hosting technology has expanded. While speed and control are important and coveted features of web hosting, security is perhaps the most essential of all features, which has led to tech placing an emphasis on security features.
Security breaches are becoming less and less common with the exception of those that occur due to human error. This is an area of web hosting that can’t be brushed under the carpet—it’s the one factor that can break a business overnight.
Customer Service
Customer service ranks close behind security in terms of factors that can sink a business. Your level of service to your customers can either build trust and garner loyalty, or it can send your customers to the competition.
Tech has made customer/company engagement much more accessible. From chatbots to automated replies, social media scheduling, and surveys, there are now endless options available within your web hosting service that can significantly boost your customer service.
Take advantage of these innovations if you want to get ahead of your customers’ needs. You can’t place too much emphasis on customer satisfaction—as they say, the customer is king!
Remember, as technology expands our horizons, it also expands the horizons of our customers, so it’s essential to put extra effort into being accessible and approachable when it comes to customer service.
Smart Technology, Next-Generation Web Hosting
Nothing is immune from the technological advances of the age. It may be more noticeable in things like Elon Musk’s SpaceX creations, self-driving cars, or the idea of brain chips, but web hosting is evolving just like anything else.
The changes are subtle but can spell big changes for users. With increased security comes a better user experience. Improved customer service leads to more trust in your brand. Faster page loading times equals happier customers and more chances to convert.
So ultimately, each new step for web hosting tech is aimed at boosting revenue if used right by website owners. On the other side of the coin, these new features also improve the visitor’s experience on the website, satisfying most browsers’ need for (almost) instant gratification.
Next-generation web hosting is all about providing for the needs of the people on both sides of the laptop—the business people providing products and services and the consumers browsing for information and intending to make purchases.
Conclusion
While it’s tempting to stick to the same website hosting you’ve always had because it’s always worked for you, you may be shooting yourself in the foot if you aren’t at least considering a change.
Every advance in technology is changing the way we treat website hosting, which in turn has an effect on how your visitors experience your website… And as a result, your web hosting can have an indirect effect on your business’s success and revenue.
With the boost in tech comes increased prices, which may lower the accessibility of some web hosting features. But failing to consider a change in web hosting can keep you in the same position in terms of revenue—or worse, end up lowering your income due to poor visitor experience as your web host doesn’t provide for the changing landscape.
However, there are good things in the works, and we can expect new solutions to meet the growing need for reliable, secure, and stable web hosting.
Don’t let poor web hosting hold you back! Keep up with the changing technologies—it’s in the best interest of your own business and your patrons.
