If you are thinking of starting your own website from which to run an e-commerce operation, you will probably be thinking of choosing Magento as your preferred choice of e-store platform. There are lots of benefits of choosing Magento. Firstly, it is free to use and yet is packed with useful features and is easily scalable to the size of your business. With thousands of extensions available, it couldn’t be easier to add features to your e-store and the talented developer community is constantly adding new solutions and fixing bugs making Magento a solid and reliable choice for your online business. However in order to run Magento smoothly and swiftly to maximise your website’s potential you will need to select the best Magento hosting to meet your needs.
Are There Advantages to Choosing a Specific Magento Shared Hosting?
While many companies are able to offer web hosting solutions that will run Magento, if you choose a specialised Magento shared hosting you can benefit from a host of features that will make your e-store easier to set up and run and will also improve the user experience of your e-commerce store front. The best Magento hosting sites have technology that is specifically optimised for hosting Magento sites and this will ensure that your site runs as swiftly and efficiently as possible. Everyone knows that part of running a successful e-commerce business is having a website with pages that load quickly. Choosing a specialised Magento shared hosting company means that this side of your business will be well taken care of. The best hosting for Magento providers also ensure that security of your website is paramout. Your clients’ financial information and personal data will be kept secure thanks to rigorous security policies, extensive monitoring and testing and highly effective firewalls. The best Magento hosting companies offer very high uptime guarantees of 99.9% or higher, meaning that your store will not suffer from unexpected downtime reducing your revenue and of course support for customers will always be given high priority as the support teams are aware of the importance of resolving issues to the success of your online business.
What Features are Required for the Best Hosting for Magento?
When it comes to choosing the best web hosting for Magento there are several features that can make it easier to set up and manage your website, not to mention improving the user experience for your customers. If you are wanting to use Magento as your e-commerce platform there are certain things that you will almost certainly want to consider.
Do They Offer 1 Click Installation?
Unless you are an advanced and experienced user, you will probably want to know that the Magento shared hosting provider that you have chosen will supply you with a one click installation solution. While it is possible to install Magento yourself, this is quite complex and will require you to have specialised technical knowledge. With a 1 click installation hosting you will simply be able to enter your administrative details and then with one click of a mouse Magento will be instantly installed allowing you to make rapid start on creating your e-commerce store. You will certainly require Apache, MySQL and PHP in order to run Magento.
Do They Offer Free Installation?
The best Magento hosting providers never charge for installation. They should also offer you a broad range of modules, components and templates to enable you to customise your online store free of charge.
Do They Offer Optimal Performance?
Everyone knows that speed is an issue when it comes to running a successful e-store. If your products are slow to load, customers are going to look elsewhere for their purchase. Make sure that you are choosing a Magento shared hosting that is an optimised environment for Magento so that your site’s performance and delivery will be as good as possible.
Can Your Web Host Offer the Best Support?
Magento is an open source platform and therefore does not have any official corporate helplines or support options. This means that choosing a web hosting provider who is a specialist in Magento hosting will enable you to access a better level of support should you run into difficulties or encounter an error that you cannot resolve. While there are community forums and third party websites where you can pose questions and queries about Magento, contacting your web hosting provider for technical advice is much quicker and more convenient which is paramount when you are dealing with an e-store that is essential to your revenue.
Can Your Web Hosting Provider Help You Get Set Up?
If you are a novice to creating your own e-commerce website, it will prove to be an added bonus if you choose the best web hosting for Magento that can give you specific advice and guidance to set up your website. A specialist can give you tailored guidelines to help you avoid making common mistakes and can help you get your website off to an optimised start to maximise its success.
Is Your Web Hosting Provider Proactive?
As well as providing support for Magento, the best Magento shared hosting providers will be proactive in ensuring your site is optimised and secure. They will always make sure that new security patches are immediately applied upon release, will regularly monitor your site for problems and act quickly to repair any problems, will analyse your site regularly in order to boost performance and will offer support for a range of PCI issues.
Can Your Web Hosting Offer PCI Compliance?
If you are planning on accepting payments with a credit card through your e-store you will need to ensure that your web hosting provider has offered you a PCI compliant hosting plan. This will ensure that you can process financial transactions securely.
Can Your Web Hosting Cope if Your Business Grows?
If you are running a small business alone, you need to consider whether it has the potential to grow and expand beyond the capacities of shared web hosting. If this is the case, you need to consider whether your chosen provider has the ability to upgrade you to a VPS or dedicated server to meet the needs of your website.
Other Important Things to Think About When Choosing Cheap Magento Hosting?
While cheap Magento hosting may be important to a new online business which needs to keep start up costs to a minimum, it is also important to balance costs with customer service and essential features. It could be false economy to simply go with the cheapest option when it comes to Magento web hosting as it is likely that the number of features and the level of customer service that you will receive will be significantly less than if you opt to pay a little more. You must weigh up your requirements and make an informed decision as to whether it would be worth your while to go for cheap Magento hosting or whether to go for a slightly higher monthly fee in return for added value.
You should also check that you are choosing the best Magento hosting in terms of reliability and trustworthiness. When you are running an online business, sales are your source of revenue, so you need to be sure you are choosing a supplier who guarantee an excellent uptime and even a compensation policy should you experience excessive downtimes.