My biggest goal this year is to work smarter, not harder. So when I expand my business, upgrade my website, and increase my traffic this year, I want to ensure that I don’t end up creating more work for myself. Instead, I want to make sure that my website hosting platform can handle all the growth I am planning. I know many of you have the same goals as I do. Many of you have been asking me what you can do to ensure that 2018 is your best year yet. So, I thought I would do a review of the best-managed WordPress hosting in 2018 to get you started on the right foot.
This article is more geared towards affilaite marketers who have already built websites that have a decent amount of traffic. If you’re in this position, you may be experiencing issues with your web host slowing down your site or wanting you to pay MUCH higher fees to handle the amount of traffic your site is now receiving.
I, too, faced this issue. When I first started using WordPress, I was using HostGator. While HostGator isn’t terrible, I found that I simply outgrew their service. I had to upgrade to a managed WordPress hosting service which was not cheap, but I also had a lot of difficulties navigating through c-panel and securing my sites. They were hacked several times, my site speed suffered, and I knew I needed to change web hosts.
To be fair to HostGator, I’m not the most technically advanced person. I’m a marketer, not a programmer or web server expert. I needed a “red carpet” type of WordPress hosting service where they would handle everything for me. I ended up finding a great option that I’ve been using for years. I’ll get into more detail below, but WPengine has worked wonderfully for me.
What To Expect From Managed WordPress Hosting In 2018
In order to determine the best-managed WordPress hosting in 2018, I think we should start with some predictions about what is changing in our industry. Understanding the coming changes will help us determine what to look for in WordPress hosting platforms. Here are my top predictions for the coming year:
1. Content Diversity And Personalization Will Be Crucial:
In the last two years, we’ve seen the importance of content diversity. With so much competition on the market and the increased availability of easy to access technology, affiliate marketers are starting to incorporate more storage-heavy content forms like images, videos, animation. Consumers love these forms because they are much easier and more fun to engage with than traditional blogs. Furthermore, this diverse content will also become microtargeted and extremely personalized. No longer will you be able to simply use a one-size fits most strategy. With these changes to content, you will make more demands on your WordPress hosting platform than ever before.
2. Mobile Optimization Still Dominates:
Mobile access is quickly becoming king on the internet. With more affordable data plans, portable technology like smartphones and tablets, people are starting to ditch their laptops and desktops to go fully mobile. Mobile optimization has different requirements than computer access. The network capabilities and hardware have unique limitations on speed. As a website developer, we have to consider making up for these limitations with faster hosting.
3. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Gets Tougher:
SEO is an extremely important part of affiliate marketing. We need to make sure that our pages show up as high as possible on related search queries. This is already challenging since the search engine companies like Google, Yahoo, and Bing aren’t fully transparent about how they determine search engine rankings. This year they will certainly be regulating query results more heavily since they are under scrutiny for allowing clickbait and bots to sometimes rank higher than legitimate forms of content. Navigating these new restrictions will require a feature-heavy, legitimate website host that can ensure that your site stays credible.
4. Site Speed Will Continue To Be An Important Ranking Factor
One of the very important factors in how Google and other search engines rank your sites is site speed. This is nothing new and it has been a well known important factor for several years. Even Google themselves tell us that site speed is important. Here is Matt Cutts from Google Search to explain further:
This is one more reason I love WPengine. Very few web hosts can compete with their ability to increase site speed.
What To Look For In The Best Managed WordPress Hosting 2018
What these three key 2018 predictions have in common is the importance of high-quality WordPress hosting. No longer can affiliate marketers simply go with the cheapest option on the market, they will need to find a host that balances price and features. Here are the key features you will need to look for in the best-managed WordPress hosting 2018 to meet these coming market trends:
- Speed: Speed is going to be the most important factor in 2018 for diverse content, mobile optimization, and SEO. The best managed WordPress hosting 2018 will offer speed features like cache, content delivery network, and faster backend processing during simultaneous visits.
- Storage: Storage will also be a critical factor for the best managed WordPress hosting 2018. With a push for more storage-heavy content, you will need to make sure your host can handle all the new forms of content you plan to incorporate into your business.
- Security: Security is going to be essential in 2018. It will not just be a necessary feature for protecting your business and your customer’s information, but it will now be a measure of brand credibility. Security certificates are going to be extremely important in 2018.
- Plug-Ins: Plug-ins will be critical in 2018. They will be necessary for expanding your content and tracking your success, as well as mastering the coming changes in SEO. Not all WordPress platforms offer a variety of useful plug-ins, so before signing up for any new plan, you need to review their plug-in offerings.
- Personalization Options: The ability to segment visitors and tailor content through things like analytics, geotargetting, and machine learning are going to be extremely important in 2018. The best managed WordPress hosting 2018 will have all of these capabilities.
My Choice For The Best Managed WordPress Hosting 2018
Keeping in mind the coming trends and critical features, I truly believe that this is not the year to take shortcuts with WordPress hosting. It’s always tempting to just go with the most affordable option when creating a website, especially when you are just starting your business. However, I’ve found that this type of affordability is very misleading. With $3 a month hosting, you simply are not going to be able to meet the needs of your audience in 2018. Instead, the $3 per month hosting will cost you big money in lost opportunity. Furthermore, if you then try to scale to meet these needs, you’ll end up a paying a ton of money in hidden fees. So the best-managed WordPress hosting 2018 balances affordability and features, it is not just whatever is cheapest.
So for my pick as the best managed WordPress hosting for 2018 I choose WPEngine. The plans are still really affordable for those of us who are price conscious. They start at $29 a month and that can handle 25,000 visitors a month. They have every single feature you will need this coming year and so many more that are not listed here. So when reviewing your 2018 goals, start by reviewing your WordPress hosting and see out how an upgrade to WPEngine can help you reach them!
