What hosting companies are best for bloggers?

There are many different web hosting companies to choose from today. Your decision should not be based on the first or cheapest host provider you come across. The company you choose is going to have a massive impact on the performance of your blog and, consequently, your search engine ranking. You need a host that has an excellent reputation, a high level of guaranteed uptime, and exceptional customer service. With that being said, read on to discover more about some of the best hosting companies for bloggers specifically.

What should you look for when choosing a hosting company? 
Before we can begin to look at the best hosting companies for bloggers, we need to establish the important ingredients when choosing a host provider. There are three critical elements you need to look out for, and these are as follows:

1. High performance levels – There is only one place to begin, and this is with performance. The host provider you choose will have a huge impact on the speed of your website. Slow websites cause a high bounce rate and a poor search engine ranking, so make sure you choose a provider with a high guaranteed uptime, i.e. in excess of 99 per cent.
   
2. Positive reviews – Reviews that have been left by other bloggers can be very insightful when searching for the best host providers. Read plenty of comments online via independent review platforms for a better understanding.
   
3. Customer support – The third and final element you need to consider when looking for a web host for your blog is customer support. If you experience a technical error on your site, you want the peace of mind that it is going to be dealt with as quickly and effectively as possible. No business can afford downtime.
   

The best web hosting providers for bloggers 

Now that you are aware of the important factors to consider when looking for a web hosting company, let’s take a look at some of the best companies that tick these three boxes.

SiteGround – The first hosting provider on our list for bloggers is SiteGround. Recommended by Drupal, Joomla, and WordPress.org, SiteGround has certainly become a popular choice. One of the best things about SiteGround is that you are guaranteed 99.9 per cent uptime; otherwise, you will be compensated. Users also benefit from 24/7 customer support, with live chat typically taking between two and hour seconds to respond, so this web host certainly fulfils the customer support criteria as well. They also offer free site transfer, free auto daily backups, and free SSL certificate. Plus, to make sure their clients will benefit from the best server response time, they present you with a number of data centres to choose from. One thing to be mindful of, though, is that you are limited to 30GB storage, although this should not be an issue for most bloggers. At present, SiteGround costs £2.75 per month.

UPDATE: If you are curious about the services from Siteground and want to get some real feedback, here is a list of 23 comments from genuine customers

HostGator – HostGator is a good choice for beginners. If you are a new blogger looking to get started, this is an option you may want to consider. Although a bit pricier, at £3.25 per month, you do get a 45-day money-back guarantee, so if you are not happy, you can always switch to another provider. Like most of the hosts featured on this list, HostGator is reliable, with a 99.9 per cent uptime guarantee. As mentioned, this is always the most important quality to look out for when choosing a web host. If you take out a shared plan with HostGator, you will get a free SSL certificate.  Customer support is available on a 24/7 basis, although response times do seem to be slightly slower than the rest.


GreenGeeks – As you may have gathered from the name, GreenGeeks is an eco-friendly hosting provider. If you are an environmentally conscious blogger, you will be pleased to know that this web host is fuelled by 300 per cent renewable energy. Despite this, you will still get a guaranteed 99.9 per cent uptime. Other benefits of this £3.00 per month plan include a free SSL certificate with every hosting plan, as well as free domain registration. It’s fair to say that GreenGeeks customer service is not as impressive as the rest, although the company does bring ten years of experience to the table. 


BlueHost – Next we have BlueHost, which is a company that has been providing hosting services since 1996. They are one of the more affordable hosting companies available for bloggers, costing just £2.00 per month. On the flip side, site transfers are not free – they cost £120, so if you need a site transfer you may want to consider a different hosting provider. Despite this, there is a lot to love about BlueHost, including their 24/7 support access and unlimited bandwidth. They also excel in terms of uptime. You will benefit from a control panel to manage your account, which is easy to use, as well as free domain name registration.


GoDaddy – Finally, we have GoDaddy, which is a company you have probably already heard about. They provide a lot of services that go beyond the competition and they make the process really easy. However, while introductory prices are low at £3.00 per month, there is a steep price increase when you renew, so do keep this in mind. Plus, live chat is only available for sales questions. Aside from this, though, GoDaddy offer a 45-day money-back guarantee, unmetered bandwidth, and 100GB storage on their cheapest plan. There are also Windows and Linux plans available, as well as DDoS protection and 24/7 security monitoring.

Hopefully, you now have a better understanding regarding the best hosting companies out there for bloggers. With many different options available to bloggers today, it can be difficult to know where to start. The last thing you want to do is waste your money on a hosting provider that actually harms your blog’s reputation through continual issues with their servers. If you opt for one of the hosting companies that have been mentioned above, you can be certain that this will not be the case.

Today’s guest post comes from our friends at UK Web Host Review.

Another article you may find useful is on SEO for beginners, this will give you everything you'll need to know in order to make your site stand out on the search engines.