Most people prefer shopping online because of the ease the E-com platform offers. Moreover, over the years, the E-com industry has been growing rapidly. Following this, every retailer needs to build a scalable and user-friendly eCommerce website.
eCommerce hosting plays a critical role in launching a new website and providing the best experience to users every day. Poor loading speed and lack of security features can affect your E-com website’s traffic. Plus, if your E-com site is managed poorly, it could affect the bottom line.
Further reading: Web Hosting Mistakes You Should Avoid
What to look for when selecting an eCommerce hosting for your online store?
When it comes to eCommerce hosting, security should be given top priority, followed by website speed. Make sure the resources available with the hosting is scalable and can handle a huge surge in traffic. Automatic backup is another important consideration. So is excellent customer support. These are a few factors that can help enhance the performance of your eCommerce website. Besides hosting, make sure your website is well-optimized and well-maintained.
A. What is eCommerce Hosting?
Similar to web hosting, eCommerce hosting is a hosting package designed specifically for eCommerce sites. The hosting supports all features and requirements to run a successful online store. In short, eCommerce hosting comes with exceptional tools designed for E-com websites.
The features might include security, payment integrations, SSL encryption, and scaling of resources to accommodate high traffic. There are many options available to build an eCommerce site like Shopify, BigCommerce, Big Cartel, and WooCommerce. Picking from among them can be a tough choice. However, when it comes to eCommerce hosting, the following are the factors you need to consider.
Read this Bluehost review to know why Bluehost India is the best hosting for eCommerce.
B. Factors to Consider When Selecting An eCommerce Hosting Provider
1. Scalable Resources
An eCommerce website can’t do without the scalability feature. As sales, discounts, promotional campaigns can affect website traffic, your web hosting should be able to handle the surge in traffic. The hosting plan you choose should allow you to scale resources to accommodate a sudden spike.
- Your E-com host should let you add RAM, CPU, and other resources you need for managing the surge.
- eCommerce hosting packages are available with Cloud hosting and offer the best solution to traffic surges. Cloud hosting lets you scale resources automatically on a surge, so you don’t have to look after your website manually.
- Plus, Cloud hosting uses only relevant resources when needed, which saves on costs.
Furthermore, it is essential to maximize CPU resources and usage if you expect higher site traffic. An E-com hosting plan that takes care of all these needs will give you good results in the long run.
Make use of these Bluehost hosting coupons to purchase eCommerce hosting now!
2. Uptime Guarantee and Bandwidth
The E-com hosting package you choose must offer you an uptime guarantee of more than 99.99%. Besides, if your website takes too long to load, the customers won’t return to your site. That’s why Shared hosting is not preferred for an eCommerce site as there could be frequent downtime. Look out for a plan that features uptime monitoring, so you are notified of server issues.
eCommerce websites take up a lot of file space, so you need to have enough resources unless you wish to pay overage fees. In addition, eCommerce websites, in particular, tend to store images of products. Multiple high-resolution images will require more bandwidth and storage, so go with a plan that offers both of these features.
Further reading: Shared hosting vs VPS hosting
3. Security Features
A customer who makes payment on the eCommerce website expects complete encrypted security, so their credit and debit card information is secure. Following this, you need to ensure your website is encrypted with SSL or HTTPS for secure checkout.
- Make sure the hosting platform you choose is payment card industry compliant.
- Your E-com hosting provider must also provide you with advanced security features like malware scan, SSL certificates, and firewall protection.
- Make sure you choose a plan that offers prevention from DDOS attacks and hacking.
Security flaws can allow the entry of malicious files on your website. That’s why you need to choose a host with complete E-com security solutions.
To purchase an SSL certificate for your website, use these Bluehost Coupons.
4. Integrations
Yet another factor that you need to consider is the eCommerce integration feature. An E-com hosting provider can provide you with many tools that will help to run your website. However, while looking for this feature, it is essential to look for the tools you’ll need for your store.
- An email integration tool can help you connect with your potential customers, an accounting plugin will help with sales and bills, and other apps can help with product shipping.
- Additionally, your E-com hosting provider should allow you to integrate with popular payment platforms. Your E-com site should integrate with debit cards, credit cards, UPI’s, cash on delivery, and bank transfers.
For example, Bluehost allows direct Razorpay integration with all the E-com integrated stores for easy access. In addition, E-com hosting companies must comply with PCI.
5. High Performance
It is essential to find an E-com host that provides fast and reliable services. More than 55% of consumers will abandon a site that does not load in three seconds. Most new E-com websites choose Shared hosting, but it’s slow and has frequent downtime that affects your rankings. Also, some hosts have unreliable infrastructure, so you will have to be careful with your choice.
Consider CDN as a significant factor while choosing an eCommerce hosting platform. As CDN’s are a set-up of servers spread across a wide area, it provides high performance.
Besides, a host that provides a CDN feature ensures that your loading time is faster than other websites. Moreover, your E-com host should include uptime monitoring and performance report in the plan you choose.
Further reading: How To Setup Free Cloudflare CDN For Your WordPress
6. Automatic Backups and Mobile-friendliness
You need to protect your site data and files with the data backup feature. You need to buy an E-com hosting plan that provides complete data backup solutions.
With the slight changes you make on your website, your site data can corrupt. Therefore, it is essential to have data backups to restore the site settings of the corrupted files. Without recent backups, it might be tricky to restore your E-com website.
Additionally, automatic data backups play a crucial role in your website security. If there is a possible hack attack on your website, you won’t lose important data. Today, most people use a mobile device for shopping, so it is essential to look for E-com hosting providers that allow purchasing on a mobile device. Mobile-friendliness is the main criterion for these purchases.
7. Customer Support
All sites face issues or errors, so it is essential to look for a host that provides 24/7 support. The support should be friendly and fast, so your site does not suffer downtime. In addition, your hosting provider must be reachable when in need to provide you with the right solution.
Whether you need to scale resources or need help in security, your E-com host should provide you with reliable support. Besides, identifying the issues at the right time will ensure your website is always up and performing.
Also, check for customer support reviews when you buy a plan.
Choose the Most Reliable E-com Platform,
Starting a new E-com website can be challenging, especially with many competitors. That’s why choosing a reliable E-com platform is essential alongside high-performing eCommerce web hosting.
Also, while looking for an E-com platform, pick a host that’s ready to scale according to your business needs. Do your research and spend time looking for hosting plans that match your requirements. Once sure, make a purchase right away.
What features do you look for in E-com platforms? Do let us know!
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