Erik D. Slater
Digital Platform Consultant

AND run your business with zero hosting skills

Warning:

This is not one of those sales-y pages that sucks you in with:

  • a bloated bundle of "awesome" stuff, most of which you don't really need;
  • overwhelming "value" you can't possibly consume in a reasonable amount of time;
  • a one-time offer that "ends soon" if you fail to take action right now;
  • a countdown that expires but actually doesn't;
  • upsells and cross-sells that toy with your head when you thought you were done buying.

Here's who I am …

As an independent consultant who follows a People First • Business Second • Technology Third philosophy, I:

  • care about nurturing longer-term relations with real people;
  • listen to actually understand, not simply to respond;
  • offer action-worthy solutions to problems, not merely answers to questions;
  • remove the derailing elements of technology, so you can focus on the business that serves your people;
  • provide deep and wide technical expertise with an open, transparent, and versatile mindset;
  • advise how to improve communication, and increase engagement with your community;
  • counsel on ways to stay accountable to yourself, your colleagues, and your consumers;
  • deliver results that work for you, so you can power your own digital platform.

… and here's what I know

Or to be more accurate … here's what I've learned:

  • after ~40,000 hours of "real" work, consults, training, research, analysis, development, testing, maintenance, and support;
  • as a consultant - and failed-at-recovering application and performance engineer - specializing in digital platforms for bloggers, coaches, content producers, course creators, and other site owners;
  • working with clients, colleagues, friends, and others with an entrepreneurial spirit;
  • participating in social media groups, product-specific forums, startups, and client projects;
  • working on simple sites and more complex platform setups.

Hosting is the biggest stress factor you face

While money, time, and expertise are general concerns, they're not the most pressing issues in terms of your typical day-to-day course of business.

Pricing, content, and monetization strategies …

Marketing automation, funnels, email campaigns …

What to write about, who to write for, who to target …

Site design, software, setup, analytics, ease of use, time to build …

Site speed, SEO …

While these form part of your narrative, they're not the showstoppers over which you lose sleep.

Your biggest stress factor is hosting

The main blocker that prevents you from getting stuff done is where to host the greatest stories you've ever told (plus the ones you're yet to tell).

And here's why …

Not all digital platforms look the same

Your digital platform may include one or more of the following:

  1. a public site for general pages, blog posts, portfolios, podcast series and episodes, sales and landing pages, documentation, etc;
  2. a customer relationship management (CRM) system for email marketing, marketing automation, etc;
  3. a commerce solution, to collect and manage payments, subscriptions, etc;
  4. a membership area for private pages, content libraries, downloads, basic courses, etc;
  5. a learning management system (LMS) for advanced courses;
  6. a referral program;
  7. a private community space, for premium-grade discussions outside the scope of social media;
  8. a product support system, because social media isn't the place for that;
  9. an event registration system;
  10. a job board system.

You most likely already have (a) and (b). But there's always that voice in your head nagging you about the others.

It depends on what you need for your digital platform, who you want to serve, how you want to run things, etc.

What you want from your hosting service

No matter what your digital platform looks like, you want a cloud-based managed hosting service that:

  • is cost-appropriate;
  • can handle a high amount of traffic;
  • serves your content quickly;
  • is secure;
  • has a good support system;
  • offers a staging environment, so you can test or debug without affecting your live site(s);
  • provides backup and restore functionality;
  • isolates each site - and the resources it requires - from others on the same server;
  • can scale server resources dynamically, based on your needs;
  • allows you to tweak server settings, use different types of cache, etc without their intervention. (NOTE: Optional, advanced, and under your control … even if you don't know what it means.)

What hosting shouldn't be

You don't want:

  • restrictions on visitors per month;
  • speed issues, even for logged-in users;
  • a slow admin backend;
  • bans on plugins or proxy services;
  • decisions about RAM, CPU / cores, PHP workers, entry processes, bandwidth, etc; (NOTE: While important, you shouldn't need to get bogged down by things like these.)
  • low disk storage space;
  • to run multiple servers;
  • hosting that forces you to spend days working in your business;
  • concerns about breaking terms of service.

Reasons you struggle with web hosting

  • Social media conversations derail you, and cause panic about scenarios that may not apply to you.
  • Tricky sales and advertising copy often omits key points through clever wordplay.
  • Selection-biased marketing strategies promote services that overlook the majority of a customer base in favour of a cherry-picked minority who effectively subsidize the rest.
  • The lifetime deal mentality - buying based on hope and emotion - sets unrealistic expectations.
  • Services that run on reseller hosting accounts as the underlying provider can be confusing, and lead to a lack of confidence.
  • Reports and "scores" from speed and performance tools don't tell the whole story about your site(s), and can be easily misinterpreted.
  • SEO hosting is a cesspool of myth and misinformation that sends you in the wrong direction.

The list goes on …

Social media distracts and confuses

Social platforms - your first port of call for just about everything - are well-known for endorsing a culture of instant gratification, conflated gossip, and self-promotion.

These might not be the best places to seek help about hosting … which is fiercely competitive, annoyingly disruptive, and curiously divisive.

Consuming hosting advice on "social" seems to send you down a rabbit hole that:

  • assumes you understand the lingo;
  • works against the way your brain is physically wired;
  • causes more issues due to flaky, duct-taped hacks;
  • doesn't solve your specific problems;
  • generates more questions than answers;
  • introduces you to others trying to sell you on their plugins, "managed" services, etc.

But here's the thing:

  • You're not a server administrator.
  • You're not a DevOps specialist.
  • You're not running an agency.
  • You're not a hosting "guru" or subject matter expert.

Yet somehow, you feel you're supposed to know this stuff.

The good news is … YOU DON'T.

Third-party hosting solutions have their place

Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solutions can be pretty great.

These types of hosting services use their own closed-source (proprietary) software.

You still own your content despite being locked in to their product.

You can still export data, although it might not be in a format that is useful to you.

But if you want direct access to your data for things like custom analysis and reports, to make custom changes, etc, these services may not be for you.

And … moving away from these services can be a painful process.

All-in-one platforms aren't the Shangri-La you hoped for

Third-party all-in-one platforms may appear to suit your purposes when you're just getting started.

Solutions like these typically house everything under one roof on a single site installation.

It's easy to get pulled in by the potential convenience and list of impressive features they offer … some of which may be exactly what you need, while others may be perpetually redundant.

Problems can arise when you begin to experience growth. Those once-attractive features may not be enough for your needs … or … the platform won't support your custom requests.

This is the opportunity cost of putting all your proverbial eggs in one rented basket.

The longer you host on a platform over which you have no control, the greater the risk, expense, and effort becomes if you need to move.

Diversify your digital platform hosting

Running your own all-in-one solution doesn't mean you need to do everything on your own.

It gives you the flexibility to add, change, and hook into components and features as required.

It also eliminates lock-in issues typically associated with third-party services.

Using open-source (non-proprietary) software like WordPress enables you to:

  • take control of your platform and its future;
  • own your content, and the data you collect;
  • customize your platform however you like;
  • keep components native for a consistent user and admin experience;
  • migrate your site(s) between hosts or plans more easily;
  • use third-party services where appropriate, and on your terms.

Parts of your digital platform should still be offloaded to services which are optimized and/or better-equipped to handle those needs:

  • Your video and audio files should be hosted with a third-party service, since they're designed to stream that type of content.
  • Caching styles, scripts, images, and public pages with a Content Delivery Network (CDN) shifts the burden from your server, enhances security, and reduces page load times.
  • A third-party email sending service (NOTE: Required when hosting your email marketing / CRM.) can improve the deliverability of emails sent from your server.
  • Some of your commerce requirements (global sales taxes, VAT, etc) may be better-managed by a third-party service.

One site for all things? Or split them up?

You typically start with your public site, before adding a customer relationship management (or email marketing) solution to the mix.

Your digital platform may need additional components at some stage. It might make sense to simply add them to your existing site. But before you do that …

You should consider the following benefits of adopting a separation-of-concerns approach to running your own all-in-one digital platform:

  • Separate sites serve different user patterns and traffic loads, leading to improved performance per site.
  • Isolating each site mitigates the single-point-of-failure risk. If one site fails, it won't bring down the others.
  • A different domain name (or subdomain) may be more appropriate for branding purposes.
  • A cleaner installation means each site uses only the themes and plugins it needs.
  • Maintenance on a per-site basis becomes a simpler task, even though there are more sites to maintain.
  • Less plugins per site reduces potential conflicts, and makes debugging easier to process.
  • Custom caching rules are easier to manage.
  • Users may be synced across different sites, if required.

There's really no one-size-fits-all solution to these things.

The main thing you need to consider

Concurrency plays a huge role in terms of your host's ability to handle multiple "connections" at the exact same moment in time.

You may have stumbled across scary terminology such as "PHP workers", "entry processes", etc while searching for web hosting.

These things aren't born equal. They're heavily dependent on some other ugly terms you may have seen and glazed over: "RAM" and "CPU / cores".

As a simple example … they become critical when serving content to logged-in site members.

More generally, they're necessary for any request that must pass through your server's primary scripting language.

If you don't have a clue what any of this means, you're in great company.

As a way of unpacking all of this geekery …

Concurrency is ultimately what matters here.

You want your hosting service to hold up to scrutiny under heavy traffic loads.

You don't want your site(s) to crumble when a ton of people view your soft-n-fluffy kitty photos en masse.

Keep in mind that "concurrent connections" is NOT the same thing as the "total visits" your site gets.

While you can't plan ahead for every scenario, concurrency is one of those crucial risk factors you want to mitigate as early as possible.

The primary hosting service I use

Nexcess offers one of the most balanced solutions in the managed WordPress (NOTE: Affiliate link. If you click the link and make a purchase, I may be compensated.) and WooCommerce (NOTE: Affiliate link. If you click the link and make a purchase, I may be compensated.) hosting spaces.

They're part of Liquid Web's family of brands, and have been in the hosting game for more than two decades.

They have a proven track record of adapting to the changing demands of the hosting market.

And … they address all the points detailed above.

I've used many hosting providers over the years, for myself and with clients. I understand the struggle of finding the best web hosting service that fits your personality and your needs.

Feel free to get in touch if you have questions, need help, or simply want to discuss your options.