I recently switched over my site, SEO Wordsmith, from Wordpress.com to BlueHost. At Wordpress.org, BlueHost is listed front and center as Wordpress’s premier selection for transferring a Wordpress account. I wasn’t entirely lazy: I did some research, looked into other web hosts, like ThinkHost and Host Monster. Every web host has complaints saying, “My service went out. Don’t use them.” BlueHost has a fair number of these, but also glowing praise, so I felt confident enough making the switch.
Switching from Wordpress to BlueHost: I’ve never had a web host before. I’ve worked within every CMS imaginable as a professional copywriter, and I’ve run blogs before using free accounts, but I’ve never had the experience of dealing with a web host content management system. I wanted to make the switch to have more flexibility for the site, such as using Wordpress plugins – I’m a plugins addict – but I also wanted to have the experience of promoting a website from an independent host.
The Verdict: The switch from Wordpress.com to BlueHost was not as seamless as it could be, though I imagine this is the case for other web hosts as well. It’s not as easy as, say, starting a blog and publishing – takes five minutes. Transferring to a web host was not nearly as quick: you have to know what you’re doing. And BlueHost customer support was not as helpful as they could be when transferring over information from Wordpress: such as where to change the nameservers within Wordpress. As this is probably a common question, I figured the BlueHost tech staff would have some idea of what to do. Wordpress support was able to help with every issue.
BlueHost Tech Support: That said, BlueHost technical support is amazingly efficient. Somehow, for a company as large as BlueHost, I’ve never had to wait online for tech support for more than 30 seconds. Literally. And you can keep calling back with new concerns and they’ll answer your problems. Such as: I inadvertently deleted my Htaccess file, so only the front page was loading. The answer: go into Wordpress, and re-save your permalink settings. The Htaccess file will return. The CMS for any web host is large, so you’re going to have questions about set-up and maintenance of your site.
What BlueHost Offers: Enough about me. This is what BlueHost offers and why you should feel confident opening up an account. BlueHost has one main hosting account. It’s listed as $6.95 a month. What this means is that you have to pay for the full year upfront, or $83.00. Given what you get with BlueHost, the price is worth it:
- Unlimited file transfer (means people can download material from your site)
- Unlimited disk space
- Unlimited domains (check me out, I started marketplace.seowordsmith.com, seamlessly adding a subdomain to my main site)
- Free domain name (I recommend you apply for a domain name with BlueHost first, rather than registering it with Wordpress first. It’s cheaper and it will take 60 days to transfer the domain registration from Wordpress)
- 2500 email accounts
- User-friendly, free site builder
- 24/7 Support (as mentioned, BlueHost support is always accessible)
Other Special Features of BlueHost: Enhanced security with user-based permissions. Attempts by hackers can slow down a website’s processing power and time, but a href=”http://www.seowordsmith.com”>SEO Wordsmith, from Wordpress.com to BlueHost is both safe and quick.
An inexpensive dedicated server: only $30 a year. Using a dedicated server is great for search engine ranking. Google prizes a dedicated server. Other web hosts might charge $200 a month for this service. In addition, certain website tools, such as payment processing, won’t work without a dedicated server – so ebusinesses can save money on high-tech implementation.
For me, aside from a couple hours dealing with getting the site up and running, it’s been a breeze using BlueHost. No down time. This isn’t a huge domain, granted, but BlueHost is known for being efficient with high server up-time. It’s a good solution for small businesses and personal use.
Apply for a Blue Host account here.
December 8th, 2008 at 11:38 pm
[...] up @ the Marketplace, a BlueHost review, my web host. As you’ll see, I don’t just write glowing praise. addthis_url = [...]
December 11th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
[...] thought it better for the site to have its own domain. It was also incredibly easy to set up with BlueHost. addthis_url = [...]