Launching your own online store has now made pretty easy thanks to WooCommerce.
WooCommerce is the most popular open-source e-commerce platform on the market. It is free and it has many options and features so that you can customize it exactly the way you want your online shop to look. It is also compatible with WordPress content management system or CMS where it comes as a plugin and turns a WordPress website into an online store.
It is very important to choose a solid platform that enables you to add products and take payments securely.
Therefore, choosing WooCommerce hosting for your online store is not to be taken lightly. If you choose a wrong hosting provider, it is very likely that you are going to end up experiencing low website speed, unwanted downtime, conflicts and errors and eventually losing online sale and even failure of your online shop.
The reason why selecting a hosting provider for your WooCommerce website can be challenging is because of its niche. There are features in an optimum WooCommerce hosting provider that you should take note of such as:
Auto Installation of WooCommerce, Extra Layers of Security, SSL Certificate, WooCommerce Support, Regular Updates and other standard hosting features.
In order for your to be able to use WooCommerce, the first step is to set up a website. For that, you would need a domain name, a WordPress hosting provider and also the WooCommerce plugin which you can find in the WordPress Repository.
Once you purchased a domain name, you can use it with any hosting company. All you need to do is to go to your domain settings and points its DNS to your WooCommerce hosting provider.
Each of the top WooCommerce hosting providers has step by step instructions on how to set that up.
You definitely do not have to buy your domain name from the very same provider you buy your WooCommerce hosting from. However, it does help if you buy them from the same company as you do not have to change DNS settings and you will be able to manage your domain and hosting under the same dashboard.
Also you can change your WooCommerce hosting company if you are not happy with their services. Most hosting providers offer migration services for you to utilize with minimum downtime.
The advantage of WooCommerce hosting is that you will not have to worry about basic website maintenance, setup and security and you can focus on growing your online store.
With WooCommerce hosting, apart from getting automated WordPress and WooCommerce setup, you get daily backups so that your data is always safe, increased security so that you can protect your user’s information and last but not least, expert support staff.
However, keep in mind that a typical shared hosting provider may not always be a good choice for WooCommerce and you would definitely need more resources like SSL certificate.
Here are some of the best WooCommerce hosting providers on the market as of now:
· SiteGround. SiteGround is one of the best all-around hosting platforms and their 24/7 support makes SiteGround very handy for new WooCommerce stores. Besides, they are an official WooCommerce hosting provider. For businesses with a tight budget, SiteGround would be a good choice since it offers all the features you need in order to run a successful online store at a very affordable price.
· Bluehost. Bluehost is the best overall WooCommerce hosting provider. Bluehost is beginner friendly, budget friendly and has a fast server speed. Bluehost is rated #1 web hosting provider for small businesses. Bluehost is an official WordPress and WooCommerce recommended hosting provider.
· A2 Hosting. A2 Hosting is considered by many the best hosting provider in terms of security.
· Liquid Web. Liquid Web is a hosting platform that has just recently launched its fully managed WooCommerce hosting platform. Liquid Web is an excellent choice for growing online businesses that need extra functionality for WooCommerce.
· WP Engine. WP Engine is a premium WordPress hosting provider that offers infrastructure that can handle high traffics and other demands. WP Engine works well with mid-range budgets and those online shop owners who require expert WooCommerce advice.
· Hostinger. Hostinger is cited by many as the most budget friendly hosting provider.
Considering how important it is to choose the best WooCommerce hosting provider for an online business startup and considering how overwhelming all the information on the web could be to especially the newbies in the business, wpbegginer has come up with a WooCommerce Hosting Quiz. This questionnaire will help you decide which WooCommerce hosting company is the best for you based on your particular needs.
In the past, web designers had two ways of creating custom-designed WooCommerce store:
- Coding Theme PHP files which is way more complicated than WordPress theme customization given the complex structure of WordPress templates.
- Coding WooCommerce’s hooks which was done by adding elements before or after the relevant hooks.
It was an extremely limited process and very prone to bugs and conflicts. Keep in mind that there are features you definitely need on your WooCommerce website such as a sign-up form for email newsletters, automatic calculations of taxes and shipping fees, automatically indicates the new products, option for confirming discounts and promotion codes at checkout, offer gift cards, etc.
Apart from WooCommerce hosting providers, there are WooCommerce builder add-ons such as Elementor WooCommerce Builder which you can use Deep theme developed by Webnus to design your single product for creating the perfect product page and get more sales as well as archive page templates for optimizing the look and feel of pages that showcase your products visually and without coding.
With Elementor WooCommerce Builder, you get every widget your online shop needs such Add to Cart Button, Product Price Tag, Product title and Description, Product image, Upsells, Related Products, Product Rating, Product Content, Product Data Tabs, Meta and Additional Information, Breadcrumbs, Product stock. Elementor WooCommerce Builder enables you to set up a pixel perfect custom-designed store and skip over the hand-coding parts.
