Is shared hosting really budget-friendly?

Submitted by Brandon Cone on 11/06/2013 - 11:00:am

We get a lot of clients who want us to help them with their website. A lot of times they want a consultation on the functionality but not on the hosting provider. They either have an existing host they want to retain or have decided on one of the many "budget-friendly" hosting services. What they often don't realize at the outset is that their budget-friendly hosting provider will probably cost them more money as time passes than it will save them. This is not a complete list, but some quick-hitters as to why we (and any development company worth your time) always encourage clients to be leery of these solutions.

  1. No root or sudo access
    1. Giving out root access to your server is not something to be taken lightly - but that's why you're hiring a professional company; they know how to take care of servers and not break your site. When something goes wrong with your site, the second place that your company looks for evidence of what happened is at the server logs. Without root access to your server, they end up in back and forth communication with your hosting provider justifying what they need to know and waiting for them to resolve the problem. This costs you money twice - in downtime as well as developer time.
  2. Limited shell access
    1. While your hosting provider most likely does provide some level of shell access, it is generally relegated to only your site's directory. This allows your developers to view files listed there but often not perform any server related actions.  
    2. One of the most common problems we encounter with new site deploys is incorrect file permissions or ownership. With limited shell access, this is a problem which can easily go from a quick chown command in the shell to either FTP work or communications with the hosting provider (see above for information on this).
  3. FTP Deploys (no git access)
    1. Git is our version control system of choice. If you're unaware why version control is so valuable, that's another post for another day. The short story is that, with Git, we can quickly deploy your site and any updates necessary down the road without worrying about tracking which files were changed and ensuring that the proper version gets moved to the server.
    2. FTP is a significantly slower medium than using a version control system.  In our experience, the increase in time and effort required for FTP deploys can add hours of work to an initial deploy or any feature deploys. This is where budget-friendly hosting really gets expensive. Every time you want to add a new feature to your site or a security update is needed, the time required goes up significantly.

Like I said, this isn't an exhaustive list but are some things to keep in mind when you're getting ready to deploy your new site. A good development company should help you weigh the pros and cons of your hosting choice. Still have questions?  Let us help you.

photo by Simon Cocks