Last Updated on December 5, 2024 by Sunny Staff
Generative AI is transforming SEO, making it both easier and more challenging. While AI can assist in content creation, it also levels the competitive field. As a result, businesses are turning to managed WordPress hosting to gain an edge—by offloading maintenance tasks and ensuring their websites remain fast, secure, and optimized for success.
In this post |
|---|
| What is Managed WordPress Hosting? |
| Better SEO |
| More speed |
| Improved scaling |
| Better security |
| Configured to rank |
| FAQ: Managed Hosting & SEO |
| In a Nutshell |
What is Managed WordPress Hosting?
Managed WordPress hosting is the savvy business owner’s answer to the ever-increasing demand on time and energy required in today’s competitive digital realm. Sounds very marketing-y, but here’s why:
Managed WordPress Hosting is a service that combines website hosting tailored specifically for WordPress with website maintenance and content updates performed by WordPress experts. As websites add more features and enhancements, the latter becomes a time-saving necessity.
Why managed WordPress hosting can be a massive benefit:
- Websites are increasingly relying on more functionality to remain competitive and meet audience demands. This includes eCommerce features, interactive elements, and custom code and / or applications.
- A study has found that the number of HTML elements used on home pages has increased by almost 12% over the span of a year.
- Websites are increasingly relying on the integration of third-party services for advanced features. Examples include payment processors, analytics, and even content delivery.
- More than 60% of websites fetch content from external sources.
Stats aside, it’s important to remember that managed WordPress hosting isn’t just someone else managing your WordPress website: it’s an extension of your organization’s technical talent pool without the associated hiring and training costs.
Also read: The Role of Professional WordPress Maintenance in Securing Agency Client Sites
Better SEO
This can improve your site’s SEO, which, in turn, can boost your search engine rank and attract visitors to your website. Managed WordPress hosting can also fuel visitor trust and help improve conversion rates. Here’s how:
More speed
Yes, site speed matters. But to what degree? Like many things about SEO, it’s up for debate. The folks over at Search Engine Journal made a valid point in this article, arguing that, if page speed does have a direct impact on a page’s rank, doesn’t that exclude search results with more relevant content that might load slower than less relevant but faster pages?
Page speed does matter. After all, Google wants its users to have a good experience, a point motivated by its ‘helpful content update’ of August 2022 that aims to reward pages that offer a hearty mix of experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness. It should also be kept in mind that, as SEJ states, page speed was more important back when mobile browsing emerged when bandwidth wasn’t as performant as it is today.
So it’s safe to say that page speed is an important factor when it comes to SEO, but it’s not the only one. Your website visitors, on the other hand, might not be as forgiving when it comes to slow load times: if there’s a competing site with the same products / services at more or less the same price point but with a better experience, which site do you think they’d choose?
The managed hosting difference: With managed WordPress hosting, the objective is to give customers the best possible chance to rank well and to help customers provide a good experience to their users and visitors. To that end, a few different methods and techniques are used to ensure that all pages load fast:
- WordPress-Optimized hosting – This involves methods and techniques that deliver low latency website hosting on servers that have been optimized specifically for WordPress websites and plugins, such as optimized PHP versions and server configurations.
- WordPress hosts typically make use of high-end hardware that supports faster page load times. This includes SSDs, as well as a hardware stack that provides the necessary resources to cope with spikes in demand, powerful CPU cores to handle high levels of traffic, and that supports high IOPS (Input/Output operations per second).
- WordPress-optimized hosts will typically use some form of caching to speed up content delivery. This can include a combination of Content Delivery Network (CDN) caching, server-side caching, and sometimes browser caching too.
Also read: Clearing Cache in WordPress: Boost Performance and Resolve Issues
Improved scaling
Resource scaling is typically a consideration for mission-critical sites, and can set you apart from your competitors during peak traffic times. It typically refers to adding more resources (such as processing power, memory, and storage) when they are needed.
For example: Johnny’s Deluxe Pizza Company typically caters to city workers. Their busiest time – both in store and online – is just after 5 pm. Their WordPress website’s traffic is 10x more shortly after 5 pm than any other time in the day. It’s a spike that lasts two hours, after which it slowly returns to normal.
Had Johnny’s Deluxe Pizza Company opted for shared hosting, chances are that their beautiful website (with all its pictures and videos) would crash just after 5 pm because there would not be enough resources. But with automatic resource scaling, resources are added as needed, when needed. And when those resources aren’t needed anymore, they are removed.
Managed WordPress hosting that includes resource scaling delivers these advantages:
- Absorb traffic spikes: As explained above, resource scaling provisions the necessary computing resources to help sites cope with a sudden spike in traffic. Without it, an influx of visitors could overwhelm the server, causing the site to slow down or crash.
- Improved budget management: Most managed hosting service providers operate on a pay-as-you-use basis. This approach can be more cost-efficient than over-provisioning resources (e.g. getting a high-performance server) since resources are added when used and removed when not needed.
- Consistent user experience. As you could have guessed by now, user experience is an important ranking factor. With resource scaling you offer a consistent user experience: your site loads as fast during peak hours as it does outside peak hours. This is crucial for user satisfaction, as slow loading speeds can lead to increased bounce rates, which in turn negatively affect SEO.
Better security
Improved Security Rock-solid WordPress security delivers a number of benefits that can contribute to your search engine rank. It improves uptime and reliability and delivers a better user experience by ensuring faster page loads and fewer bounce rates. You’ll also avoid penalties: search engines like Google can blacklist compromised sites or mark them as unsafe.
Here’s how managed WordPress hosting keeps your site secure:
- Updates: Keeping your WordPress core, plugins, and themes up to date is one of the biggest contributors to site security. Regular updates ensure your site is protected from known vulnerabilities and exploits, reducing the risk of being hacked. Secure sites also enjoy more uptime, are therefore more reliable, and are more likely to be displayed ahead of compromised sites in search results.
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- SSL: SSL certificates are common nowadays, with domain-validated SSL certificates (requiring the least checks and verifications) usually included in managed WordPress hosting plans free of charge. SSL certificates prevent attackers from intercepting sensitive information, and, thanks to increased visitor trust, also reduce bounce rates. SSL is also a known ranking factor for Google, though its impact is considered lightweight compared to other ranking factors like content quality.
- Web Application Firewall (WAF): Web Application Firewall (WAF): A Web Application Firewall, or WAF, acts as a filter for malicious traffic, preventing attacks like SQL injections and cross-site scripting (XSS). While a WAF is highly effective, it cannot prevent all forms of attacks, especially if there are vulnerabilities at the application level that can bypass the firewall. Hosts might give their customers access to a WAF, or the host configures and maintains the WAF on behalf of its customers. A WAF further reduces the potential to be hacked, and so keeps your site in good standing with search engines.
- Malware scanning and removal: When your managed WordPress host includes proactive malware scanning as part of their service, it means that any potential malware infection is quickly detected and removed, preventing it from affecting your site’s functionality or appearance.
- Brute force protection: A brute force attack is a method used to gain unauthorized access to a system by systematically guessing passwords, encryption keys, or other credentials. It involves trying every possible combination until the correct one is found, and can dramatically reduce site speed and performance. Managed WordPress hosts will typically include various mechanisms to protect against brute force attacks, including rate limiting and CAPTCHA challenges, among others.
- Backups: You might not immediately think that backups qualify as a security measure. But when your entire site is encrypted in a ransomware attack, or when your site goes down due to a security issue, a backup can quickly save the day and avert a major and very costly disaster. Since downtime can cause a dip in your search engine rankings, a backup always at the ready can help you maintain your position. However, backups are only part of the solution—preventive measures are also necessary to reduce the risk of security breaches.
- Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS): A DDoS attack occurs when multiple connected devices (e.g. servers) flood a target with traffic with the aim to disable said target. Search engines like Google penalize sites that are slow or unavailable. To prevent that, managed WordPress hosting comes with built-in DDoS protection that helps absorb malicious traffic. Note that not all managed hosting providers offer enterprise-grade DDoS protection, so it’s important to verify the level of DDoS mitigation offered by your provider.
Also read: Essential WordPress Security Tips Every Site Owner Should Know
Configured to rank
While technical support may not contribute directly to a good Google rank, it does do so indirectly by ensuring that your WordPress website isn’t experiencing any downtime or serious lag, that it’s secure, and that any technical issues are dealt with proactively.
Here’s how managed WordPress support can help you rank better:
24/7 Monitoring: With proactive monitoring, you get eyes on your website 24/7 to pick up on and resolve anomalies before they become issues. Consistent uptime, facilitated by rapid support, ensures that search engine crawlers can access the website without interruption, which is crucial for maintaining or improving rankings.
Improved performance: Faster load times improve user experience and reduce bounce rates, both of which are directly linked to better SEO performance. Round-the-clock support ensures that any performance issues affecting speed are fixed quickly. This can include troubleshooting caching issues, optimizing server settings, or fixing broken links.
Reduced bounce rates: When website visitors are faced with technical issues such as missing pages, slow site speed, or errors, they leave. This results in high bounce rates, which could signal to search engines that the on-site experience is terrible or that you do not provide valuable content. 24/7 Support minimizes disruptions and ensures the website remains user-friendly, helping keep bounce rates low.
Content changes: If content changes are included in your hosting plan, you may be able to request SEO-specific changes (e.g. on-page optimization) from your host. With expert assistance available at all times, you can implement SEO best practices quickly and ensure that changes are done correctly without affecting site performance or stability.
FAQ: Managed Hosting & SEO
Q: How does managed WordPress hosting improve SEO?
A: Managed WordPress hosting improves SEO through optimized performance, enhanced security, and guaranteed uptime. It ensures that your website loads faster, stays secure, and remains accessible—all of which are crucial factors that search engines consider when ranking websites.
Q: What is the difference between regular hosting and managed WordPress hosting?
A: Regular hosting provides basic server resources, whereas managed WordPress hosting includes specialized services like automatic updates, enhanced security, performance optimization, and expert support tailored to WordPress sites. These features help improve your website’s SEO performance.
Q: Does managed hosting impact page load speed?
A: Yes, managed WordPress hosting significantly impacts page load speed. By utilizing optimized server environments, advanced caching mechanisms, and content delivery networks (CDNs), managed hosting ensures faster load times, which is beneficial for both user experience and SEO.
Q: How does uptime affect SEO, and how does managed hosting help?
A: Search engines penalize websites that have frequent or extended downtimes. Managed WordPress hosting minimizes downtime through proactive monitoring, quick issue resolution, and reliable server infrastructure, ensuring your site remains available and maintains its SEO ranking.
Q: Is managed WordPress hosting worth it for small businesses?
A: Absolutely. Managed WordPress hosting helps small businesses stay competitive by improving their website’s performance, security, and reliability—all of which contribute to better SEO. It also reduces the technical burden, allowing businesses to focus more on growth rather than website maintenance.
In a Nutshell
Managed WordPress hosting is more than just a convenience; it’s a strategic investment that enhances your website’s performance, security, and user experience—ultimately boosting SEO rankings. By offloading technical tasks to experts to Sunny HQ, you can focus on creating high-quality content and engaging with your audience, while ensuring your website remains competitive in search results.
Make the switch today and give your website the edge it deserves.
