Cloud Hosting is a type of website hosting where the data of a website is stored across multiple servers. This is a fundamental shift from traditional hosting methods where all the data of a website is stored on a single server. Traditional hosting methods host the data of multiple websites within a single server, but Cloud Hosting distributes the data of one website to multiple servers.
This change in the basics of data storage lends several key benefits to Cloud Hosting – greater redundancy, better uptime, easier disaster recovery are some of the prominent benefits.
This article lists and explains a few steps that you can take to fully capitalise on your Cloud Hosting plan.
How to Setup Cloud Hosting to Get the Most Out of it?
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Choose a plan with a good hosting company and a decent feature set
The web hosting company that you get your Cloud Hosting plan from has more effect on your website than you may initially think. The hosting company owns and maintains the servers that house your website.
Server hardware and server maintenance have a direct impact on the functioning of your website. When looking for a Cloud Hosting plan, enquire about the ease of scalability, redundancy measures in place, security strategy for the servers, and uptime assurances that the company is willing to offer on paper.
Leading web hosting companies are not only transparent about what they offer but are also more than willing to spell it out on paper. The best hosting companies usually nail the basics of Cloud Hosting — security, reliability, performance — and offer decent features like a versatile web management application, great customer support, and a few other software that’ll help you set up your website.
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Consider using a CDN
Once your website is up and running, consider if a CDN (Content Delivery Network) would be beneficial. A CDN is essentially a collection of servers (called the edge servers) that are positioned in different parts of the world.
When someone accesses your website, the edge server closest to the device will service that request. If data has to travel lesser distances, it’ll take less time, thus making your website that much faster.
Of course, you can skip a CDN if most of your customers are concentrated in a single geographic area. CDNs aren’t of much use in those cases.
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Enable caching on your website
If there’s just one thing that you’re willing to do to speed up your website, it’s enabling caching on your website.
When you enable caching, your server allows a device to store some of the basic elements of your website locally. When your website is accessed from the same device again, the browser will simply use the saved data to load much of the website. The server only has to fill in the blanks, which means that it’ll be done quickly.
Caching is crucial for website speed and can have a significant impact. So, ensure that website caching is always on. It’s a simple setting that you can change within minutes and there are innumerable guides online that’ll make it even simpler.
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Use cloud-based security tools
Unfortunately, with the rising number of businesses going online, cyber attacks are on the rise too. More and more websites are getting targeted, not just by hackers but also by the bots released into a network. These bots are capable of completely hacking websites.
The best way to protect your website from these cyber attacks is to ensure that you’ve deployed the best security that you can. Cloud-based security tools are now designed especially for websites of small and medium-sized businesses. The prices are reasonable and you pay a small fee each month like you would for a Netflix subscription.
These applications are a collection of a wide variety of tools in one package. They scour your website daily, looking for vulnerabilities and fixing them. These include malware, virus, injection points, and weak codes.
One such popular cloud-based security tool is SiteLock Website Security.
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Deploy an automated website backup tool
Backups are crucial for obvious purposes and given how sensitive people are today about data privacy and data loss, it makes sense to invest in an automated backup tool.
An automated backup tool like CodeGuard Website Backup requires no intervention once it’s been installed and configured. It’ll automatically take backups from time to time, store multiple copies of the data securely, and even make it easy to recover the data if you ever need it.
Again, more tools are now available at prices that small and medium-sized businesses can afford. So, make sure that you buy a good website backup tool. It’s worth it in the long run.
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Don’t clutter your server
If you’re not using any applications, just delete them. Each unused website acts as a deadweight to your server, affecting its performance.
Additionally, make sure that you periodically update all the applications that you do use. Updates usually contain important security fixes that can better protect your applications and your website too.
In fact, the best way to go about this is to have an updated schedule on a calendar. You should go through all applications and programs you have, check for updates, and bring your entire server and all the applications up to date.
While this may not seem like an optimisation task, the fact is that hackers routinely use known backdoors to hack a website. Updates usually contain patches that close these backdoors. So, even though it may not seem like much, it’s actually crucial for the overall safety of your website.
Conclusion
Cloud Hosting is a powerful hosting solution that takes a fundamentally different approach to the way the data of a website is stored. However, even a highly redundant setup like Cloud Hosting needs regular tweaking to ensure you get the maximum value for your money. You can get the most out of your Cloud Hosting plans by adopting a CDN and caching software, installing a cloud-based security tool and an automated backup solution, ensuring a clean, decluttered server, and finally, choosing the right hosting plan.
A Cloud Hosting plan from HostGator India will ensure that you get great security, performance, and reliability. With those aspects covered, you can concentrate completely on growing your website.
To know more, get in touch with us today!
