We find that pricing for server hosting can seem pretty mysterious to our clients (and sometimes to us as well as we shop around). But there are lot of factors that go into pricing:
How many folks can access the account at the same time
How complicated the processes are that are being completed on the site
Are there other functions – email, FTP, advanced security – being provided by the server company
Quality and level of support: user guide, email contacts, phone call
A brochure site that averages 500 views per month is going to need a lot less than an online transaction and scheduling site that averages 150 transactions and 4000 views per month. A site that manages membership renewals is going to need a lot more than one that does not. It all goes into the resources that a website needs. In general terms of WordPress, the more plugins you need, the more resources you are going to need.
Of course, what do “WordPress plugins” mean to the average person? Think functionality. Plugins are pieces of software that provide functionality, usually with a lot of flexibility. But the software that provides the ability to generate and process a contact form is not the same as the software that provides the ability to run a front page moving banner. Usually, the more functionality that your website has adds more plugin software that your WordPress site needs. And that can require greater database server and memory resourcing.
Server accounts can share across processes. Lots of server accounts can share the same database server, and the same holds true for mail servers. We see more and more often that database server sharing can be pushed to the limit, and heavy duty traffic on somebody else’s site can impact the responsiveness of the entire server and the sites that it serves. If your site has greater responsiveness needs than that, you may wish to get a higher end account that both increases your site’s resource allocations and perhaps even limits those resources to your site.
On the web, the resources needed per site keep increasing BUT the growth of the number of sites is not like it used to be. So hosting costs per site are going up. At the same time, competition among hosting companies keeps increasing, so they quite often offer a first year price that is significantly lower than what the second year price will be. And unfortunately, the way they provide that information makes it seem like the first year price IS the price. Since moving an existing web site can be some labor and cost, and there aren’t nearly as many new web sites being built, they have to incentivize moving the site, and that’s usually with price. So read the pricing information carefully and look for the “regular price”.
We’ve had several client sites outgrow their shared hosting provisions in the past few years and have to move to what are called “Virtual Private Server” or VPS accounts. Some general information on such accounts can be found here – https://cloud.google.com/learn/what-is-a-virtual-private-server but hosting companies can vary in their offerings. They tend to run considerably more than shared accounts, but you’re paying for the advantages provided. If you have a larger site that has online transactions, membership management, heavy duty data searching or other such database server needs, you probably are heading for a VPS in the next few years if you’re not there now.
One final thought about server price – security. Most server companies provide a little detail of some security measures they take to protect their servers from hackers. We all need as much protection as we can get right now. So make sure you look into this as well.