the best UK WordPress hosting for speed, security and support

I need a site that’s the best UK WordPress hosting

One has to have a compelling reason to switch hosting sites, it’s akin to switching your bank account, it’s something you don’t want to do often and it’s something that can scupper your day, your week, your month or even your year. It needs serious thought and a hard Paddington stare.  I just needed something simple, I needed the Best UK WordPress Hosting

I have used a handful of hosting partners over the years, I’m not a big player and I dabble in the black arts of WordPress. This may seem to make me not such a good judge of the wellbeings of a hosting service, y’know I’m not a player, I’m not big so… meh, what do my thoughts count.

Well if you’re sitting comfortably I’ll explain a few things:

1. I’m teeny, if I get stuck and phone up a support desk, well I can be treat as though I’m teeny tiny. What does it matter if my business is lost, hey I can even be on the end of a bad day at the office rant, I can be throwaway and dealt with when it suits the supporting (allegedly) supporty person.
2. My knowledge is not particularly intensive, I don’t have an in-house support techie working for me to dig out answers, I need to be able to liaise with someone who knows how to get down with anyone.
3. Even though I’m small I still need speed, I cannot afford the luxury of my own personal server but hey I still need speed, who doesn’t.
4. Etcetra Etcetra

So what have I had in the past, well I’ve had hosting services that I’ve paid for.

That’s about it… they’re not particularly fast, they’re not particularly well supported they’ve been vanilla and in some cases they been downright earwax.

There was the one where my sites were crazy hacked, I can be pretty techie when I put my mind to it and I’m not the first to pick up the phone at the first sight of blood… but…. Where was the support?

I don’t expect gold class service when I’m not paying big bucks for it, but where were the alarms to at least inform me that someone had uploaded a bazillion PDFs to me website. Where was the shoulder to cry on when I was up that creek without a paddle or even a spork to row with? No-one at all called, all I got were threats that my site was to shut down because of increased activity, that was it.

When I tidied things up it happened again, I was out on a limb, out on my own and I was sinking fast.

Anyway hacking whingeathon over…

Then there was the site that offered everything but didn’t have a CPanel interface and offered it’s own custom jobbie. Well that may be very well but it just didn’t work, don’t reinvent the wheel and all that springs to mind. It just didn’t work, I spent ages trying to rouse support to my aid, they were good, in my time I’d had terrible experiences with support desks, but hey there was an answer within a couple of hours so this wasn’t too bad. It just never worked though.

Also I have a very specific need, it’s my nationality, I’m British (damnit 🙂 ), hosting in the UK is pretty slim, when it does raise its head it’s not exactly fantastic. I needed someone who could host my badly designed site so that even though it was badly designed it would race along in the UK.

So why SiteGround.

I was hacked and exhausted.  I needed to move my sites, all kit and caboodle, I needed to have them tidied up, I needed it validating that they were clean and I needed it done on a shoestring. I also considered the UK problem and support needs but I thought they were was a slim chance of getting all my needs fulfilled.

Anyway I came across the usual contenders and I started summing up what they had and weighting what would be the best compromise of those available sites. Thing was I’d been here before, it hadn’t worked put then and I was exasperated in the realisation that it probably wouldn’t work now.

I was idly flicking through sites and searching deeper into the pages of Google results when I came across a WordPress developers page expounding the wonders of a hosting service called SiteGround. The developer’s experiences seemed to tally with mine and despite her not needing UK hosting she outlined that they did provide it.

I was amazed that I’d fallen for an affiliate advertiser and I pressed on with my idle search.

A bit more jumping around and I came upon a WordPress forum with a chat service, I filled in a chat request. A bit of small talk and the chatter cut to the chase and asked me what I was considering. I said this, that and SiteGround, the reaction was pretty amazing… “oh yeah, they’re the best, support is fantastic, give them a go”

So off to SiteGround and a chat request was requested, ten seconds later and by gum I was being dealt with… hey but it was probably sales.

Nope it was a technical bod…

Ten minutes later they’d agreed to offer me a transfer of one of my existing sites, they’d agreed to check it for hacking and they’d agreed to do it all for free, pending my approval.

I gave them minimal details and bango when I arose the next morning, there it was up in lights.

There were some problems but click on chat, ask a question, get a response and all was good in the world.

Suffice to say they were great.

Further suffice to say they’re still great.

I now have my three sites – go on try them for speed:

http://www.mydreamhouse.co.uk – yay speedy, even with the new galleries and the numpty design

http://www.dragonsforkids.co.uk – is it speedy or what

http://www.joggybloggy.com – although it’s pants it’s fast pants

Support is and never will cease to amaze me, it’s just beyond belief how good it is, particularly when compared against some of the alternatives. It really is just fill in a chat request and within a couple of minutes – at the most – support is there and it’s supportive.  It’s not rocket science, they’re just there to get you through your problems. Sure some services are charged, subsequent sites that I needed moving would have been charged but I managed to do this on my own and with the help of the support people to get me through.

So what else, well UK hosting is great in the UK, they offer other worldwide links, don’t be put off by the UK element, they’re offering services in the US and Asia Pacific, hell I think they even do a Australian service down under. Oh did I mention that they’re cheap too. I mean really cheap. Do it as a spreadsheet though and on paper they might not seem as good as some of the alternatives but trust me this is the best host I have ever partnered with. They do CPanel too and as well as WordPress there’s Drupal, Magneto and Joomla.

They don’t wear capes, the force is strong in them though…

They do have customer feedback here though…