Host Your Own Site
Host Your Own Site: A Tale of Two Hosting Services
As of November of 2023, The Renaissance Garden Guy maintains its home on a massive, missile-fast dedicated server at A2 Hosting. Its residence there has been characterized by awesome performance and infallible security. A site of The RGG’s ever-increasing size and content type is best served by a big, fast, dedicated server. And A2 provided one. But before this time, The Renaissance Garden Guy enjoyed flawless hosting with Bluehost. During the time that its size and scope were within Bluehost’s substantial (but ultimately, insufficient) storage capabilities, The Renaissance Garden Guy literally flowered. And my appreciation of Bluehost’s awesome capabilities have recently resulted in the creation of my new website, A Man for Some Seasons, which is currently in development and hosted by Bluehost.
So, I love both of these hosting services. A2 is big and fast, and supports larger, more complex websites, while Bluehost is fast, reliable, and affordable, and is perfect for brand new WordPress sites, or sites that don’t require insane levels of server space. I love them both, and I use them both, and I highly recommend them both. Read on to learn why.
Why A2 Hosting?
The Renaissance Garden Guy has grown considerably in terms of content – including ever-growing levels of written, photographic, video, and audiovisual content – since it was first created in 2020. As it grew, and with more website components and capabilities in the works, I realized that at some point, it would need to move to a hosting service with massive storage and speed capabilities. That point came in November of 2023, and the hosting service I settled on was A2 Hosting. Right below, I’ll fill you in on not only those amazing storage and speed capabilities, but on a few additional really important A2 Hosting benefits.
Hosting capacity. A2 Hosting servers offer up to 5TB of website content storage. Enough said.
Speed and performance. The Renaissance Garden Guy occupies an A2 Hosting Warp 2 Turbo AMD bare metal dedicated server, which is a massive, insanely fast server. Sites with less storage requirements can opt for any number of A2 server solutions, and can be guaranteed incredible speeds with each and every one. A2 Hosting’s servers are famous for those unparalleled speeds, and they all utilize SSDs (solid state drives). But this amazingly capable hardware is not the only reason A2 Hosting is so incredibly fast. A2’s advanced software optimizations like A2 Optimized (which optimizes software like WordPress) and LiteSpeed Cache (which delivers website content with unequaled speed) combine with A2’s prodigious server hardware to deliver unheard of speed and performance.
Reputation. A2 Hosting has been around since 2003, and their reputation is excellent. This long-time, highly reputable mainstay of the website hosting industry was PC Magazine’s top pick for WordPress hosting in 2023. In addition to A2’s massive hosting capacity and unbelievable speed, A2’s reputation was a huge selling point for me.
Flexibility and package choices. One of the key benefits to going with A2 is the fact that they offer, in addition to both shared and dedicated servers, the option of unmanaged as well as managed hosting. In terms of their unmanaged servers, A2 offers almost limitless configuration options and a multitude of different plans. With managed hosting, A2 handles every conceivable behind-the-scenes adjustment, fix, patch, update, etc., etc., etc. pertaining to the care, maintenance, and management of your site’s server.
Reliability. A2 guarantees an uptime of 99.99%. Again, it’s guaranteed.
Free site migration. A2 offers free site migration to new customers. They also offer free migration to existing customers who upgrade to higher level servers.
Security. A2 takes security incredibly seriously. My confidence in their ability to keep The Renaissance Garden Guy (and ultimately, my site’s visitors and me) safe is unshakable. A2’s laundry list of security features includes free, automatically activated SSL certificates, DDoS protection, dual firewalls, the Patchman enhanced security tool, daily automatic backups (excludes the start-up package), and 2-factor authentication.
Easy and thorough cPanel hosting management and control. Do it all from your A2 cPanel: add domains, set up an unlimited number of domain-based email accounts, install and manage WordPress, plus much, much more.
Technical support and customer service. A2 Hosting offers 24/7 technical support and customer service via telephone, live chat, and/or email. Every representative I’ve talked to since becoming an A2 customer has been incredibly technically adroit, super-friendly, and extremely helpful. If an issue can’t be resolved instantly, follow-up and resolution happen quickly as a ticket and corresponding ticket history are created. You can’t fall through the cracks when it comes to A2 technical support. I am a tech idiot, so their thorough and patient approach has proven for me to be an invaluable component of the entire A2 experience gestalt.
As far as the evolving, cumbersome nature of The Renaissance Garden Guy site is concerned, A2 Hosting’s size, speed, and performance capabilities, plus their extensive list of additional benefits, provide the perfect hosting solution.
If you’ve got a site of your own in mind that you’d like to get up and running, or if you’ve got an existing site that’s a bit larger and more complex that you’d like to speed up or offer more room to grow, A2 Hosting is the perfect choice. To learn more about what A2 Hosting has to offer, or to let them handle all of your site’s hosting needs, feel free to click on any of the A2 Hosting banners on this page.
Why Bluehost?
Back in 2020 when I knew I first realized that I wanted to start a blog, I asked other bloggers and website owners to recommend a hosting service for my new, potential site. The recommendation was loud, clear, and unanimous: Bluehost.
Why Bluehost?
After all of the great Bluehost recs I received from other bloggers, and after doing tons of my own research, I decided on Bluehost. As far as my soon-to-be-born website and I were concerned, Bluehost came out ahead of all the other hosting services in terms of the following criteria: reputation, value, included products and services, technical support/customer service, and WordPress support.
Reputation. Bluehost has got an impeccable rep. After talking with personal friends and others in various blogging communities, I found that the consensus was that Bluehost was THE go-to hosting service for smaller, new websites. Successful bloggers seemed to almost universally recommend Bluehost. For me, a personal recommendation goes a long way. But virtually every digital review publication that I checked out also gave Bluehost the best possible review. These publications have got website pros writing those reviews. When these folks give a hosting service that level of review, I pay close attention. Top10.com recently ranked Bluehost as the number one hosting provider of 2022 with a score of 9.7 out of 10. Like I said, I pay attention to stuff like this.
Value. Obviously, I encourage everyone to shop around. But for me, I felt that what I was getting with Bluehost (and as you’ll see, it’s tons) was a lot of bang for my buck.
Included products and services. With Bluehost, you get domain registration (my site’s URL, renaissancegardenguy.com, is registered to me only and is guaranteed to stay that way), super security protocol (their SiteLock Security is unbeatable), free SSL certification (another level of online security), and a free, simple 1-click installation of WordPress (the go-to content management [web building] system for bloggers and web site owners) onto your site. I’m not a techie, but I can tell you that a Bluehost subscription comes with a lot of awesome bells and whistles.
Technical support and customer service. When it comes to any and all questions or concerns, the team at Bluehost is icredible. Their technical support is awesome, and their customer service reps are friendly, courteous, and knowledgeable. And they’re available 24/7. Bluehost’s scores are off the charts in these areas.
WordPress support. If you’re tech savvy, you’ll be thrilled with the free, 1-click installation of WordPress onto your newly registered site. You’ll be able to hit the ground running and start building your site, exactly how you want it, and without any help. WordPress is so fertile, well-equipped, and adaptable, the sky literally is the limit. And speaking of the sky… If you’re not tech savvy (like me), than you’ll want to take advantage of an incredible suite of WordPress site building and support services offered by Bluhost, called WordPress Pro Design Live (formerly Blue Sky). You can choose from different packages, from on-demand ticket support through live telephone support, each of which includes SEO tools (stuff that makes your site get noticed more quickly in online searches) and mobile optimization help. Bluehost gives you the power and genius of WordPress, and offers you all the help you could ever need in exploiting its awesome potential.
The entire Bluehost start-up process was incredibly fast and simple. I got a fabulous hosting package that’s reliable, secure, and remarkably efficient and effective. And if I ever have a question, that fabulous customer support I just mentioned is right there for me – the Bluehost team is excellent on all counts.
If you’re thinking about beginning your own blogging or website adventure, Bluehost is a perfect hosting answer. You can learn more about all the ways that Bluehost has helped The Renaissance Garden Guy grow and thrive by reading “Choosing a Great Hosting Service for Your Site,” and “Why Start a Blog?”. And of course, to learn more about Bluehost and what they offer, or to let them handle all of your site hosting needs, simply click on any of the Bluehost banners on this page.
There you have it. Two great hosting services. A2 Hosting is tailored for handling bigger sites with unparalleled speed, performance, and more. Bluehost offers unbeatable amenities for smaller and brand new sites. A2 hosts The Renaissance Garden Guy. Bluehost formerly hosted The Renaissance Garden Guy, and now hosts my second site, A Man for Some Seasons. I love both of these services, and I highly recommend each of them. So, host your own site and feel great about doing it on either an A2 Hosting or Bluehost server.
Cheers, and Happy Hosting!
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Additionally, The Renaissance Garden Guy is a participant in the Bluehost, SeedsNow, and A2 Hosting affiliate programs. The Renaissance Garden Guy earns a fee/commission each time a visitor clicks on an ad or banner in this site from one of these companies and makes a subsequent qualifying purchase.
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