Server downtime is the biggest nightmare for bloggers and they try to avoid this by any means. Visitors can not access your blog on the downtime and worst of all this is going to create a very bad impression among first time visitors.
Chances are that most of the first-time visitors will never come back to your blog and this is why bloggers take server downtime very seriously.
Recently I was faced with this disastrous problem on a blog that steadily makes over $200 a day. I had people emailing me and telling me my website had problems and when I investigated, I found out that my account had been shut down for CPU throttling. I probably would have preferred some server maintenance or server downtime because it took me hours to convince the company to put me back online.
This was a nightmare and what was even worse, was that this occurred every day for the next week. The company assured me that the problem had been fixed but kept shutting me down.
I cannot tell you what this can do to an online business. Having server downtime, for any reason, actually just wipes your business off the face of the earth. I lost potential customers, loads of sales, and confused the regulars. This is definitely one of the downsides of an online business.
What Does Server Downtime do to Your Business?
Issue No1: You Are Creating A Very Bad First Impression
If you are new to blogging, the first thing you need to understand about server downtime is that it’s not a onetime thing, but its impact can last forever among most first comers. Chances of your first time visitor making a comeback are really low or you must be a famous blogger with huge online popularity and the visitor is looking for some unique information on your site. In such cases, they may give it a shot again.
Issue No2: Downtime Means No Productivity
This is another way that downtime can ruin your blogging business. If your blog is not online, you can’t publish fresh content to it and this will affect your traffic in many ways. Visitors who are coming for constant updates will be disappointed and if downtime happens more often, they may look for other sources. Regular updates are also essential for maintaining your search engine ranking and without proper search engine rankings; you’re losing money this way as well.
You probably have invested a significant amount of money on search engine optimization and all your other SEO efforts will be in vain with a blog that has regular downtimes. Once search engines get a bad impression about your blog, it’s very difficult for you to push it back to the front pages of leading search engines like Google and Yahoo.
Issue No3: Loss Of Data
Several backups may not always work, especially when you’re trying to reach the website after downtime and things can get much worse if your downtime coincides with your server’s backup time. As a matter of fact, nothing is impossible in the online world, so be prepared for the worst. If you do not have proper backup of your data, you will lose your recent upgrades and other important information.
This can be even more frustrating if you paid someone to create the content.
Issue No4: Liabilities and Money Factor
Advertising on your blog is a great way to make money but at the same time, when it is going through a downtime most of the day, you’re not going to please your advertisers and some of them may even ask for their money back. This not only results in a lot of stress and possible financial loss, it can also affect your credibility as a blogger and the issue should be rectified at any cost.
Issue No5: Search Engine Rankings
If server downtime occurs too often you will lose rankings. I lost all my traffic on a few top pages and had to work frantically to get them back. Some are still not back to where they should be because so many people tried to access them and could not.
This ruins your reputation in the search engines and sees all of your visitors bouncing from your website.
This situation was a lot like Google Panda hitting my website, which did happen, and thankfully I recovered from that also.
What Did I Do?
I desperately wanted to move my website to another server, however I was at the mercy of the company because I could not access my website to move it. I was frantically looking for a solution to my problem and scoured through many of the top web hosting companies to find one that would help me quickly.
Eventually I bought dedicated hosting with Hostgator and they moved my entire blog for me. I mean an exact replica of the blog and also even the e-mail accounts. All I did was walk in and start running my blog again. This was such a relief after going through a week of this awful server downtime and loss of earnings. I would not wish this upon anyone and when your business can support itself, I suggest you buy the best hosting you can afford.
Now you know how server downtime can affect your blogging business, so if you’re serious about building a successful blogging career it’s important to choose a web hosting company that has at least 99% uptime. You also need to move your successful moneymaking blogs to safe hosting where you have plenty of room to expand. I neglected the fact that my hosting needed upgrading and caused myself some unnecessary stress.
Hosting is the absolute most important part of your blogging business, because without it, you have nothing.
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