In the last few years, e-commerce has seen tremendous growth and if statistics are to be believed, then we can expect around 65% of global internet users to purchase products online by the year 2021. Also, in terms of revenue, the global retail e-commerce sales figures are expected to grow to around USD 4.8 trillion by 2021. Hence, e-commerce is the business to focus on in the future. There are many e-commerce platforms that allow users to start their online store . Of these, WooCommerce ranks among the top few e-commerce platforms preferred by users around the globe.

What is WooCommerce?

WooCommerce is the most popular e-commerce WordPress plugin acquired by Automattic in 2015. It is free and allows you to add unlimited products, customize your e-store according to your needs, and hundreds of free and paid extensions for all your requirements. With 4 million plus downloads, WooCommerce certainly has struck the right chord with WordPress users who have an online store.

Importance of hosting for an online store

With the increase in online buying, consumers demand a 24x7x365 availability of the online store, quick load times, and a great shopping experience. For the owners, this translates to a site designed keeping the user’s experience in mind and a host that is sensitive to buyer behavior that  offers solutions for storing, managing, retrieving, distributing, and backing-up huge volumes of data churned from the e-commerce sites.

For business owners running WooCommerce websites, hosting plays an important role. WordPress packs a punch with the various plugins and tools provided to its users. WooCommerce being a plugin means that the performance of your store ultimately depends on the performance of your WordPress site and the management of the plugin database.

How WordPress hosting can help WooCommerce websites

Here is a list of benefits that WordPress hosting can offer WooCommerce websites:

• Automated WordPress updates – When you are running a WP website, updating the WP core is essential since it keeps your website secure and working in excellent condition. While this can be time consuming, a good WordPress hosting provider can offer automated updates ensuring that you run your website on the latest WP version at all times.
• Managed services – While many platforms have made creating a website easy, running it requires some amount of technical know-how and expertise. Managed WordPress hosting handles all the technical aspects like system backups, migration etc. so that you can concentrate more on the core business.
• Optimization of WP database – All important elements of your WP website including plugins are stored in the WP database. As your site grows, this database can become bloated affecting the overall speed and performance of your website. While there are tools to optimize the WP database, a WP hosting plan automatically optimizes it for you.
• Automatic backup – With a plugin like WooCommerce, you can certainly expect your online store to attract buyers. All the data that you gather from them is very important for your business. In case of any problem, you wouldn’t want to lose the data. Managed WP hosting plans offer automatic cloud backup services which includes periodic system backups for your website to protect you from any possible threat and assistance with the restoration process in case of any disaster. 

Conclusion

While WooCommerce helps you to improve the website, ensuring that they have a great experience is the ticket to a loyal customer and great reviews. Hosting plans dedicated to WordPress websites understand the WP environment and deploy the latest infrastructure and advanced security tools to offer you a platform to build your e-commerce business on.