Web Hosting for Small Business
Web hosting for small business, and how to pick the right plan.
The website up and the email working, without a second job running a server. Hosting, mailboxes at your own domain, daily backups, and a free move off your old host.
- From $7.95/mo paid yearly
- Business email included
- Free migration by engineers
- Helpdesk available 24/7
Choosing between them comes down to one thing: whether everything you run is WordPress.
Blue Arctic runs two hosting platforms, Shared Web Hosting and Managed WordPress Hosting, and no separate small-business product. Almost every business lands on one of the two, and the deciding factor is usually just whether you want email in the same account.
If the answer is yes, Managed WordPress Hosting is the one.
A platform that only has to run WordPress can be tuned harder for it. Plans are $29, $49 and $89/mo.
- Runs WordPress and WooCommerce, and nothing else
- A control panel built purely for WordPress, with updates you can configure per site
- Vulnerability protection that blocks known plugin and theme flaws while you schedule a safe update
- A practice copy of your site to test changes on, and one-click cloning
- Free SSL, daily backups kept 30 days, free migration
- Email hosting is not included
Email at your own domain comes with one of them, not both.
This is the detail that trips people up when they compare hosting. Shared Web Hosting includes business email at your domain on every plan: mailboxes, webmail, forwarders and autoresponders, on the same account as the website. Looking professional shouldn’t be a separate invoice.
Managed WordPress Hosting does not include email. Those plans run WordPress, so your email stays wherever it is today. Plenty of businesses run exactly that combination.
And if your email already works and you are happy with it, keep it right where it is. The two setups work fine side by side.
What a small business needs, and what it does not.
Hosting is sold with long specification lists. This is the short list that decides whether your website serves your business well. It is standard on both platforms.
A website that stays available
Your site runs on servers Blue Arctic owns and manages in Tampa, Florida. Every plan carries a 99.99% uptime SLA, our uptime promise, with credits defined in the agreement.
Backups you can get back
Every site is backed up daily and kept for 30 days under our Terms of Service. Ask the helpdesk and an engineer restores it. Backups are a safety net rather than a certainty, so keep your own copies of anything the business can’t lose.
Someone technical to talk to
The helpdesk is available 24/7, and a person reads your ticket rather than a script. Who answers, and how fast.
Someone else doing the move
Our engineers migrate your site free on both platforms, and most sites move within 24 hours. Your site stays live at your current host while we build and test the copy here. How migration works.
A fair share of the server
Each account gets a defined amount of processing power and memory, and we limit how many accounts share a server. Another site’s busy morning is contained rather than becoming your problem.
What you do not need
A server of your own. Most small businesses never need one, and we will say so. You also do not need the website itself looked after unless you want that: Website Care is separate, from $100/mo.
Both platforms carry a 30-day money-back guarantee for new customers, and there is no teaser pricing: your plan renews at its regular rate rather than jumping to a higher renewal price.
About regulated data. Standard plans are not HIPAA, PCI DSS, SOC 2, CJIS, or CMMC compliant environments; compliance work is scoped and quoted as its own project. If your business handles protected health information or cardholder data, start at compliance and talk to us first.
Questions business owners ask first.
What web hosting is best for a small business?
For most small businesses, managed shared hosting with business email included. It runs the website, holds the mailboxes at your own domain, and leaves the server work to someone else. At Blue Arctic that is Shared Web Hosting, from $7.95/mo paid yearly. The exception is a business whose entire online presence is WordPress and who wants a platform tuned only for it: that is Managed WordPress Hosting, and email for those sites still lives on a Shared Web Hosting account. Everything else is a question of size, not of product.
Do I need technical experience to host my website?
No. On a managed plan the server, the operating system, the security patching and the backups are ours. You get cPanel, a plain control panel for the everyday things, and the helpdesk for anything beyond that. We also move your existing site over for you, free, so getting started does not require any technical work either. If you would rather not maintain the website itself, Website Care covers that as a separate service.
Is shared hosting enough for a small business?
For the large majority, yes. Shared Web Hosting runs WordPress, WooCommerce, Drupal, Joomla and custom PHP, and it includes business email. It carries a 99.99% uptime SLA, and the server security is maintained for you. Businesses outgrow it when the work demands more: sustained traffic, a large catalogue, or heavy applications. We will tell you when we think you are close.
How much does it cost?
Shared Web Hosting starts at $7.95/mo paid yearly and Managed WordPress Hosting starts at $29/mo. Website Care starts at $100/mo if you want the site itself looked after too. Everything is on plans and pricing.
Can I talk to someone on the phone?
The helpdesk is available 24/7, in the client portal, and it is the fastest path to a fix for anything technical, including urgent and after-hours issues. Phone is for sales and account questions, Mon–Fri, 8AM–4PM ET.
Tell us about your business. We’ll tell you what you need.
What the website does, and whether you need email at your domain. That is enough for a straight recommendation, including if the answer is our cheapest plan.
Free migration 99.99% uptime SLA