SiteGround eCommerce Review – Free Let’s Encrypt SSL With Unmatched Speed Technology From A Top Rated Host

Looking into SiteGround’s eCommerce hosting?

No, my site isn’t eCommerce, but if you view the StartUp vs. GrowBig vs. GoGeek comparison chart you can see the difference. You get a free shopping cart install and Let’s Encrypt SSL with ALL SiteGround plans, 1 year of wildcard SSL with GrowBig, and PCI compliance with GoGeek.

Outside of these eCommerce features, the MAIN difference between plans is GrowBig and GoGeek allow you to host unlimited websites (where StartUp you can only host 1). GrowBig and GoGeek also come with more server resources (which make your site load faster) and include priority support. Both also come with more web storage, 30 daily backups (instead of 1), advanced caching for SiteGround SuperCacher plugin, and GoGeek comes with staging which allows you create demo websites for testing new designs and code before launching.

There are a few other differences which I will cover these in this SiteGround eCommerce review. But assuming you’re set on going with SiteGround (which you should be since they’re the #1 rated host in this Facebook poll)… you will be choosing between their StartUp, GrowBig, or GoGeek plan. Unless you want to use their cloud hosting which is $80/month.

SSL Certificates

Here’s a list of SiteGround’s SSL certificates but I’ll go through each one…

Let’s Encrypt SSL – free on all SiteGround plans. You can enable Let’s Encrypt in the cPanel.

Wildcard SSL – $82/year and secures subdomains. GrowBig /GoGeek come with 1 free year.

EV SSL – $499/year and gives you that green color on your https. It also guards the information on its way between the browser and final destination – the server,  by encryption.

Third Party SSLs – you can install these through your SiteGround cPanel.

PCI Compliance For Fraud Protection

PCI Compliance –  “payment card industry” offers people a unified approach towards safeguarding credit card holder information for all types of credit cards, preventing fraud, cracking and various other security threats and vulnerabilities. This is included in SiteGround’s GoGeek hosting but can requested for other plans too, I’m just not sure how much it costs.

Supported Shopping Charts + Free Installation

SiteGround supports the following shopping carts and offers a free installation with the purchase of any hosting plan. Below are eCommerce-specific hosting plans unique to each shopping cart, but they’re pretty much the same. You’re better off learning the difference between StartUp vs. GrowBig vs. GoGeek which I’ll explain. Here are shopping cart FAQs.

Faster Load Times: My Site Loads In Under 1s

I’m hosted on SiteGround GoGeek and my site loads in under 1s. Here’s my Pingdom report…

That’s because SiteGround customers have the fastest average load times around…

SiteGround Speed Technology – SiteGround uses the best speed technology including SSD (solid states drives), NGINX servers, HTTP/2 enabled servers, and other features listed on their speed technology page. I host multiple sites on SiteGround and they all load in under 1s.

Cloudflare CDN – SiteGround’s eCommerce hosting comes with Cloudflare’s free CDN which you can access in their cPanel. This improves both speed and security and should be activated as soon as you sign up. A content delivery network hosts your website on multiple servers around the world (as oppose to just 1 origin server), delivering content from the closest server to your visitor. You can setup Cloudflare with W3 Total Cache if you’re running WordPress.

Higher Plans Come With More Server Resources – the higher the plan (StartUp vs. GrowBig, vs. GoGeek), the more resources are dedicated to hosting your website. You can find this on the features page (under “we allocate the resources you need). For each plan you upgrade you get about 1.5x more server resources. If speed is important to you, I would at least consider upgrading to GrowBig which is only $4/month more than StartUp and is much faster.

WordPress Caching – if you plan on using SiteGround’s SG CachePress plugin, StartUp only gives you 1 level of caching while GrowBig and GoGeek give you 3 levels, thus a faster website. However I would use W3 Total Cache instead which yields better results in Pingdom. Just install the plugin then use my W3 Total Cache tutorial to download my pre-configured settings from Dropbox and import them to your W3 Total Cache plugin under Performance → General Settings → Import / Export Settings. Read my full tutorial for best results which has over 200 comments and helped plenty of people get .5s load times and 99% performance scores.

Better Uptimes: 100% Last Month In Uptime Robot

I recommend signing up for Uptime Robot to monitor your uptimes (and downtimes). SiteGround claims their uptimes to be 99.99% but I’ve actually had 100% in the last month…

StartUp vs. GrowBig vs. GoGeek Comparison Chart

SiteGround’s feature page shows a comparison chart of each plan…

StartUp $3.95/month – host 1 relatively low traffic website with a free domain, 1 daily backup, automatic updates, email, and 10GB of storage. Does not come with priority support or a lot of server resources (which make your site faster) which is why I recommend GrowBig for $4 more per month. Still comes with SiteGround’s core speed, security, and uptime technology so even though StartUp is cheap, it’s much better than other $3.95/month plans.

GrowBig $5.95/month – host unlimited websites with priority support and about 1.5x more server resources than StartUp. 30 daily backups (instead of 1), 20GB storage, and an easy backup/restore service. Comes with advanced caching but I recommend using a plugin like W3 Total Cache over SiteGround’s SG CachePress plugin, so that shouldn’t matter. More email features and 1 year free wildcard SSL for subdomains. Comes with everything StartUp has.

GoGeek $11.95/month – semi-dedicated hosting allows you to host unlimited websites and is about 4x faster than other lowered sharing hosting plans. Staging allows you to create demo sites to test new code/designs on, and PCI compliance. 30GB more storage, more email features, and pre-installed GIT. A great alternative if you want a super fast website you don’t want to pay $60/month for SiteGround’s cloud hosting. Comes with everything GrowBig has.

Recommended Merchants

SiteGround has a list of recommend merchants to collect payments. Generally, 2Checkout and PayPal are good for smaller volumes. But as you grow you can negotiate smaller fees.

eCommerce Tutorials

SiteGround has tons of tutorials some of which are specific to eCommerce and will show you how to install your shopping cart (even though SiteGround’s support team will do this for you).

Why SiteGround

I mentioned SiteGround was the #1 rated host for WordPress. Here are the polls…

I like SiteGround because…

1. They’re recommended by WordPress
2. They use PHP 7.3 (check your version here)
3. They use HTTP/2 servers (check your version here)
4. Their speed technology page clearly lists what they use
5. Free Let’s Encrypt SSL (EIG companies charge for this)
6. My GTmetrix/Pingdom reports are great (the biggest reason)
7. Average load time is 1.3s, giving most people instant speed improvements
8. Ivica runs the WordPress Speed Up Facebook Group and ranks them #1
9. Consistently #1 in Facebook polls/conversations (#1, #2, #3, #4, #5, #6, #7)
10. Their semi-dedicated plan is affordable yet much faster than shared hosting
11. They have 1-click Cloudflare activation in the cPanel (view cPanel demo)
12. Designated WordPress support (tickets usually answered in <10 min)
13. SG Optimizer plugin keeps your PHP updated with latest version
14. Automatic daily backups, WordPress updates, and security updates
15. Great eCommerce hosting
16. Weekly security email notifications
17. I usually get 100% uptimes but 99.99% is guaranteed
18. Out of 50 people I referred to SiteGround in July, not 1 person cancelled
19. I can call them 24/7 and they’re happy to answer questions (1.800.828.9231)
20. They will migrate you for free with a 30-day money back guarantee

View SiteGround eCommerce Hosting

I hope you liked my SiteGround eCommerce review! If you have any questions at all, feel free to leave a comment and I’ll be glad to help you anyway I can. Or call SiteGround’s customer service and they can answer your questions. SiteGround’s number is 1.800.828.9231.