It’s a morbid question, but it sets the stage for one of the problems that can result with your web designer also being your web host. It isn’t so much that it isn’t possible, in fact, 515Hosting offers web hosting plans, but can be depending upon how the web hosting plan is structured.

Often, it isn’t uncommon for an individual web designer to purchase a shared web hosting account at a web hosting provider like Bluehost or GoDaddy that offers unlimited bandwidth and emails and domains. Then, they’ll simply purchase domains on clients behalf, add websites to their account, and setup email addresses on this one single shared hosting account effectively sharing the resources of an already shared web hosting account with multiple clients.

The Technical Problem

While shared web hosting accounts offer unlimited bandwidth, domains, and email addresses, they are still limited by certain resources like CPU allocation and other technical resources that are shared amongst all of the websites on that server. These plans are typically $12-15 a month and they’re really designed as an economical approach for an individual that wants to have a bunch of small websites. Now, while shared hosting by design is of course shared and will always be at the mercy of other websites, typically each individual hosting account has separate limits per account.

So, if that individual is divvying up an already shared account with limitations, then your client website is going to be sharing those already limited resources so that if any other business website on the account spikes the usage, websites on the account will be affected but other websites in other accounts on the shared server will not…and it doesn’t take much for any one website to monopolize those resources.

The Financial Problem

If you’re paying a web designer $20 a month to host your website, you’re likely being pooled into a shared hosting plan that’s costing the web designer closer to $20 a month total. That means, from a cost stand point you’re not getting a very great deal. You could be buying an entire shared hosting plan all to yourself for the same cost. Let’s say a web hosting company offers each account a maximum surge of 25% of the server CPU usage for a maximum of 90 seconds. The typical individual will pay their bill and they can use up to that 25% usage once in a while if needed and not really affect any other websites and in return not really be affected by any other websites that hit that maximum. If you’re paying a web designer who has that maximum and one of the sites on the account hits the maximum and it takes down all the sites on their account temporarily, you’re not getting very good bang for the buck because you’re not getting the full 25% allowance as if you had your own account.

The Ownership Problem

Here is the big one, though. While it might seem convenient to have your web design oversee and set up everything regarding the domain and hosting, there can be some issues regarding ownership. You might feel like you own the domain because you pay for it to the web designer, but if you can’t access it on demand and change things yourself (or someone else you delegate) than you don’t really own it. Instead, it is effectively being leased back to you.

So let’s say for instance, your webmaster (web designer you’ve been paying monthly hosting bills to) suddenly dies. Now there are 100 or so domain names and websites locked behind a password that perhaps no one knows. It’s possible the web hosting account would actually have to go through probate and certificate of death be provided to the hosting company in order to release access to the account and then that person would have complete access to every website on there. It’s a security problem, an ownership problem, and an urgency problem that could destroy your business.

What happens if you desperately need to renew your domain and there’s no one there to do so? What happens if you have to transfer to a new web designer or a new host in lieu of the one that has passed away and you have no way to access the account? These might not be such a big problem for an agency with many employees, but if you’re working with an individual freelancer web designer and they have 100 business emails locked behind a password and they end up in the hospital for a week, you’re at the mercy of them getting out of the hospital to do absolutely anything with your website. That’s not a problem if you have your own web hosting account.