Are you beginning to feel that little nagging feeling of dissatisfaction with your current web host? Maybe your site is a little slow to load for your local customers in Vancouver, or maybe you are simply looking for the peace of mind of keeping your data based in Canada. Whatever the reason, moving your website to a different hosting provider – and perhaps one in Vancouver – is definitely worth considering.
Now I can hear you think “migration? That seems complex. Sounds like I will have downtime. Sounds like a lot of hassle!” And although there is indeed a bit of planning that is involved with migrating a website, it is not nearly as scary as it has been made out to be. If you approach the migration in the right way, it is possible to have a near seamless migration to your new web host, reduce downtime, and get your site up and running quickly and happily in its new, faster, Vancouver home.
Let’s outline this process step-by-step, so its painless as possible.
Why Make the Move to Vancouver Hosting?
Before we get into the “how,” let’s quickly summarize the “why.” Why are so many businesses, and especially Vancouver hosting for small businesses, choosing to host locally?
- Low-Latency Nirvana: This one is huge! When a web server is geographically closer to the web visitor, the distance that the data has to travel decreases. With incredibly low-latency hosting Vancouver, a website will load faster, it will feel snappier, and it will provide a much better user experience for your local customers.
- SEO Advantage: In an increasing number of cases, search engines are favouring faster loading websites and those with a relatively local presence. You may get a tiny SEO advantage hosting in Vancouver for searches that originate from within and around the city.
- Data Sovereignty & Peace of Mind: A priority for many Canadian businesses is keeping data within Canadian borders because of privacy regulations such as PIPEDA. Hosting locally ensures your data is subject to Canadian laws, adding a little more security and trust.
- Local Help That Gets It: There’s nothing worse than a support team on the other side of the globe. A Vancouver hosting company provides local support that understands your time, local infrastructure, and the challenges of Canadian business owners.
Your Seamless Migration Checklist:
Your step-by-step guide to moving your website with ease:
Step 1: Select Your New Vancouver Hosting Provider Carefully
This may be the most important step in the process. Don’t simply choose the first hosting provider you find! What you want is a provider that focuses on Vancouver hosted solutions for small businesses that has the features you want. Consider:
- How well the host will perform: SSD/NVMe storage, optimized server stacks, caching,
- How reliable the host is: Solid uptime guarantee – you can typically expect close or equal to 99.9% from reputable hosts.
- How scalable they are: Can they accommodate your future growth?
- How responsive their customer support team is: Are they knowledgeable, local, and responsive?
- Migration service: Many hosting providers offer migration services to assist you for free (and save your business a lot of time and headaches, which I will elaborate on below!).
Pro Tip: Consider companies like 4GoodHosting for Canadian organizations. They have a great reputation for performance, reliability, and are a trusted provider of local support, making them a great provider to consider if you’re switching to Ottawa-based hosting.
Step 2: Back Up EVERYTHING (Seriously, Everything!)
- This will be your safety net, your insurance policy, or whatever you want to call it. This is your digital ‘oh crap’ button. Prior to touching anything, properly backup your entire site in its entirety.
- Website Files: You will need to download all your website files using an FTP program. FileZilla is a widely used free FTP client. Or, if you’re clueless on FTP, you can usually download all your files through your host control panel (usually cPanel has a file manager, or backup option). Again, make sure you download everything (public_html or www) directory.
- Database: If your website uses a database (like WordPress, Joomla, or basically every e-commerce platform), you will need to export the database. Most hosting control panels provide phpMyAdmin (at least in cPanel) which helps and makes it relatively simple. Click your database you want to export, and click export.
- Emails: If your email accounts are also with your current host, also keep in mind to backup any important emails you may have. That usually means using your email client (like Outlook or Thunderbird) to set it up using IMAP, and syncing all mail locally.
Keep your backups in a safe, accessible location on your computer, or external drive.
Step 3: Set Up Your New Hosting Account
Once you have selected your new Vancouver host (like 4GoodHosting) and signed up for your plan, the host will send you login details for your new control panel when they have provisions made for your new website.
- Create a New Database (if applicable): If your website uses a database, you will need to create a blank new database on your new hosting account. Make a note of your new database, user name and password; you will need this soon.
Step 4: Upload Your Website Files
You are now ready to upload your backup website files to your new vancouver server.
- Using FTP: Login to your new hosting account through FTP (using Filezilla again). Go to the public_html or www directory and upload all the files you downloaded in step 2. Depending on how big your site is this part may take some time.
- Using Your Host’s File Manager: Many hosting control panels also have a built-in file manager that allows you to upload zipped files directly to your hosting space and then extract (unzip) them on the server, which can be significantly faster on larger sites.
Step 5: Import Your Database
Now that the files are uploaded, it’s time to get the information into the new database you created.
- Using phpMyAdmin: Go to phpMyAdmin on your new hosting account, select the empty database you created, and locate the Import option and click. Select the provided database backup file you exported in Step 2 and upload.
Step 6: Edit the configuration file on your site
This is a very important step since especially for WordPress and CMS platforms, your website will need to know where your database is located on the new server.
- For WordPress: Find the file called wp-config.php in your main WordPress installation (which should typically be public_html) and open it in a text editor. Edit the database name, username, and password to match the new database made in step 3. Depending on your new hosting provider, you’ll also likely need to change the database host if they don’t have localhost in the new server setup.
Step 7: Preview Your Site on The New Server (But Don’t Edit Your DNS Yet!)
This is where the fun begins, and you will get to preview your site before anyone
else can. Your new hosting provider will probably give you a temporary URL or IP address to test your site on. You’ll effectively preview what your site looks like on the new host.
- Temporary URL: you will navigate to your site using the temporary url that your new hosting provider will give you (it may look something like http://[new_ip_address]/~[your_username]/).
- Edit Your Hosts File (Advanced): To have a more realistic test, you can temporarily edit your computer hosts file to point your domain name to the new server IP address. This means when you type your domain into your browser only your computer will see the site on the new server and everyone else will still see the old site. (Don’t forget to change it back after your migration is complete!).
You should test every page, every link, every form, and every image. Make sure everything is working exactly as it should.
Step 8: Update Your DNS (The Big Switch!)
After you’re completely confident that your site is functioning exactly as you intend on the new host, it’s time to switch over. Switching over means changing your Domain Name System (DNS) records.
- Nameservers: Your new Vancouver host will give you their nameserver addresses (which will look like ns1.newhost.com and ns2.newhost.com or something similar).
- Update at your Domain Registrar: The next step is to login to the control panel of the company where you registered your domain name (for example, GoDaddy, Namecheap, Google Domains). Find the section labelled “DNS Management” or “Nameservers,” and replace your old nameservers with the new nameserver addresses provided by your new Vancouver host.
Note: Keep in mind that it can take anywhere from a few minutes to 48 hours for DNS changes to propagate across the Internet. This means that during this window of time, some visitors will see your old site and others will see your new site. This is completely normal and why it is critical to do thorough testing in
Step 9: Final Checks and Old Host Cancellation
If 24-48 hours have passed, and you are convinced that your site is now live and functioning properly on your new Vancouver hosting (you can confirm with online DNS tools), you can:
- Cancel your old hosting account: Oh yeah. Don’t forget to do that. You do not want to be billed for a service you no longer are using.
- Monitor performance: Keep an eye on your site’s speed and up time on the new server – you should now see the benefits of that low-latency hosting Vancouver coming into play!
Don’t be afraid to ask for help!
Although this guide aimed to make your migration seamless, sometimes things get tricky. If you find yourself confused at any point, do not forget that many Vancouver hosting providers, particularly those focused at Vancouver hosting for small business like 4GoodHosting, offer free migration services. They have professional migration teams that can do the heavy lifting and make sure that your website migration is totally pain-free.
Remember that migrating your website is an investment in the future of it. With the right Vancouver hosting strategies and partners, you should expect faster speeds, reliable hosting services, and a better end-user experience overall.
