Running an online business comes with all sorts of issues. But Cloudflare may be just the platform that helps you confront many of them.
When you started your online business, you likely had grand visions of what it would become. You knew your amazing service would attract clients. And with the power of the web at your fingertips, you also knew you could provide that service to anybody, no matter where they were.
But you didn’t know just how complex the technical aspects of running an online business can be…
As each year passes, the internet becomes more demanding. Your own systems administrators know this all too well. They’re dealing with more demand on the network and a host of new and evolving security threats.
Much of this work goes on behind the scenes. But if something is missed, your website may be at risk. And that means your entire online business is at risk as well.
Enter Cloudflare. The platform developers have a simple mission – to help build a better internet. To do that, Cloudflare claims to improve performance and provide greater protection for your online presence.
But what does that mean for you? How can you use Cloudflare to create a stronger internet-based business?
In this article, we look at the reasons why Cloudflare may be the perfect platform for your business.
Reason #1 – Improving Your Website’s Speed
Speed is of the essence when it comes to building a successful online business. And if you don’t believe us, just look at the stats.
A shocking 47% of internet users now expect a website to load in two seconds or less. Even more disheartening is the fact that 40% will abandon a website if it takes more than three seconds to load.
And according to data shared by web marketing guru Neil Patel, a one-second delay can lead to a 7% loss of conversions.
The simple message is that your website needs to meet your customers’ expectations concerning speed.
And that’s one of the main benefits of Cloudflare.
Using the platform, your pages load twice as fast as they normally would.
How does this happen?
Cloudflare maintains static data centres all over the world. When you start using the platform, your website’s data gets shared with all of these centres. When somebody visits your website, Cloudflare pulls the relevant data from the centre nearest to them. This improves your site’s performance and ensures your customers don’t have to wait for a page to load.
Reason #2 – Mobile Website Performance Optimisation
Cloudflare doesn’t just improve overall site loading speeds. The tool allows you to optimise your website in a variety of other ways, too.
Take mobile performance as an example.
Several issues can affect how your site performs on a mobile device. For example, the smaller CPUs and lower memory in mobile devices affect performance. This can lead to images loading too slowly or not loading at all.
Cloudflare can optimise your mobile content to ensure that it displays quickly and properly on any mobile device.
This is particularly important in a world where more people than ever use mobile devices to access the internet. In 2019, 52.2% of all web traffic came from mobile devices. That’s a huge increase from 16.2% in 2013. The simple fact is that the mobile trend will keep growing. With Cloudflare, you can ensure you offer a mobile experience that matches your customers’ expectations.
Reason #3 – Cloudflare Blocks Hacking and Brute Force Access Attempts
Security is a huge concern, both for your customers and you as a business owner. Brute force attacks on your online business could shut it down for several days. For example, a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack could lead to nobody being able to access your site.
Worse yet, there are hackers out there who may attempt to get into your website. They might gain access to your customer data, which would damage your reputation.
Cloudflare offers amazing protection against these types of security threats.
The platform can filter out most basic spam attacks at the level of its name server. This means that the spam never actually makes it to your own server. It’s stopped in its tracks before it can get to your website.
The platform also has measures in place to protect against DDoS attacks and SQL injections. This means your website will stay up and running without the risk of getting compromised.
Cloudflare allows you to choose from a variety of security settings, which it groups into low, medium, and high levels. Typically speaking, the low option is more than enough for most online businesses. This ensures global access, while protecting against the threats we’ve mentioned.
Even more impressive is the sheer scale at which Cloudflare operates. According to its website:
“More than 1 billion unique IP addresses pass through Cloudflare’s network every day. With every bit we move, our network gets smarter and faster.”
The platform handles huge volumes of traffic every day and it learns constantly from what it processes. This means that Cloudflare stays one step ahead of today’s major web-based security threats.
Reason #4 – Saving Server Bandwidth
As we said before, Cloudflare operates hundreds of data centres all around the world. These centres store most of the information needed to load up your website.
That means the demand on your servers decreases dramatically.
You may not think that this is an important issue. After all, many web hosting providers claim to offer unlimited server bandwidth. However, what they don’t tell you is that “unlimited” often comes with limits. For example, some providers alter the bandwidth you have available based on the number of hits your website gets. It’s fine print like this that leaves you open to DDoS attacks, which thrive on overloading servers with requests.
Cloudflare ensures that your servers do as little work as possible. This allows you to welcome more people to your website and clears the way for continued site improvement.
Reason #5 – No Need to Install Hardware
Cloudflare doesn’t require a complex hardware setup to get up and running. You won’t need to install extra servers or buy new equipment.
The platform handles all of those requirements on its end. All you need to do is sign up and install the platform.
Since you don’t need to buy new hardware, your business will save money it can put towards more important investments. You can dedicate that cash to improving your marketing and building out your website instead.
Reason #6 – Plenty of Backup If a Server Goes Down
It’s the one issue that all web-based business owners dread…
The server goes down and no one can access your website. You work with technicians and network operators to try and get your site online again as quickly as possible. But in some cases, downtime can last for 24 hours or more.
That’s a day’s worth of lost sales your business has to absorb. Plus, any new prospects who visit your site during that downtime may assume that it simply doesn’t work. They may never come back!
This is where Cloudflare’s huge network of data centres comes into play again. As mentioned, these centres store your website’s static data. This process is referred to as caching. If your main server goes down, Cloudflare can pull this cached data from its nearest centre and serve it to your customer.
This includes all of your main pages and blog posts.
This means that your website won’t go down, even if you run into server issues.
Reason #7 – The Basic Service Is Completely Free
Perhaps you’re worried about the cost of installing Cloudflare for your business.
The good news here is that the platform offers a range of packages, and the base version is absolutely free. That free package offers more than you might think. The features that you have access to include:
- Cloudflare’s full Content Delivery Network, which allows for faster load times
- The static content caching that’s so important for improved speed and uptime
- Accelerated mobile performance
- Protection against DDoS attacks
- Protection against content scrapes and comment spammers
- Access to Cloudflare’s threat intelligence technology
- Site analytics
- Email support
For many smaller businesses, the free package may be all that they need to experience many of the benefits we’ve talked about.
Of course, there are several paid packages that offer a host of extra features. At the time of writing, these range from $20 per month for the Pro package to custom pricing for enterprise users.
Still, the fact that Cloudflare offers so much for free means that it’s worth trying it out.
Reason #8 – It’s Easy to Enable (With a Little Help)
As we mentioned earlier, you don’t need any hardware to install Cloudflare. But what’s even more astonishing is that you don’t need any software, either. Cloudflare doesn’t require you to install any add-ons or software packages to use it.
Better yet, you also won’t need to alter any of your website’s code.
It really is as simple as setting up an account and typing in the domain that you want to protect.
Of course, enabling the service is only the first step. You may need a little help to maximise the benefits and ensure that you’re getting what you paid for. Still, even somebody with no tech knowledge can get Cloudflare up and running in a matter of minutes.
Could Cloudflare Help Your Business?
Cloudflare improves website performance while offering a host of security features. We recommend it for anybody who runs an online business. And thanks to the free version of the platform, you can test it out before committing to buy it.
The platform allows your site to stay up and running, no matter what the web throws at it. And Cloudflare’s powerful network ensures fast loading times, no matter where your customers are.
Perhaps you need a little help integrating it into your business. You want to make the most out of Cloudflare and its array of features.
That’s where Automation Agency can help.
Cloudflare is among the dozens of platforms that we provide support for through our Concierge Service. Our team of experts can get you up and running, while helping you to get the most out of the platform.
Get in touch with us today to learn more or send a task to the Concierge Service if you’re already a member.
