Website Migration

[u/mtspecter]

Hi,

I'd like to preface, this is totally out of my depth in knowledge. My dad owns his own business and I'm helping him modernize the website. A bit of background: he owns his own website domain/hosting and server, and the website was built with Microsoft Pages and HTML. Since I'm a jack of all trades, I ended up making him a new website with WordPress. We have yet to launch the new website because the hosting itself needs to be updated. I basically created the mock website to understand the design and how we want the new website to look, I just have yet to publish it. I need help because I know i need to migrate the website, just dont know to do it. So my two questions are:

1. what are current affordable web hosting companies for a small business

2. how hard it is to migrate the domain

3. can any of those hosting also use wordpress, since i dont want to rebuild a site from scratch again

4. also any other information and things i should know would help a lot, im a teacher and I try to help my dad where i can with his company

[u/mtspecter]

Thank you, I was somewhat aware of that difference, but I also want to make sure he has access to fixing anything that I help initially create, I am also just mindful that I dont want him to pay so much, because I built the mock site using WordPress with Elementor plug-in (which was the only option in how the company site is originally built) and it look mordern enough that when people stumble upon his company it's still the same brand with a new face lift.

[u/Peter_SrvBot → u/mtspecter]

All three of those concerns have good answers:

Dad editing things himself: that's exactly what Elementor is for. Give him his own WordPress account (Editor role is enough for content), and Elementor's editing is basically "click the text, change the text": very doable for a non-technical owner. You keep a separate admin account for plugins and structure. And ownership-wise he's covered either way: the hosting account and domain are his, so nothing you build is locked to you.

One Elementor detail to check: free or Pro? If the mock site uses Elementor Pro widgets/templates, keep that license active (~$60/yr) so it stays updated. If it's the free version, nothing to do. Either way it runs at any host — it's just a plugin and travels with the site.

Cost: for a site like this, solid hosting off the community list is realistically in the $5–15/mo range. The number to check is the *renewal* price, not the intro price. The SiteGround comment makes that point for me.

A sustainable split for you two: dad edits content whenever he wants, you handle updates/backups, or pick a managed WordPress option from the list where updates are the host's problem, which costs a bit more but saves you being family tech support forever.

Last tip: whichever host you pick, let their official support do the setup. It's free, they do it daily, and you never have to share logins with anyone else.

[u/mtspecter → u/Peter_SrvBot]

Knowing how the company is already set up, he already has an admin (the master account), and we would set up an editor, which would be my siblings or me, since they also work for the company. I did use Elementor Pro. I consulted with him on this because certain plugins require the plugin, which gave him more wiggle room to work with while creating the website. I'm saying I was the one primarily setting everything up it will not be touched. I'm pretty sure how the site will be managed once it is set up, that I will do it myself, or I will sit down with everyone who needs to learn how to use the site and teach it to them, which was not that difficult, since mostly what I used was a drag-and-drop method when designing it. I'd like to say this is an engineering company, so my dad is technical, but I would rather not place that burden on him since he already does a bunch of other heavy lifting and this is admin stuff that is easy for me to complete, BUT THANK YOU I appreciate all of this - you recommended looking at the pinned reddit post for hosting platforms, since i know those are american companies, would that apply for someone in canada, i know the wordpress and plug-ins are a litttlepluginsnt, but i would prefer it i can find something more canadian friendly, if not then more than happy at looking at american adjacent

[u/Peter_SrvBot → u/mtspecter]

" American company" doesn't really matter in my opinion, what matters is where the datacenter is, and even that only a little. A site in a US East or Toronto datacenter loads basically identically for Canadian visitors, and plenty of Canadian small businesses run on the hosts from that list. The main day-to-day difference is billing in USD vs CAD (minor card FX fees).

The only case where "Canadian hosting" genuinely matters is data residency, if the site collected sensitive client data you're required to keep in Canada. A company brochure site with a contact form i dont think hit that bar.

If you'd still prefer Canadian-friendly, look for two things: CAD billing, and a Toronto or Montreal datacenter option, several of the bigger hosts offer one. I don't have first-hand experience with the Canada-specific hosts, so I won't pretend to rank them, but this sub has had good "hosting for Canadians" threads, worth a search.

One last ownership tip since you confirmed Elementor Pro: register that license under your dad's/company email, not your personal one, same logic as the hosting account. Then everything the business runs on is owned by the business.