November 7, 2025 • 43 mins
The web is changing fast — faster than most agencies, hosting providers, and developers are ready for. In this episode of Over the Bull, Ken Carroll from Integris Design talks about the rise (and fall) of “managed” WordPress hosting, why piecemeal systems are killing efficiency, and how outdated thinking is costing businesses real money.
From the honeymoon phase with WPEngine to the rough patches with Kinsta, and finally finding a solid partner in Pressable, this isn’t a hit piece — it’s a reality check. Ken shares the lessons learned from a decade of agency experience and the surprising truth about what actually makes hosting stable, scalable, and sane.
You’ll also hear how today’s perfect storm — made of AI shifts, bad tech habits, and patchwork infrastructure — is reshaping the web, and what agencies must do if they want to stay afloat in 2025 and beyond.
Key topics:
•Why “managed hosting” doesn’t always mean managed well
•How the web’s evolution has outpaced agency infrastructure
•The hidden cost of bad plugin culture and stack sprawl
•Why unified systems are the future — and duct tape is not a strategy
If you’ve ever asked “Why is my site breaking again?” or “Why are we paying for hosting that’s slowing us down?” — this episode gives you the answer (with a little humor and a lot of truth).
To learn how Integris Design can support your business with strategic design and marketing, schedule a consultation at IntegrisDesign.com.
Over The Bull is brought to you by IntegrisDesign.com. All rights reserved.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:02):
You're listening to Over the Bull, where we cut
through marketing noise.
Here's your host, Ken Carroll.
SPEAKER_01 (00:09):
How not to turn the car around on this episode of
Over the Bull.
Thanks so much for tuning in.
I appreciate it.
You know, when uh my kids wereyoung, the one thing that I
never wanted to do was have toturn the car back around to go
turn something off or getsomething.
You know, it's like we're we'regetting ready to go on that
(00:31):
vacation.
And as we're traveling and we'regetting down that road, you
know, and then somebody, I canstill, you know, hear, oh, I
think I forgot or I needed this.
And uh no matter how many times,you know, we had to uh or we
asked, you know, there wasalways a chance we had to turn
around.
Now, in your uh business life,more of you than you think are
(00:55):
going to be turning yourbusiness around and having to
start over.
Um, I know this sounds like itcould be hyperbole to you, but
but it's reality.
Okay, I'm seeing it in realtime.
So, what I want to share withyou today is just kind of talk
to you about what's going onwith the internet, and then what
(01:17):
I want to do is transition thatto a story about um a review
about hosting that I think wouldkind of crystallize this whole
thing and kind of button it up.
So, what do I mean by turningthe car around?
Well, when you um when you havea business, there are certain
things that can help yourbusiness move in the right
(01:38):
direction, and there's certainthings that can help your
business move in the wrongdirection.
Your business never gets to acertain point, and then you're
done building credibility.
Building credibility isconstant, consistent, and
requires best practices.
Now, for the last since theinternet basically popped into
(02:00):
existence, there have beenpeople that have been trying to
gain the system.
And there have been other peoplewho work from a little bit of
knowledge that have created somesuccess but some problems.
So the the issue with the web isthat now we're hitting a storm,
(02:21):
and this storm is actuallygetting worse for several
reasons.
Now, the first is that thecompetition is really kicking up
a notch with the advent ofartificial intelligence.
We talked about um Atlas lastweek, a uh a new browser by uh
(02:42):
OpenAI, the folks that make ChatGPT, and it's pretty impressive.
Now, the one thing that uhGoogle wants to do is maintain
its authority on the internet,and we are seeing some slight
percentage drops in terms ofusage, and we are seeing AIs
being widely adopted.
(03:04):
And so with this fight on theinternet for uh Google trying to
remain at the top, and thenthese newer, younger, uh
arguably more efficient systemsare popping up, um, they're
fighting for that.
Now, what this means is thatcontent uh that is created in
(03:27):
bad ways, in bad practices, arefalling under the microscope.
Now, here's why that'shappening.
Because relevancy in searchresults is more critical than
ever for these companies toremain relevant.
What that means is basically yougo type something in a Google
search, you need the mostrelevant results at the top.
(03:51):
You don't want to filter througha bunch of junk, a bunch of
generic AI-generated blogarticles.
You don't want to filter throughthat.
You want accurate answers, soyou can make a decision.
That is a search engine's valueproposition.
When I say search engines, Imean like like Google, for
example, is a search engine.
(04:12):
Well, with people, uh agenciesand freelancers, what they've
done, and they've a lot of themhave always taken shortcuts.
Okay, and the problem is some ofthem believe in myths that
simply aren't true, but they'vehad success with them in the
past.
So if you could imagine you'vegot freelancers with limited
(04:33):
experience, you have freelancersthat are building WordPress
sites with templates and freeplugins, and you have agencies
doing this too, by the way.
You have these piecemealsystems, and they've built
entire companies around thesepiecemeal systems.
Think your do-it-yourselfwebsite builders, and now all
this stuff is coming to theforefront.
(04:55):
Google's fighting to remain onthe top, these other guys are
fighting for them, and the bestsearch results have to be at the
top, which means they have tostart pushing things that are
shortcuts down to the bottom andbring up the best of the best to
the top.
Now, it gets a little morecomplicated than that.
(05:16):
Uh, I've been talking to you awhile about a principle called
EEAT.
Um, this is really importantbecause it appears that
artificial intelligence does notlike artificial intelligence
content.
And so original, human-curated,human-touched content appears to
(05:39):
be the gold standard, while allthe junk content appears to be
uh falling to the wayside.
So think that when you'recreating a blog article using AI
and you're and you're notputting in the right systems in
place to have it human-touched,just think that Google's going
to devalue that.
(06:01):
Just think uh, like I've talkedabout YouTube, uh, it came
across my desk uh several monthsago now, where they're devaluing
AI content.
Now they didn't devalue AIcontent because of it's uh it's
incredibly valuable and peoplelove it and they want to see
more of it.
It was because it was making thesearches on YouTube less
(06:23):
credible and people were notwanting to use it because they
really didn't want to see a fakecelebrity generated through AI
saying things that they neversaid.
I mean, that just creates thisstate of confusion.
And who wants to quote somethingthat artificial intelligence
said someone said when theydidn't say it?
(06:44):
I mean, you can come acrossreally foolhardy if you were to
fall into that and then startquoting it.
So as you can imagine, thisstorm is really intense.
It's like everything's comingtogether.
The the technology companies,the big tech companies, the
freelancers are uh and the andthe agencies are heavily
(07:08):
invested in their piecemealsystems.
And then you have the businessowner.
So let's talk about you as theowner of a business.
You know, it's always been wherethe owner of a business, there's
certain things that we just knowabout people who own businesses.
Number one is when things getlean, they usually cut the
marketing budget.
We know that.
(07:29):
So they we know they cut thelifeline of their business as
things start to get lean becausethey think that's an easy place
to do.
It's always happened and it'salways been a bad decision.
But more than that, businessowners, especially small
business owners, they want tocut as many corners as they can.
(07:50):
And so oftentimes they'll hire afreelancer, a cheap agency, or
they will try to do things ontheir own.
So then they start toincorporate products like Canva
or uh do-it-yourself websitebuilders or different things
like that.
And so what they do is theythrow together this piecemeal uh
(08:12):
system that hasn't been properlythought through, and so they're
already off on the wrong foot.
So if we if we back the internetup, say 10, 15 years, the uh you
could get away with some of thisstuff.
You could get away with being alittle more sloppy than the
(08:32):
average bear.
There were other things that youknow really needed to be done,
but not on the level that itdoes today.
So think in terms of like youruh your nap score, your nap
name, address, phone number, uhscore, and optimizing that.
Now you could do it kind of in asmall version, and some could
(08:57):
get by maybe with a very limitedversion, but now that score is
more important than ever.
It's a have to, it's not awant-to.
So when we see businesses startto pull away from like our nap
optimization uh tool, we knowthat that's a fundamental block
in the foundation that they'reignoring.
(09:19):
So you as the owner want uh ascheap as you can get it, a
piecemeal system, some of you.
Um some of you are hiring peoplethat aren't qualified to do the
job.
The people that are selling youthe product, they think that
what they're selling you issomething good and efficient.
The agencies and the freelancersthat are abusing artificial
(09:41):
intelligence think that somehowthey found a way to shortcut
everything so they can make morerevenue and make it appear as
though they're doing more workthan they can.
The um the software companiesare invested in text that
agencies use that is becomingquickly irrelevant.
These these big institutions, Imean, just think of the the
(10:05):
do-it-yourself website buildersthat are on the uh the Super
Bowl and all these otherlocations.
I mean, they're quickly becomingincredibly irrelevant.
And then of course, now we'vegot another factor, which is how
do you use artificialintelligence to begin with?
I mean, using putting peoplethrough an AI system when they
(10:29):
want to talk to a human is bad.
I mean, it's it's kind of likethey're they're trying to
replace uh the poor andfortunate people uh in these
call centers overseas that arehaving to grab calls and take
the abuse of frustrated peoplewith these AI systems.
But here's the thing thecustomer still doesn't like it.
(10:50):
Okay, it's got to it's got to bebetter and more efficient.
Now, what's great is there aresome really great tools out
there.
I just experienced one uhyesterday, as a matter of fact.
It was an incredible product,and then of course the 99% are
horrible.
(11:10):
Okay, so let's move and turn thecorner and look at this from a
whole different direction.
Artificial intelligence isgobbling up a lot of tasks that
were once valuable that can beautomated.
And it's just a fact.
And so what we're seeing are alot of white-collar jobs and
(11:33):
different jobs that arebasically becoming obsolete
because they can be performed byartificial intelligence.
So some projections are sayingthat people are going to have to
move to a whole other industryand try to figure out a way to
provide for their lives andtheir families and things like
that.
(11:53):
And so they're going to bemoving from their white-collar
jobs to maybe other jobs.
So think, for example, uhwhite-collar guy sees the
writing on the wall, and he goesout and says, I'm going to
invest in an electrical companyor a plumbing company, or maybe
I'll start building websites.
(12:15):
And so now what we're going tosee is an influx of people
trying to survive.
So, what this means for you isyour competition levels are
going to increase.
It also means that the number ofpeople that are going to start
building websites, sellingthemselves as digital marketing
(12:37):
experts, taking these weekendcourses or these uh six-month
courses, and then going out intothe world and then trying to
present themselves as experts,those things are just going to
increase.
Now, guys, let me tell yousomething here.
I know of an agency right nowthat's been around for over 10
years, and I can tell you thatI've seen the work that they've
(13:00):
done, and it's horrible.
It's it's it's absolutely justdestroyed this one company's
reputation.
Now, I can tell you that ifsomeone in a white-collar world
who's got a little bit of agrasp on how business works, and
they get just the pieces up tostart starting a um an SEO
(13:22):
company, uh digital marketingagency or whatever, they're
gonna put a shine on that, andit's gonna be hard to tell who
the good guys are and who thebad guys are.
And so this is going to add awhole other element to this game
and make it much morecomplicated for you as an owner
of a business to one compete,because now your marketing
(13:43):
budget's gonna have to increase.
Other things are gonna have toincrease for you to compete
against all the new peoplecoming into your markets.
But more important than that,now you're gonna have
freelancers and agencies andpeople who can say the right
things who may be polishedsalesmen, and they're gonna come
to you and start selling youproducts in which they are not
(14:05):
capable of producing.
Now, this is the state of theinternet.
This is where we are at thistime and space on the web.
And for you to sustain yourself,the very first thing you have to
do is equip yourself with thereality of the web.
(14:27):
Um, for us as an agency, we'removing toward a model where we
need to handle pretty mucheverything from beginning to end
with clients, including uhconsultations, um, directions,
looking at data.
Uh, you name it.
We're we're trying to move intoa model where we're kind of
doing all that holisticallybecause look here, okay.
(14:51):
Let's talk about a televisionchannel, uh, you know, TV and
newspapers.
Okay, so let's let's move herefor a second.
They they started losing theirreadership, they started losing
momentum.
You know, it's um almost likethe phone book, you know, 2.0
situation.
And so they're they're trying tosurvive too.
(15:13):
Well, these organizations, whatthey've done is moved into
digital marketing, they'retrying to leverage their
previous reputation, piggyback alegacy product, you know, and
then they're what they're tryingto do is move into digital
marketing and do that in orderto sustain themselves.
Okay, I can tell you firsthandthat they are not equipped in
(15:36):
the cases I've looked at tomanage this market.
They are reselling a product ona very high level that is
inefficient at best, but itlooks good numerically.
So, you know, part of theproblem, I'm sure you know this
as the owner of a business, youget into this stuff and you
(15:57):
start looking at it, and thenyou start getting these numbers,
and you're like, well, what doesthat number even mean to me?
Well, how does that even equateto business?
And then you start getting thesenebulous definitions.
Well, that's going on on top ofeverything else.
So as an owner of a business whodoesn't live in this field, you
(16:18):
may be chasing numbers thatreally are completely
irrelevant.
Now, this speeding up has beengoing on for some time.
Okay, uh in the uh in the Bible,you'll get to uh these things
must shortly come to pass, andthere's a term in there called
tacos, which uh uh it basicallymeans like a revving up when it
(16:42):
talks about shortly, like thingsare speeding up, a tachometer,
so to speak.
And so when we're looking atwhat's going on in the web, this
tachometer has been increasing.
Now, as an agency, we have awhole other undercurrent because
if you're a reputable agency andyou're trying to stay on top of
(17:03):
the game, it's a little bit of agame of frogger at different
points because you're alwaystrying to find the best solution
that is good for a client, andthen you're watching the
deterioration of certaincompanies that appeared to have
been good at one point.
Now you're trying to figurethings out and move in a uh
(17:24):
another uh direction in order toremain relevant.
And you know, certifications,best practices, not trying to
cheat the system, uh, building aplan that's holistic, overall
credibility, all of these thingstie in to building a plan.
I mean, everything down from uhhow long you register your
(17:47):
domain to your hosting to allthese complexities that business
owners, um, you know, it's justa lot.
I mean, we're in it full time,and you know, I'm here early in
the morning on a uh a Wednesdayjust to get the podcast in due
to all the things that go onwithin an agency.
So I really strongly recommendyou start taking some of this
(18:10):
stuff to uh to heart.
So let me let me share a journeywith you.
And, you know, as many of youknow, our agency, we've been
building off WordPress for 20years.
Okay.
And so let me talk to you abouthosting solutions from the
perspective of an agency.
Now, before we get into it,let's talk about what hosting is
(18:33):
as a recap because I know youown a business and you're you're
likely not like well in, youknow, you don't live in these
waters.
So hosting is basically whereall the stuff that makes up a
website resides on the internetso that it can be uh properly
found.
(18:53):
I mean, I guess that's theeasiest way to say it.
So just think uh it's like thisthis place on the web uh where
you store all those files, andthen when they're properly
structured, they make a website,and there are good
neighborhoods, there are badneighborhoods, there are pl uh
just like you would in reallife.
There's there's efficiency,there's uh stability, there's a
(19:16):
lot of factors that go into uhjust the idea of hosting, I
mean, security alone.
I mean, you want to talk abouteverybody talks about how great
AI is.
You should look at the uh theundercurrent of the AI war and
all the wasted energy that goesinto all the bad guys trying to
hack and use AI for maliciousreasons, and then the good guys
(19:40):
trying to combat the bad guys byputting in new processes and
steps, and then what do you do?
Now you have 500,000 two-stepauthentications you've got to go
through because of uh all thatwar going on in the
undercurrent.
So there's all that stuff thatgoes into uh good hosting, and
(20:02):
of course, you know, um thepeople that sell the very
low-end hosting want you tothink that hosting is hosting is
hosting, and they're just tryingto get it at the bottom dollar,
while those of us on the insideunderstand that hosting is
foundational and and goodhosting is non-negotiable.
(20:23):
We need to move to the placeswhere it's going to give us the
best overall performance uh forour clients.
I mean, when you're on the end,you know weird things.
Like you know that you typicallyhave less than 10 seconds to get
someone's attention on the web.
People have become very, veryimpatient.
I mean, if you want to talkabout a whole other layer, we
(20:46):
could talk about the impatienceof people and the conditions,
conditioning of people and whatthey expect.
Um, it's a lot different.
It's a lot different.
Your 35-year-olds today are alot different than your
35-year-olds of just five, 10years ago, just from the
expectation uh with some of thistechnology.
All right, so let's get back tothis.
(21:06):
So this is I want to take you onthis journey of what we've
experienced with our hosting.
And I'm just going to read thisarticle because you got to be
careful when you write things,uh, reviews and things like
that.
And you kind of need to stay touh a script, and you you know
you don't want to be um mean topeople or whatever.
(21:29):
This is this is my personaljourney through our company with
hosting, and we're going to kindof walk through that a little
bit.
So here we go.
I'm going to read.
Uh WordPress is the most popularcontent management system on the
planet, which means it's alsothe most misunderstood.
Okay, so CMS, content managementsystem.
(21:51):
It's basically just a way foryou to log in and manage your
website.
Just think of it kind of likethat.
And it also gives features, uh,different things that kind of
help with that websiteexperience to customize it for
your business.
Uh with this open source freedomcomes a flood of freelancers,
agencies, and enterprise-levelhosting companies, all promising
the same thing (22:13):
speed, security, and support.
Okay, we got another word there,open source.
Open source just means you candownload all the code.
Okay, so there's two flavors ofWordPress: WordPress.com, where
you have limited access, and youhave WordPress.org where you can
build it and have all access.
(22:35):
Every competent agency orfreelancers I've ever met uses
WordPress.org.
That's my opinion.
In reality, many of thosecompanies land somewhere between
almost there and are you kiddingme?
Subagencies cut corners withbloated themes and questionable
plugins.
Some hosts claim unlimitedeverything until you actually
(22:57):
use it.
Meanwhile, business owners areleft with websites that look
fine on the surface, but arebuilt on quicksand.
Now, this is absolutely truewith what's going on with
WordPress today.
And while everyone debatesplugins and page builders and
all those critical, uh all thoseuh most critical parts, hosting
(23:18):
gets overlooked.
It's almost like, well, wherecan I stick this website?
Where can I get cheap hosting?
You know, it's the same thing.
Business owners want somethingcheap.
Everybody's trying to dosomething, you know, and and
think that they're going to uhkind of cut corners in the
system and do as good.
Um let's be honest here.
(23:40):
No serious agency is throwingclient sites on shared hosting
and calling it a day.
You want a stronginfrastructure, consistent
performance, and a support teamthat won't ghost you when things
go sideways.
I mean, you guys know this.
You guys have seen it where youget in and all of a sudden
(24:00):
you're confronted with some kindof ticket or forum or someone
that doesn't quite understandyou or whatever may happen, and
now you're stuck, and then badthings just continue to cascade
in the wrong direction.
So for us at Integrate Design,that search for a truly reliable
premium managed host has been along and winding road.
(24:22):
We've been through WP Engine,we've been through a company
called Kensta, and we finallyfound something that actually
feels like home by a companypowered by automatic called
Pressible.
Now, let me say a few thingsabout this.
This journey has, remember, Itold you things speed up and
(24:44):
we're seeing it happen more.
Other things, there's a lot offactors that are going in it
that are making us test it andmove in this direction.
So it's really kind of importantbecause even though we're
talking about hosting here andyou probably want me to cut to
the chase, it's not the wherewe're landing, it's the journey.
(25:04):
Because in your business,everything from every component
actually, if it's not workingtogether holistically, then it's
going to fail.
This is just an example.
It's the journey, not thedestination here.
So if you run or own an agency,because I'm writing to agencies
here, um, I think our lastdecade of hosting headaches
(25:26):
might save you a few years offrustration, some oxidative
stress, and maybe a little bitof hair.
For those who know me, I shavemy head.
So there is a little joke there.
Um So the early days, whenhosting was simple, and then it
wasn't.
Back in the day, um, we startedwith smaller hosts, the kind
that were great before beingswallowed up by mega companies.
(25:49):
For a while, everything workedfine, but over time, the
industry changed.
Today, picking a host is a bitlike shopping for healthy food
at a grocery store.
The shelves look full ofoptions, but once you read the
labels, you realize it's mostlythe same fluff and different
packaging.
And yes, for those wondering,we've been through the VPS
(26:11):
phase, CPanel, Plesk, and I'lljust manage my own server
chapter in the businessevolution.
Uh now, some of this is finewhen the business was slower or
the web was slower, notbusiness.
But these days, betweenAI-driven systems and shifting
STO algorithms, running your ownbox is like a phone, uh, a flip
(26:34):
phone in the age of satellites.
It's just it's not as there'smuch more important things for a
lot of agencies.
So, what I'm trying to tell umthe agency here and what applies
to you as the owner of abusiness is there's all these
decisions that have to be made.
Like, do I manage my own umvirtual private uh uh solution
(26:57):
or do I a server is what thatstands for.
Or do I do this or do I handleit this way?
And what I'm basically lettingpeople know is we've been there
and done that.
And so as we moved along, we sawkind of uh the writing on the
wall and how important it is tohave a team that kind of
complements your team.
(27:18):
So, first of all, let's land onWP Engine, and this part of the
uh the section is called thehoneymoon that didn't last.
Uh, when we first joined WPEngine, it felt like the real
deal.
The onboarding was smooth, theportal was very clean, and we
thought finally a grown-uphosting experience, something
(27:39):
where we could focus on thethings we're really good at, and
we'll have a partner to help usthrough some of those uh
trickier spots.
Uh support initially seemedresponsive, and we love that we
didn't need third-party tools uhlike uh main WP, things like
that.
For a brief moment, it felt likewe found the one.
(28:01):
Then came the following years.
Support responses, they sloweddown, performance dropped, and
our enthusiasm quickly deflated.
Now, I'm not saying it coincidedwith their IPO, uh, but the
timing didn't exactly inspireconfidence.
It was like being in a greatrelationship until you realize
(28:23):
your partner's been seeing10,000 other agencies on the
side.
So what I'm doing here is uhinitial public offering, that's
a business concept.
You know, you can Google that,and if you if you don't know
what that is, it's not relatedto uh technology.
I mean, we get hit with with allthese acronyms, and we think,
well, that acronym uh that'sobviously a web, it's not a web
(28:45):
thing.
Um, so uh transparency became anissue too.
We never got clarity on what wasunder the hood.
Plans were based on site counts,not specs, which made
optimization for us feel likeguesswork.
And then later, uh, we heardtalk about artificial
intelligence dynamicallyallocating resources.
(29:05):
Um that sounded fancy until werealized it might mean doing
more with less.
And when our livelihood dependson uptime, AI throttling did not
exactly spark joy in the midstof everything we were seeing.
Eventually, support tickets wentunanswered long enough for us to
write blog posts betweenreplies.
(29:25):
Um, that's when we knew it wastime to move on.
Now, of course, I'm I'm using alittle bit of humor in the
article.
Um, let's move on to uh therebound relationship, which uh
is a company called Kensta.
So enter Kensta, the excitingnew player that promised
everything WP Engine wasn't.
They were this scrappy eagercompany, and they told us very
(29:48):
convincingly that lots of otheragencies were making the switch
to them because they wereexperiencing the same thing we
were experiencing.
Of course, it was probably, youknow, we don't know, was it?
Sales pitch, was it not?
At first, it was great.
Support was sharp.
We had a dedicated advocate.
And I even felt I even felt sogood about it that I wrote a
(30:11):
glowing testimonial, whichshortly after I asked them to
remove due to issues, and theydidn't respond and made it a
headache.
So once they got us to to writeup, you know, everything, it
just uh they they refused topull it back down for or they
didn't communicate with me thatthey uh were doing that unless I
(30:32):
missed something obvious.
Uh after the honeymoon phase,the same pattern started to
show, slow response time, vagueanswers, and the occasional
we'll look into it that neverwent anywhere.
Uh we had a few serious issuesthat for professional sake I'll
just describe as unresolvedmysteries.
(30:52):
Even our advocate admitted shereally wasn't an advocate.
She was more of an order taker.
Um that was honestly refreshing,but also it was concerning.
I mean, because keep in mind wewe manage a lot.
I mean, and to have someonewhere all of a sudden we're
moving from the standpoint of anadvocate and someone who's
(31:14):
trying to help us out to someonewho basically says, I'm here to
change your order whenever youneed something, that's a lot
different relationship.
Now, to Kence's credit, theyeventually allowed a prorated
early exit uh when we decided tomove on.
We didn't get to take advantageof that because we wanted to do
a bunch of homework beforemoving on.
(31:34):
Cause this is a big decision.
I mean, it's like breaking upthe foundation of a house and
moving it six feet.
Uh, but between unexpected uhoverage charges from what look
like bot traffic and awkwardCloudflare conflicts, uh, it was
clear we needed to uh findsomething sturdier.
So uh Cloudflare to you who owna business, it's just a uh it's
(31:59):
a piece of uh between yourdomain and your hosting, it's
just uh an extra layer ofsecurity and stability that uh
is pretty universal.
So let's talk about commonissues with both Kensta and WP
engine.
To be fair, both these companieshave their strengths, uh, but
(32:21):
also consistent hurdles thatmake life harder for agencies
like ours.
Smooth onboarding, rough middleground.
Uh the first impression isgreat, the follow-up, it wasn't
so great.
Complex issues rarely got realsolutions.
Uh if a fix wasn't in thescript, it usually led to a dead
(32:42):
end, or it led to so muchhomework that you just kind of
gave up.
Uh too much do-it-yourselfsupport, many solutions required
us to do dozens of extra stepson our end.
That's kind of what I meant.
Like, you know, being asked somany questions that are so
complex that, you know, or notcomplex, but it's just so
(33:03):
detailed that you you literallydon't have time to do all the
work that they want you to do.
Uh Middleware Headaches, uh,both of these companies, uh,
from my understanding at thetime use Google uh cloud, which
sounds great in theory, butintroduced some weird quirks.
Like uh we had problems withSFTPs in some cases, some real
(33:26):
sluggish dashboards, and justdifferent little weird problems
that seemed to uh pop up a lot.
Customer uh support have felt uhreactive and not proactive.
Every ticket felt like a freshstart sometimes with a new rep.
It was like, or you would you'dbe on this chat for you know a
long time as a reading throughold notes, but even then there
(33:48):
were some trip-ups and it almostfelt like I had to recycle part
of the conversation.
Uh so in short, uh, we spent uhmore time managing the managed
part of hosting than actuallyworking on client sites.
And uh I felt like ourreputation was starting to take
some dings there too, eventhough these were not our issue,
(34:09):
they are our issue because ourclients trust us to make good
decisions.
And so in order for us to be agood steward of that trust, we
have to make the rightdecisions.
And so these are big moves, iswhere I'm driving at.
So when you're talking about uh,well, I've used this same guy
for this long, or my Google Adsis working great, why would I
(34:33):
want to uh switch that?
Or, you know, you're stickingall these things that are
probably bouncing around in yourhead.
But here's the deal we're havingto make these moves because it's
no longer relevant.
If you're on that do-it-yourselfsystem and you're doing
piecemeal systems and yourbranding is disjointed or your
messages uh aren't good or usingblog content, keep in mind that
(34:58):
this change is happening,whether you want it to or not.
This change is happening.
And for people who are restingon what they've always done,
thinking that it's always goingto be, that's a that's just like
confirmation bias, more or less.
Uh or it's not it's a normalcybias, not a confirmation bias.
And a normalcy bias makes youthink that things are just going
(35:19):
to continue the way they are.
Uh sorry, uniformitarianismloses its legs really quick.
Okay, so let's talk aboutPressible, the calm after the
storm.
And then came Pressible, theautomatic.
Yes, that automatic, the folksbehind WordPress.com and
WooCommerce.
So now we're it was a great, itwas a great initial
(35:43):
conversation.
But here's the interestingthing.
We started cautiously migratinga few sites as a test.
Now, in this case, it wasn'tperfect at first.
Um, there were some redirectquirks, some migration hiccups,
uh, but the difference wasimmediate.
Okay, it was real people, realsupport, and real
(36:04):
infrastructure.
Now, the big win, um, they're ontheir own stack.
There's no middle layers thateliminated many of the
mysterious issues we've seenbefore.
They also offer 90-day backups,while the other systems, to my
understanding, are still around30-day.
Um, they do have multiple datacenters, and um, it's the most
(36:27):
consistent support team I'veworked with.
I mean, it's it's just beenincredibly smooth.
And they they wanted ourbusiness, which is something
that um I almost found shocking,to be honest with you.
It's almost like when you startworking with some companies, you
know how it is, like you get onboard and they act like they
(36:49):
don't care whether you stay withthem or not.
I mean, I know you know what I'mtalking about.
Well, this company seems tocare, and that's not waned a
bit.
And so um, if you use pagebuilders uh with your WordPress
environment, now this is for theuh the agency folks, uh you'll
(37:10):
appreciate this.
Kinstas caching often uh brokeour page previews.
Now, what that meant was you'dgo in to edit a uh a site
visually, and then it would justkind of everything would jump
all over the place.
So for us, we kind of know thatthat exists with some caching.
Uh now Pressible fixed it.
Now it's it's maybe a little bitslower on the back end, but the
(37:34):
stability and predictability andperformance beats those random
issues because now our creativefolks can focus on being
creative.
After two months, uh weconnected directly with their
automatic team and startedhaving regular check-ins with
someone who actually knew oursetup.
Now imagine that.
A host that knows who you areand wants to know your business
(37:57):
is succeeding.
Now that's what we're gettingwith um uh with them.
And uh, you know, our our personout there is just an amazing
guy.
And uh when he comes in, hecomes in prepared.
He knows where we're at, heknows what we're doing, he's
asking the right questions, hesays, do you want to meet more
often, less often?
It's just incredibly different.
(38:18):
So since moving, we've probablysaved, no joke, 30 to 50 percent
of the time we used to wastechasing these bugs, clarifying
tickets, or waiting for someoneto escalate our issue into
oblivion.
And honestly, after years offrustration, this is feeling
like a vacation right now.
(38:39):
Okay, so here's the verdict.
No host is perfect.
Every platform has trade-offs,and what works for one agency
might not fit for another.
But after more than a decade ofexperimentation, we've landed
where stability, transparency,and partnership seem to finally
align.
So if you're an agency thatvalues real support, competent
(39:01):
infrastructure, and a partnerthat doesn't vanish once your
credit card clears, then my voteheading into 2026 is going
depressible.
And if you've ever had thathosting horror story, just
remember you're not alone.
Every agency has one.
We just decided to stopcollecting them.
Now, here's my disclaimer (39:21):
this article reflects our personal
experience and opinions atIntegris Design LLC.
Your experience may differ.
All company names and trademarksare properties of their
respective owners.
Now, so you see here as anagency, this is this is actually
(39:41):
a real thing that happened.
And so we're constantly workingto solidify, get better,
stronger, tougher, learn AI,when to use it, when to not, how
to tie the whole thing together,and all these pieces.
And yet we're still playingfrogger with some key components
of our business, trying to findthe best solution that's going
(40:06):
to help us in the mostmeaningful ways possible.
So, you as the owner of abusiness, the problem is you may
be happy and not know thingsaren't going well.
You may not be happy, you couldbe in a lot of different spaces.
But I can promise you thatmoving forward, the more
holistic your plan is and themore comprehensive your plan is,
(40:29):
considering all the littleminutiae that goes into
marketing, you're going to bemore successful long term.
And there's nothing morefrustrating than having to sit
with the client, and we look atthem coming to us or wanting to
talk to us, and they express howthey've lost all their momentum,
(40:52):
they express how their ads areno longer working, they express
how their organic traffic hasfallen through the floor, and
they just want to be back wherethey were.
Okay, they don't they don't careabout making progress, they just
want to get back to where theywere, and they wonder what
happened.
Well, it's all the stuff, allthe stuff that's been going on
(41:15):
for the last 20 years, all thesebad practices, all these uh
hacks, all these get, you know,uh get you know success quick
schemes that are backfiringbecause of the perfect storm
that's here.
Your business cannot afford towait uh for those signals.
(41:38):
And so you need someone thatcould audit.
We do offer auditing uhsolutions, we can help you out
with that.
We're in the middle of revampinguh all of our site and
everything, but if you go tointegrisdesign.com and you just
kind of want to talk about it,feel free to book.
Now, we are a boutique agency,and we do have limited offerings
(41:59):
because we believe in beingpersonable and comprehensive and
understanding one business at atime and all that.
And so if you do want some help,we may have a slot, we may be
able to sit down and talk withyou and be able to go through
your data and then help youunderstand exactly what's going
on.
And just if you're on a trend,you know, are you are you
(42:21):
holding uh par?
Are you uh are you fallingbehind?
Are there signals to showingthat you're probably got some
things that need to be fixed?
We could help you with that, butyou need to find somebody that
can do that and work with you.
Okay, uh, I think I'm gonna wrapit up at that.
Uh thanks again for tuning intoOver the Bull.
(42:43):
I do hope this helps you out.
I know this isn't as much of adeep dive as it is just kind of
letting you know what's going onwith the internet today.
And uh this internet of uhmoving into 2026, guys, it's
changed 60 days ago.
And uh practices that were goodeight or nine months ago are
(43:04):
completely irrelevant and aregoing the wrong direction.
So be careful.
The decisions you make today aregoing to dictate whether you're
going to fall behind or actuallyjump way ahead with the advent
of artificial intelligence.
SPEAKER_00 (43:18):
Thanks for tuning in to Over the Bull, brought to you
by Integris Design, a fullservice design and marketing
agency out of Asheville, NorthCarolina.
Until next time.
You're listening to Over the Bull, where we cut
through marketing noise.
Here's your host, Ken Carroll.
SPEAKER_01 (00:09):
How not to turn the car around on this episode of
Over the Bull.
Thanks so much for tuning in.
I appreciate it.
You know, when uh my kids wereyoung, the one thing that I
never wanted to do was have toturn the car back around to go
turn something off or getsomething.
You know, it's like we're we'regetting ready to go on that
(00:31):
vacation.
And as we're traveling and we'regetting down that road, you
know, and then somebody, I canstill, you know, hear, oh, I
think I forgot or I needed this.
And uh no matter how many times,you know, we had to uh or we
asked, you know, there wasalways a chance we had to turn
around.
Now, in your uh business life,more of you than you think are
(00:55):
going to be turning yourbusiness around and having to
start over.
Um, I know this sounds like itcould be hyperbole to you, but
but it's reality.
Okay, I'm seeing it in realtime.
So, what I want to share withyou today is just kind of talk
to you about what's going onwith the internet, and then what
(01:17):
I want to do is transition thatto a story about um a review
about hosting that I think wouldkind of crystallize this whole
thing and kind of button it up.
So, what do I mean by turningthe car around?
Well, when you um when you havea business, there are certain
things that can help yourbusiness move in the right
(01:38):
direction, and there's certainthings that can help your
business move in the wrongdirection.
Your business never gets to acertain point, and then you're
done building credibility.
Building credibility isconstant, consistent, and
requires best practices.
Now, for the last since theinternet basically popped into
(02:00):
existence, there have beenpeople that have been trying to
gain the system.
And there have been other peoplewho work from a little bit of
knowledge that have created somesuccess but some problems.
So the the issue with the web isthat now we're hitting a storm,
(02:21):
and this storm is actuallygetting worse for several
reasons.
Now, the first is that thecompetition is really kicking up
a notch with the advent ofartificial intelligence.
We talked about um Atlas lastweek, a uh a new browser by uh
(02:42):
OpenAI, the folks that make ChatGPT, and it's pretty impressive.
Now, the one thing that uhGoogle wants to do is maintain
its authority on the internet,and we are seeing some slight
percentage drops in terms ofusage, and we are seeing AIs
being widely adopted.
(03:04):
And so with this fight on theinternet for uh Google trying to
remain at the top, and thenthese newer, younger, uh
arguably more efficient systemsare popping up, um, they're
fighting for that.
Now, what this means is thatcontent uh that is created in
(03:27):
bad ways, in bad practices, arefalling under the microscope.
Now, here's why that'shappening.
Because relevancy in searchresults is more critical than
ever for these companies toremain relevant.
What that means is basically yougo type something in a Google
search, you need the mostrelevant results at the top.
(03:51):
You don't want to filter througha bunch of junk, a bunch of
generic AI-generated blogarticles.
You don't want to filter throughthat.
You want accurate answers, soyou can make a decision.
That is a search engine's valueproposition.
When I say search engines, Imean like like Google, for
example, is a search engine.
(04:12):
Well, with people, uh agenciesand freelancers, what they've
done, and they've a lot of themhave always taken shortcuts.
Okay, and the problem is some ofthem believe in myths that
simply aren't true, but they'vehad success with them in the
past.
So if you could imagine you'vegot freelancers with limited
(04:33):
experience, you have freelancersthat are building WordPress
sites with templates and freeplugins, and you have agencies
doing this too, by the way.
You have these piecemealsystems, and they've built
entire companies around thesepiecemeal systems.
Think your do-it-yourselfwebsite builders, and now all
this stuff is coming to theforefront.
(04:55):
Google's fighting to remain onthe top, these other guys are
fighting for them, and the bestsearch results have to be at the
top, which means they have tostart pushing things that are
shortcuts down to the bottom andbring up the best of the best to
the top.
Now, it gets a little morecomplicated than that.
(05:16):
Uh, I've been talking to you awhile about a principle called
EEAT.
Um, this is really importantbecause it appears that
artificial intelligence does notlike artificial intelligence
content.
And so original, human-curated,human-touched content appears to
(05:39):
be the gold standard, while allthe junk content appears to be
uh falling to the wayside.
So think that when you'recreating a blog article using AI
and you're and you're notputting in the right systems in
place to have it human-touched,just think that Google's going
to devalue that.
(06:01):
Just think uh, like I've talkedabout YouTube, uh, it came
across my desk uh several monthsago now, where they're devaluing
AI content.
Now they didn't devalue AIcontent because of it's uh it's
incredibly valuable and peoplelove it and they want to see
more of it.
It was because it was making thesearches on YouTube less
(06:23):
credible and people were notwanting to use it because they
really didn't want to see a fakecelebrity generated through AI
saying things that they neversaid.
I mean, that just creates thisstate of confusion.
And who wants to quote somethingthat artificial intelligence
said someone said when theydidn't say it?
(06:44):
I mean, you can come acrossreally foolhardy if you were to
fall into that and then startquoting it.
So as you can imagine, thisstorm is really intense.
It's like everything's comingtogether.
The the technology companies,the big tech companies, the
freelancers are uh and the andthe agencies are heavily
(07:08):
invested in their piecemealsystems.
And then you have the businessowner.
So let's talk about you as theowner of a business.
You know, it's always been wherethe owner of a business, there's
certain things that we just knowabout people who own businesses.
Number one is when things getlean, they usually cut the
marketing budget.
We know that.
(07:29):
So they we know they cut thelifeline of their business as
things start to get lean becausethey think that's an easy place
to do.
It's always happened and it'salways been a bad decision.
But more than that, businessowners, especially small
business owners, they want tocut as many corners as they can.
(07:50):
And so oftentimes they'll hire afreelancer, a cheap agency, or
they will try to do things ontheir own.
So then they start toincorporate products like Canva
or uh do-it-yourself websitebuilders or different things
like that.
And so what they do is theythrow together this piecemeal uh
(08:12):
system that hasn't been properlythought through, and so they're
already off on the wrong foot.
So if we if we back the internetup, say 10, 15 years, the uh you
could get away with some of thisstuff.
You could get away with being alittle more sloppy than the
(08:32):
average bear.
There were other things that youknow really needed to be done,
but not on the level that itdoes today.
So think in terms of like youruh your nap score, your nap
name, address, phone number, uhscore, and optimizing that.
Now you could do it kind of in asmall version, and some could
(08:57):
get by maybe with a very limitedversion, but now that score is
more important than ever.
It's a have to, it's not awant-to.
So when we see businesses startto pull away from like our nap
optimization uh tool, we knowthat that's a fundamental block
in the foundation that they'reignoring.
(09:19):
So you as the owner want uh ascheap as you can get it, a
piecemeal system, some of you.
Um some of you are hiring peoplethat aren't qualified to do the
job.
The people that are selling youthe product, they think that
what they're selling you issomething good and efficient.
The agencies and the freelancersthat are abusing artificial
(09:41):
intelligence think that somehowthey found a way to shortcut
everything so they can make morerevenue and make it appear as
though they're doing more workthan they can.
The um the software companiesare invested in text that
agencies use that is becomingquickly irrelevant.
These these big institutions, Imean, just think of the the
(10:05):
do-it-yourself website buildersthat are on the uh the Super
Bowl and all these otherlocations.
I mean, they're quickly becomingincredibly irrelevant.
And then of course, now we'vegot another factor, which is how
do you use artificialintelligence to begin with?
I mean, using putting peoplethrough an AI system when they
(10:29):
want to talk to a human is bad.
I mean, it's it's kind of likethey're they're trying to
replace uh the poor andfortunate people uh in these
call centers overseas that arehaving to grab calls and take
the abuse of frustrated peoplewith these AI systems.
But here's the thing thecustomer still doesn't like it.
(10:50):
Okay, it's got to it's got to bebetter and more efficient.
Now, what's great is there aresome really great tools out
there.
I just experienced one uhyesterday, as a matter of fact.
It was an incredible product,and then of course the 99% are
horrible.
(11:10):
Okay, so let's move and turn thecorner and look at this from a
whole different direction.
Artificial intelligence isgobbling up a lot of tasks that
were once valuable that can beautomated.
And it's just a fact.
And so what we're seeing are alot of white-collar jobs and
(11:33):
different jobs that arebasically becoming obsolete
because they can be performed byartificial intelligence.
So some projections are sayingthat people are going to have to
move to a whole other industryand try to figure out a way to
provide for their lives andtheir families and things like
that.
(11:53):
And so they're going to bemoving from their white-collar
jobs to maybe other jobs.
So think, for example, uhwhite-collar guy sees the
writing on the wall, and he goesout and says, I'm going to
invest in an electrical companyor a plumbing company, or maybe
I'll start building websites.
(12:15):
And so now what we're going tosee is an influx of people
trying to survive.
So, what this means for you isyour competition levels are
going to increase.
It also means that the number ofpeople that are going to start
building websites, sellingthemselves as digital marketing
(12:37):
experts, taking these weekendcourses or these uh six-month
courses, and then going out intothe world and then trying to
present themselves as experts,those things are just going to
increase.
Now, guys, let me tell yousomething here.
I know of an agency right nowthat's been around for over 10
years, and I can tell you thatI've seen the work that they've
(13:00):
done, and it's horrible.
It's it's it's absolutely justdestroyed this one company's
reputation.
Now, I can tell you that ifsomeone in a white-collar world
who's got a little bit of agrasp on how business works, and
they get just the pieces up tostart starting a um an SEO
(13:22):
company, uh digital marketingagency or whatever, they're
gonna put a shine on that, andit's gonna be hard to tell who
the good guys are and who thebad guys are.
And so this is going to add awhole other element to this game
and make it much morecomplicated for you as an owner
of a business to one compete,because now your marketing
(13:43):
budget's gonna have to increase.
Other things are gonna have toincrease for you to compete
against all the new peoplecoming into your markets.
But more important than that,now you're gonna have
freelancers and agencies andpeople who can say the right
things who may be polishedsalesmen, and they're gonna come
to you and start selling youproducts in which they are not
(14:05):
capable of producing.
Now, this is the state of theinternet.
This is where we are at thistime and space on the web.
And for you to sustain yourself,the very first thing you have to
do is equip yourself with thereality of the web.
(14:27):
Um, for us as an agency, we'removing toward a model where we
need to handle pretty mucheverything from beginning to end
with clients, including uhconsultations, um, directions,
looking at data.
Uh, you name it.
We're we're trying to move intoa model where we're kind of
doing all that holisticallybecause look here, okay.
(14:51):
Let's talk about a televisionchannel, uh, you know, TV and
newspapers.
Okay, so let's let's move herefor a second.
They they started losing theirreadership, they started losing
momentum.
You know, it's um almost likethe phone book, you know, 2.0
situation.
And so they're they're trying tosurvive too.
(15:13):
Well, these organizations, whatthey've done is moved into
digital marketing, they'retrying to leverage their
previous reputation, piggyback alegacy product, you know, and
then they're what they're tryingto do is move into digital
marketing and do that in orderto sustain themselves.
Okay, I can tell you firsthandthat they are not equipped in
(15:36):
the cases I've looked at tomanage this market.
They are reselling a product ona very high level that is
inefficient at best, but itlooks good numerically.
So, you know, part of theproblem, I'm sure you know this
as the owner of a business, youget into this stuff and you
(15:57):
start looking at it, and thenyou start getting these numbers,
and you're like, well, what doesthat number even mean to me?
Well, how does that even equateto business?
And then you start getting thesenebulous definitions.
Well, that's going on on top ofeverything else.
So as an owner of a business whodoesn't live in this field, you
(16:18):
may be chasing numbers thatreally are completely
irrelevant.
Now, this speeding up has beengoing on for some time.
Okay, uh in the uh in the Bible,you'll get to uh these things
must shortly come to pass, andthere's a term in there called
tacos, which uh uh it basicallymeans like a revving up when it
(16:42):
talks about shortly, like thingsare speeding up, a tachometer,
so to speak.
And so when we're looking atwhat's going on in the web, this
tachometer has been increasing.
Now, as an agency, we have awhole other undercurrent because
if you're a reputable agency andyou're trying to stay on top of
(17:03):
the game, it's a little bit of agame of frogger at different
points because you're alwaystrying to find the best solution
that is good for a client, andthen you're watching the
deterioration of certaincompanies that appeared to have
been good at one point.
Now you're trying to figurethings out and move in a uh
(17:24):
another uh direction in order toremain relevant.
And you know, certifications,best practices, not trying to
cheat the system, uh, building aplan that's holistic, overall
credibility, all of these thingstie in to building a plan.
I mean, everything down from uhhow long you register your
(17:47):
domain to your hosting to allthese complexities that business
owners, um, you know, it's justa lot.
I mean, we're in it full time,and you know, I'm here early in
the morning on a uh a Wednesdayjust to get the podcast in due
to all the things that go onwithin an agency.
So I really strongly recommendyou start taking some of this
(18:10):
stuff to uh to heart.
So let me let me share a journeywith you.
And, you know, as many of youknow, our agency, we've been
building off WordPress for 20years.
Okay.
And so let me talk to you abouthosting solutions from the
perspective of an agency.
Now, before we get into it,let's talk about what hosting is
(18:33):
as a recap because I know youown a business and you're you're
likely not like well in, youknow, you don't live in these
waters.
So hosting is basically whereall the stuff that makes up a
website resides on the internetso that it can be uh properly
found.
(18:53):
I mean, I guess that's theeasiest way to say it.
So just think uh it's like thisthis place on the web uh where
you store all those files, andthen when they're properly
structured, they make a website,and there are good
neighborhoods, there are badneighborhoods, there are pl uh
just like you would in reallife.
There's there's efficiency,there's uh stability, there's a
(19:16):
lot of factors that go into uhjust the idea of hosting, I
mean, security alone.
I mean, you want to talk abouteverybody talks about how great
AI is.
You should look at the uh theundercurrent of the AI war and
all the wasted energy that goesinto all the bad guys trying to
hack and use AI for maliciousreasons, and then the good guys
(19:40):
trying to combat the bad guys byputting in new processes and
steps, and then what do you do?
Now you have 500,000 two-stepauthentications you've got to go
through because of uh all thatwar going on in the
undercurrent.
So there's all that stuff thatgoes into uh good hosting, and
(20:02):
of course, you know, um thepeople that sell the very
low-end hosting want you tothink that hosting is hosting is
hosting, and they're just tryingto get it at the bottom dollar,
while those of us on the insideunderstand that hosting is
foundational and and goodhosting is non-negotiable.
(20:23):
We need to move to the placeswhere it's going to give us the
best overall performance uh forour clients.
I mean, when you're on the end,you know weird things.
Like you know that you typicallyhave less than 10 seconds to get
someone's attention on the web.
People have become very, veryimpatient.
I mean, if you want to talkabout a whole other layer, we
(20:46):
could talk about the impatienceof people and the conditions,
conditioning of people and whatthey expect.
Um, it's a lot different.
It's a lot different.
Your 35-year-olds today are alot different than your
35-year-olds of just five, 10years ago, just from the
expectation uh with some of thistechnology.
All right, so let's get back tothis.
(21:06):
So this is I want to take you onthis journey of what we've
experienced with our hosting.
And I'm just going to read thisarticle because you got to be
careful when you write things,uh, reviews and things like
that.
And you kind of need to stay touh a script, and you you know
you don't want to be um mean topeople or whatever.
(21:29):
This is this is my personaljourney through our company with
hosting, and we're going to kindof walk through that a little
bit.
So here we go.
I'm going to read.
Uh WordPress is the most popularcontent management system on the
planet, which means it's alsothe most misunderstood.
Okay, so CMS, content managementsystem.
(21:51):
It's basically just a way foryou to log in and manage your
website.
Just think of it kind of likethat.
And it also gives features, uh,different things that kind of
help with that websiteexperience to customize it for
your business.
Uh with this open source freedomcomes a flood of freelancers,
agencies, and enterprise-levelhosting companies, all promising
the same thing (22:13):
speed, security, and support.
Okay, we got another word there,open source.
Open source just means you candownload all the code.
Okay, so there's two flavors ofWordPress: WordPress.com, where
you have limited access, and youhave WordPress.org where you can
build it and have all access.
(22:35):
Every competent agency orfreelancers I've ever met uses
WordPress.org.
That's my opinion.
In reality, many of thosecompanies land somewhere between
almost there and are you kiddingme?
Subagencies cut corners withbloated themes and questionable
plugins.
Some hosts claim unlimitedeverything until you actually
(22:57):
use it.
Meanwhile, business owners areleft with websites that look
fine on the surface, but arebuilt on quicksand.
Now, this is absolutely truewith what's going on with
WordPress today.
And while everyone debatesplugins and page builders and
all those critical, uh all thoseuh most critical parts, hosting
(23:18):
gets overlooked.
It's almost like, well, wherecan I stick this website?
Where can I get cheap hosting?
You know, it's the same thing.
Business owners want somethingcheap.
Everybody's trying to dosomething, you know, and and
think that they're going to uhkind of cut corners in the
system and do as good.
Um let's be honest here.
(23:40):
No serious agency is throwingclient sites on shared hosting
and calling it a day.
You want a stronginfrastructure, consistent
performance, and a support teamthat won't ghost you when things
go sideways.
I mean, you guys know this.
You guys have seen it where youget in and all of a sudden
(24:00):
you're confronted with some kindof ticket or forum or someone
that doesn't quite understandyou or whatever may happen, and
now you're stuck, and then badthings just continue to cascade
in the wrong direction.
So for us at Integrate Design,that search for a truly reliable
premium managed host has been along and winding road.
(24:22):
We've been through WP Engine,we've been through a company
called Kensta, and we finallyfound something that actually
feels like home by a companypowered by automatic called
Pressible.
Now, let me say a few thingsabout this.
This journey has, remember, Itold you things speed up and
(24:44):
we're seeing it happen more.
Other things, there's a lot offactors that are going in it
that are making us test it andmove in this direction.
So it's really kind of importantbecause even though we're
talking about hosting here andyou probably want me to cut to
the chase, it's not the wherewe're landing, it's the journey.
(25:04):
Because in your business,everything from every component
actually, if it's not workingtogether holistically, then it's
going to fail.
This is just an example.
It's the journey, not thedestination here.
So if you run or own an agency,because I'm writing to agencies
here, um, I think our lastdecade of hosting headaches
(25:26):
might save you a few years offrustration, some oxidative
stress, and maybe a little bitof hair.
For those who know me, I shavemy head.
So there is a little joke there.
Um So the early days, whenhosting was simple, and then it
wasn't.
Back in the day, um, we startedwith smaller hosts, the kind
that were great before beingswallowed up by mega companies.
(25:49):
For a while, everything workedfine, but over time, the
industry changed.
Today, picking a host is a bitlike shopping for healthy food
at a grocery store.
The shelves look full ofoptions, but once you read the
labels, you realize it's mostlythe same fluff and different
packaging.
And yes, for those wondering,we've been through the VPS
(26:11):
phase, CPanel, Plesk, and I'lljust manage my own server
chapter in the businessevolution.
Uh now, some of this is finewhen the business was slower or
the web was slower, notbusiness.
But these days, betweenAI-driven systems and shifting
STO algorithms, running your ownbox is like a phone, uh, a flip
(26:34):
phone in the age of satellites.
It's just it's not as there'smuch more important things for a
lot of agencies.
So, what I'm trying to tell umthe agency here and what applies
to you as the owner of abusiness is there's all these
decisions that have to be made.
Like, do I manage my own umvirtual private uh uh solution
(26:57):
or do I a server is what thatstands for.
Or do I do this or do I handleit this way?
And what I'm basically lettingpeople know is we've been there
and done that.
And so as we moved along, we sawkind of uh the writing on the
wall and how important it is tohave a team that kind of
complements your team.
(27:18):
So, first of all, let's land onWP Engine, and this part of the
uh the section is called thehoneymoon that didn't last.
Uh, when we first joined WPEngine, it felt like the real
deal.
The onboarding was smooth, theportal was very clean, and we
thought finally a grown-uphosting experience, something
(27:39):
where we could focus on thethings we're really good at, and
we'll have a partner to help usthrough some of those uh
trickier spots.
Uh support initially seemedresponsive, and we love that we
didn't need third-party tools uhlike uh main WP, things like
that.
For a brief moment, it felt likewe found the one.
(28:01):
Then came the following years.
Support responses, they sloweddown, performance dropped, and
our enthusiasm quickly deflated.
Now, I'm not saying it coincidedwith their IPO, uh, but the
timing didn't exactly inspireconfidence.
It was like being in a greatrelationship until you realize
(28:23):
your partner's been seeing10,000 other agencies on the
side.
So what I'm doing here is uhinitial public offering, that's
a business concept.
You know, you can Google that,and if you if you don't know
what that is, it's not relatedto uh technology.
I mean, we get hit with with allthese acronyms, and we think,
well, that acronym uh that'sobviously a web, it's not a web
(28:45):
thing.
Um, so uh transparency became anissue too.
We never got clarity on what wasunder the hood.
Plans were based on site counts,not specs, which made
optimization for us feel likeguesswork.
And then later, uh, we heardtalk about artificial
intelligence dynamicallyallocating resources.
(29:05):
Um that sounded fancy until werealized it might mean doing
more with less.
And when our livelihood dependson uptime, AI throttling did not
exactly spark joy in the midstof everything we were seeing.
Eventually, support tickets wentunanswered long enough for us to
write blog posts betweenreplies.
(29:25):
Um, that's when we knew it wastime to move on.
Now, of course, I'm I'm using alittle bit of humor in the
article.
Um, let's move on to uh therebound relationship, which uh
is a company called Kensta.
So enter Kensta, the excitingnew player that promised
everything WP Engine wasn't.
They were this scrappy eagercompany, and they told us very
(29:48):
convincingly that lots of otheragencies were making the switch
to them because they wereexperiencing the same thing we
were experiencing.
Of course, it was probably, youknow, we don't know, was it?
Sales pitch, was it not?
At first, it was great.
Support was sharp.
We had a dedicated advocate.
And I even felt I even felt sogood about it that I wrote a
(30:11):
glowing testimonial, whichshortly after I asked them to
remove due to issues, and theydidn't respond and made it a
headache.
So once they got us to to writeup, you know, everything, it
just uh they they refused topull it back down for or they
didn't communicate with me thatthey uh were doing that unless I
(30:32):
missed something obvious.
Uh after the honeymoon phase,the same pattern started to
show, slow response time, vagueanswers, and the occasional
we'll look into it that neverwent anywhere.
Uh we had a few serious issuesthat for professional sake I'll
just describe as unresolvedmysteries.
(30:52):
Even our advocate admitted shereally wasn't an advocate.
She was more of an order taker.
Um that was honestly refreshing,but also it was concerning.
I mean, because keep in mind wewe manage a lot.
I mean, and to have someonewhere all of a sudden we're
moving from the standpoint of anadvocate and someone who's
(31:14):
trying to help us out to someonewho basically says, I'm here to
change your order whenever youneed something, that's a lot
different relationship.
Now, to Kence's credit, theyeventually allowed a prorated
early exit uh when we decided tomove on.
We didn't get to take advantageof that because we wanted to do
a bunch of homework beforemoving on.
(31:34):
Cause this is a big decision.
I mean, it's like breaking upthe foundation of a house and
moving it six feet.
Uh, but between unexpected uhoverage charges from what look
like bot traffic and awkwardCloudflare conflicts, uh, it was
clear we needed to uh findsomething sturdier.
So uh Cloudflare to you who owna business, it's just a uh it's
(31:59):
a piece of uh between yourdomain and your hosting, it's
just uh an extra layer ofsecurity and stability that uh
is pretty universal.
So let's talk about commonissues with both Kensta and WP
engine.
To be fair, both these companieshave their strengths, uh, but
(32:21):
also consistent hurdles thatmake life harder for agencies
like ours.
Smooth onboarding, rough middleground.
Uh the first impression isgreat, the follow-up, it wasn't
so great.
Complex issues rarely got realsolutions.
Uh if a fix wasn't in thescript, it usually led to a dead
(32:42):
end, or it led to so muchhomework that you just kind of
gave up.
Uh too much do-it-yourselfsupport, many solutions required
us to do dozens of extra stepson our end.
That's kind of what I meant.
Like, you know, being asked somany questions that are so
complex that, you know, or notcomplex, but it's just so
(33:03):
detailed that you you literallydon't have time to do all the
work that they want you to do.
Uh Middleware Headaches, uh,both of these companies, uh,
from my understanding at thetime use Google uh cloud, which
sounds great in theory, butintroduced some weird quirks.
Like uh we had problems withSFTPs in some cases, some real
(33:26):
sluggish dashboards, and justdifferent little weird problems
that seemed to uh pop up a lot.
Customer uh support have felt uhreactive and not proactive.
Every ticket felt like a freshstart sometimes with a new rep.
It was like, or you would you'dbe on this chat for you know a
long time as a reading throughold notes, but even then there
(33:48):
were some trip-ups and it almostfelt like I had to recycle part
of the conversation.
Uh so in short, uh, we spent uhmore time managing the managed
part of hosting than actuallyworking on client sites.
And uh I felt like ourreputation was starting to take
some dings there too, eventhough these were not our issue,
(34:09):
they are our issue because ourclients trust us to make good
decisions.
And so in order for us to be agood steward of that trust, we
have to make the rightdecisions.
And so these are big moves, iswhere I'm driving at.
So when you're talking about uh,well, I've used this same guy
for this long, or my Google Adsis working great, why would I
(34:33):
want to uh switch that?
Or, you know, you're stickingall these things that are
probably bouncing around in yourhead.
But here's the deal we're havingto make these moves because it's
no longer relevant.
If you're on that do-it-yourselfsystem and you're doing
piecemeal systems and yourbranding is disjointed or your
messages uh aren't good or usingblog content, keep in mind that
(34:58):
this change is happening,whether you want it to or not.
This change is happening.
And for people who are restingon what they've always done,
thinking that it's always goingto be, that's a that's just like
confirmation bias, more or less.
Uh or it's not it's a normalcybias, not a confirmation bias.
And a normalcy bias makes youthink that things are just going
(35:19):
to continue the way they are.
Uh sorry, uniformitarianismloses its legs really quick.
Okay, so let's talk aboutPressible, the calm after the
storm.
And then came Pressible, theautomatic.
Yes, that automatic, the folksbehind WordPress.com and
WooCommerce.
So now we're it was a great, itwas a great initial
(35:43):
conversation.
But here's the interestingthing.
We started cautiously migratinga few sites as a test.
Now, in this case, it wasn'tperfect at first.
Um, there were some redirectquirks, some migration hiccups,
uh, but the difference wasimmediate.
Okay, it was real people, realsupport, and real
(36:04):
infrastructure.
Now, the big win, um, they're ontheir own stack.
There's no middle layers thateliminated many of the
mysterious issues we've seenbefore.
They also offer 90-day backups,while the other systems, to my
understanding, are still around30-day.
Um, they do have multiple datacenters, and um, it's the most
(36:27):
consistent support team I'veworked with.
I mean, it's it's just beenincredibly smooth.
And they they wanted ourbusiness, which is something
that um I almost found shocking,to be honest with you.
It's almost like when you startworking with some companies, you
know how it is, like you get onboard and they act like they
(36:49):
don't care whether you stay withthem or not.
I mean, I know you know what I'mtalking about.
Well, this company seems tocare, and that's not waned a
bit.
And so um, if you use pagebuilders uh with your WordPress
environment, now this is for theuh the agency folks, uh you'll
(37:10):
appreciate this.
Kinstas caching often uh brokeour page previews.
Now, what that meant was you'dgo in to edit a uh a site
visually, and then it would justkind of everything would jump
all over the place.
So for us, we kind of know thatthat exists with some caching.
Uh now Pressible fixed it.
Now it's it's maybe a little bitslower on the back end, but the
(37:34):
stability and predictability andperformance beats those random
issues because now our creativefolks can focus on being
creative.
After two months, uh weconnected directly with their
automatic team and startedhaving regular check-ins with
someone who actually knew oursetup.
Now imagine that.
A host that knows who you areand wants to know your business
(37:57):
is succeeding.
Now that's what we're gettingwith um uh with them.
And uh, you know, our our personout there is just an amazing
guy.
And uh when he comes in, hecomes in prepared.
He knows where we're at, heknows what we're doing, he's
asking the right questions, hesays, do you want to meet more
often, less often?
It's just incredibly different.
(38:18):
So since moving, we've probablysaved, no joke, 30 to 50 percent
of the time we used to wastechasing these bugs, clarifying
tickets, or waiting for someoneto escalate our issue into
oblivion.
And honestly, after years offrustration, this is feeling
like a vacation right now.
(38:39):
Okay, so here's the verdict.
No host is perfect.
Every platform has trade-offs,and what works for one agency
might not fit for another.
But after more than a decade ofexperimentation, we've landed
where stability, transparency,and partnership seem to finally
align.
So if you're an agency thatvalues real support, competent
(39:01):
infrastructure, and a partnerthat doesn't vanish once your
credit card clears, then my voteheading into 2026 is going
depressible.
And if you've ever had thathosting horror story, just
remember you're not alone.
Every agency has one.
We just decided to stopcollecting them.
Now, here's my disclaimer (39:21):
this article reflects our personal
experience and opinions atIntegris Design LLC.
Your experience may differ.
All company names and trademarksare properties of their
respective owners.
Now, so you see here as anagency, this is this is actually
(39:41):
a real thing that happened.
And so we're constantly workingto solidify, get better,
stronger, tougher, learn AI,when to use it, when to not, how
to tie the whole thing together,and all these pieces.
And yet we're still playingfrogger with some key components
of our business, trying to findthe best solution that's going
(40:06):
to help us in the mostmeaningful ways possible.
So, you as the owner of abusiness, the problem is you may
be happy and not know thingsaren't going well.
You may not be happy, you couldbe in a lot of different spaces.
But I can promise you thatmoving forward, the more
holistic your plan is and themore comprehensive your plan is,
(40:29):
considering all the littleminutiae that goes into
marketing, you're going to bemore successful long term.
And there's nothing morefrustrating than having to sit
with the client, and we look atthem coming to us or wanting to
talk to us, and they express howthey've lost all their momentum,
(40:52):
they express how their ads areno longer working, they express
how their organic traffic hasfallen through the floor, and
they just want to be back wherethey were.
Okay, they don't they don't careabout making progress, they just
want to get back to where theywere, and they wonder what
happened.
Well, it's all the stuff, allthe stuff that's been going on
(41:15):
for the last 20 years, all thesebad practices, all these uh
hacks, all these get, you know,uh get you know success quick
schemes that are backfiringbecause of the perfect storm
that's here.
Your business cannot afford towait uh for those signals.
(41:38):
And so you need someone thatcould audit.
We do offer auditing uhsolutions, we can help you out
with that.
We're in the middle of revampinguh all of our site and
everything, but if you go tointegrisdesign.com and you just
kind of want to talk about it,feel free to book.
Now, we are a boutique agency,and we do have limited offerings
(41:59):
because we believe in beingpersonable and comprehensive and
understanding one business at atime and all that.
And so if you do want some help,we may have a slot, we may be
able to sit down and talk withyou and be able to go through
your data and then help youunderstand exactly what's going
on.
And just if you're on a trend,you know, are you are you
(42:21):
holding uh par?
Are you uh are you fallingbehind?
Are there signals to showingthat you're probably got some
things that need to be fixed?
We could help you with that, butyou need to find somebody that
can do that and work with you.
Okay, uh, I think I'm gonna wrapit up at that.
Uh thanks again for tuning intoOver the Bull.
(42:43):
I do hope this helps you out.
I know this isn't as much of adeep dive as it is just kind of
letting you know what's going onwith the internet today.
And uh this internet of uhmoving into 2026, guys, it's
changed 60 days ago.
And uh practices that were goodeight or nine months ago are
(43:04):
completely irrelevant and aregoing the wrong direction.
So be careful.
The decisions you make today aregoing to dictate whether you're
going to fall behind or actuallyjump way ahead with the advent
of artificial intelligence.
SPEAKER_00 (43:18):
Thanks for tuning in to Over the Bull, brought to you
by Integris Design, a fullservice design and marketing
agency out of Asheville, NorthCarolina.
Until next time.
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