I’m looking into building a directory website, something like (HomeAdvisor, Angie’s List, etc…) but a more bland and less robust version on the WordPress platform. I am not a coder. I am planning on using Elementor Pro and Crocoblocks since I already have subscriptions to both. I understand HTML and CSS but that’s about the extent of it. I have no knowledge of the backend, databases, PHP, or caching.
I’m currently hosting on a Vultr server on cloudways.
My questions:
1. I will have 10,000 contractors sign up in the first 60 days so what type of hosting am I looking at to handle something like this. Can’t imagine the website traffic being over 1000 visitors a day. What would monthly hosting cost be roughly for this
2. I know WordPress isn’t ideal for this scenario but would WordPress, Epro, and Crocoblocks work relatively easy for this type of load without constantly crashing or will this be a constant fight?
3. The site will be pretty photo heavy so what do I need to look at to solve any issues that might arise from this?
I was hoping to start off with a no code dynamic website for proof of concept and then maybe look at a custom development if needed.
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I don’t know if a similar setup can efficiently handle 10k photo-heavy listings. It also depends on how many custom fields you’ll have. If Crocoblock uses the default WP Media Library, even if you optimize it and stop it from creating various media sizes, it will add a couple of rows for each picture in the database. So, if you have 5 pics per listing, you’re looking at 100k rows in the wp_postmeta table just for the pictures (best case scenario). Then you’ll have 2 rows for each custom field. Your search form could easily struggle if you get some traffic. Our plugin uses custom DB tables to store all that info. We built it that way because we experienced all the bottlenecks WP was throwing at us. It’s called GeoDirectory; you may want to have a look at it.
Cloudways is a great place to be. You can easily expand your account as the traffic increases.
Here is a list of directory plugins:
[https://blog.hubspot.com/website/best-directory-wordpress-plugins](https://blog.hubspot.com/website/best-directory-wordpress-plugins)
I have a few thoughts.
– WordPress isn’t the ideal platform for this type of project. Yes, you can do it, but that doesn’t mean you should. You will soon be experiencing a variety of technical bottlenecks that you are not currently prepped for skills-wise.
– If you really want to build this in WordPress, or from scratch, you really should either seek out a technical co-founder, or hire a technical project manager/developer who has the required backend/stack experience.
– You may want to look at a pre-built solution. Brilliant Directory comes to mind, but there are others.