A friend asked me what I knew about a hosting company she was considering moving her business website to. When I saw the name of the business (which I will NOT name in this article), I hadn’t a clue who they were. However, a few minutes of searching – well, just one search was enough – and I knew enough to tell my friend it would be an unwise move.
My first glance of their website suggested the service was decent, at a fair price. But…
- The price displayed on their home page was the price you got if you paid for 5 years up front!
- The price displayed did NOT say ‘from’ $….. It stated A price!
- The conversion between USD and other currencies didn’t add up!
That was enough to make me pull back on the reins but what startled me more was the results from a single search on Google!
Here are some of the spicy comments I read:
- they are the biggest scammers in the name of a domain provider
- ——–.com sucks! My site went down 15 times this month! My revenue on my website has been severely affected. 99.9% up-time guarantee? Bull crap. I experienced 66% up-time this month, horrible.
- Diabolical; Disgraceful; Incompetent; Unprofessional; Unlawful
See for yourself:
If that was my business these folks (kind enough to share their thoughts) were talking about, I would think very carefully about how I run my business. In fact, I'd probably have closed my business, accepting I was rubbish at what I was doing. Unless...
Unless I didn't care.
Initially I was giving them the benefit of doubt, it could have been, simply, bad business. But since these comments have been circulating since 2009 (possibly earlier) and the most recent comment I found was June 2011, I suspect they have no intention of making their business model better and it is, in fact, a scam operation.
Research Before Signing Up With ANY Service
Don't just search the company name, think about statements reviewers may have used.
In the search above, I simply searched "[company name] is crap" and sure enough, I found all the answers I needed.
Anyone can PAY for glowing reviews and (as I mentioned in my recent posts about lack of trust and social proof) but genuine comments will use every day language and it is these genuine comments that will tell you the truth.
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