Web Host Ethics

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Okay, I've had to change web hosts half a dozen times in the last year andI've noticed a pattern.
It's a very clear and simple pattern, actually aseries of ... on the part of web hosting compani Okay, I've had to change web hosts half a dozen times in the last year andI've noticed a pattern.
It's a very clear and simple pattern, actually aseries of behaviors on the part of web hosting companies. These behaviorscause these companies to lose customers and gain poor reputations.To sum it all up in a single word: ethics.
Web hosts need to act ethically.As long as they are ethical towards their business and customers, theythrive. When they become unethical, they will fail.What are web hosting company ethics? This is a code which all hostingcompanies need to follow if they want to stay in business for the long term.The most important goal is up-time - Almost anything can be forgiven as longas sites are up and running, as close to 100% of the time as possible.
Everyfeature provided by a hosting company needs to be working and workingproperly. A small amount of downtime (an hour or two in a month long period)is acceptable, but more than that is not.Every time I've had to change web hosts, this was the base reason.Unexplained and unexpected downtime.
Oh, there were many excuses and manyreasons which I'm sure were perfectly valid. But the basic reason why Icreate and maintain a web site is so people can see it - and they cannot seeit if the site is down.To make it even worse, sites which are down for a significant length of timehave side effects.
Webrings owners often check for broken rings usingautomated code - down sites will trigger suspensions and even deletions.Search engines tend to drop sites which are down too often or for too long aperiod of time. And, of course, visitors may remove your site from theirbookmarks, thinking you have closed it or moved on.The second most important goal is performance - I understand that you wantto jam as many sites on a single server as you can.
This is how you maximizeyour profits. Please understand that all of the web sites which you hostmust perform well.
So don't overload your servers.Stay in communication - We all know that things happen. Sometimes servers docrash and once in a while they require maintenance.
Let your customers knowabout important events. If you are concerned that they might consider itspam, give your customers the option to receive updates if they desire.I had one host (Hostrocket) which performed, in my opinion, one of the mosthostile acts that I have ever seen against a paying customer.
I had a CGIscript on my site which logged each 404 error in a text file. Normally thisscript was harmless and used little CPU.
Unfortunately, with the new breedof worms striking the internet, 404 errors went way up and the script beganusing large amounts of processor.One day I tried to reach my site and didn't get my friendly front page. Igot a "forbidden" error.
I freaked out and sent off a quick email to the webhost support group. I didn't receive a response.
Not a word (and it was onlyearly afternoon). I sent another, then another.
Nothing. Finally, 18 frantichours later, I received a note that my site was closed down because of thescript.The number of four letter words that spewed from my mouth that day wouldhave turned a street girl's face red.
I was so angry - not because theyclosed my site, but because these idiots (again, Hostrocket) didn't tell mewhat they had done. Because of that, I wasted almost an entire day trying tofigure out what was wrong.What I would have done had I been the technical person in their company issimple.
Just disable the script and send off an email to the web site ownerexplaining why and telling him not to do it again. If the owner ran thescript again, then shut down the site (and, of course, send another email).Needless to say, I regained access to my site, copied my databases to myhard drive, then switched web hosts.
Within two days I had moved my site toanother, much better hosting service (and, of course, I deleted theoffending script).Don't test on your production servers - I know you want to upgrade yourApache to the newest version or install the new control panel right away,but please don't immediately install anything on your production servers.Believe me, your customers don't care about any of this - they want workingsites. Saying "everything is going slow because we upgraded" is notacceptable - the host should know ALL side effects of any upgrades fromactual testing long before any change, however, small, is made to aproduction system.Do what you say you are going to do - I was with a hosting company calledBizland for over a year.
They were good most of the time except for (a)excessive downtime, and (b) they didn't deliver on their promises. They keptsaying CGI will be released in April, then May, then June.
Finally, Idecided I could not wait anymore (and also concluded the host was down toomuch) so I moved my site.Free hosting companies seem to have a bad habit of using production systemsas test beds. This is one of the strong downsides to using free hosts - theyreally don't care if your site is up or not, as long as the advertisementsare displayed.Acknowledge your trouble tickets - One web hosting company that I was withfor quite a long time was Addr.com.
These guys had easily the best supportso far. What stands out in my mind is every single message that I sent gotacknowledged by a human being.The sequence was as follows: I would send a trouble ticket and get anautomated response.
A short time later, I got a note that the ticket washandled. I always respond with a "thank you", because I've been a supportperson before and I understand the power of getting thanked.
Addr.com evenresponded to the thank you with a "you are welcome" message!To contrast, another hosting company (hostrocket again), had a nasty habitof just closing tickets. I'd send in a question and get an answer, then askanother question as follow-up.
I would never get a response, then check tosee that the ticket was marked "closed". This is not the way to keep acustomer happy.Actually read your trouble tickets - I write very clearly in troubletickets, precisely because I've been a support person and I know exactlywhat is needed.
I'm constantly surprised at how many times web host supportpeople simply don't read the ticket and thus do the wrong thing.One particularly glaring example was a ticket which I sent in which said toset up a certain domain with bigmailbox. The support person (fromHostrocket) changed the MX record for an entirely different domain, in spiteof my message clearly stating "change it for domain xyz".
This caused mysite to lose email capability for two days until they eventually figured outwhat they messed up.Most importantly, remember where you get your money from - This message isfor all web hosting companies everywhere. Your money comes from those peoplecalled webmasters.
Free hosting companies get their money indirectly via thecontent provided by webmasters. With paid hosts the relationship is directand to the point - money is paid by webmasters.If you annoy your customers or don't provide service, then you will findyourselves out of business.
And in these days of a looming recession, goodcustomers are gold. Keep them happy and your company will prosper.
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