How visitors can trust on your hosting business?

[River]

I havent seen SSL mentioned before, lots of general business practices which are all good.


I'd also make sure you have an SSL certificate on your site (kinda goes without saying) but I would never, ever give my financial information to a company who didn't have the decency to spend a small amount on an SSL certificate.

 

[ioZoom]

Trust starts with being trustworthy and that usually starts with being a legal registered company that people can actually lookup.
Do you have an address listed on your website? Be transparent as possible.
Do you own your own hardware? That tells me how invested you are in the business. The more invested the less likely you're a fly by night operation.
Are you committed to customer satisfaction? Being accredited by entities like the BBB shows how serious you are to customer satisfaction.


The bottom line is you want to be seen as a company who is transparent (company registration, whois, address, etc), who is invested in the company and not just someone who rented a cheap server, and committed to their customers satisfaction.

 

[mitgib]

Are you committed to customer satisfaction? Being accredited by entities like the BBB shows how serious you are to customer satisfaction.

This is worth $0, you are only accredited if you pay them, and anyone who pays gets accredited. BBB is as big a scam as SSL certs and the browser mafia.  

 

[KuJoe]

+1 to what @mitgib said. I'm never going to pay for that BBB sticker since it's not worth the pixels it's painted on. In my many years of hosting I only had one person complain about my company not being BBB accredited and they still ordered service and never had an issue so it wasn't that big of a deal apparently.

 

[ioZoom]

This is worth $0, you are only accredited if you pay them, and anyone who pays gets accredited. BBB is as big a scam as SSL certs and the browser mafia.  

Sure you have to pay them but we're talking about how to show visitors that your business can convey trust and this is one of them. Not everyone will agree and to each their own and there is no problem with that at all. It's just simply one extra way to convey trust and as a BBB accredited business you're obligated to respond to and resolve customer complaints. To some customers that's worth something.

 

[CenTex Hosting]

IMO it really depends on the company.


Some small companies will give you better support and service than larger companies. To a small company trying to make it you mean something to them. For a large company you are just another number to them.

 

[BalkanVPS]

Small providers generally care about all of their customers, big providers care about earning the most money. I'd go with smaller providers.

 

[drmike]

Small providers generally care about all of their customers, big providers care about earning the most money. I'd go with smaller providers.

Ahhh well, this isn't a truism.... There are slews of small companies that couldn't care in the least about customers.  Just check out most of the companies that show up on Lowend*.


Big companies aren't really any better on average.  They are just less likely to do stupid, but I point at EIG as the poster child of big company dysfunction that acts no better than scammy lowend companies.


It's less of a matter of company size and more a matter of integrity of the ownership and having said people that align costs with customer expectations and spend that money properly caring for customers.  That might mean just customer support or it might mean that plus bringing in competent systems administrator.   Support remains pretty bad in many shops.

 

[Hosting Specialists]

I dislike buying from huge companies such as 1&1, HostGator etc, but don't like buying from new startups either. Companies that have been going strong for at least a year and are medium sized.

 

[graeme]

Shared hosting (or one segment of it) is a lemon market, I am not sure VPS hosting is.
 

1. it is a service, not a one off sale: if quality is poor people will switch - and unlike shared hosting you tend to have reasonably knowledgeable users (I hope so, anyway, running an internet connected server...).
   
2. A lot of people do consider reputation before buying. I am on this forum today because I am trying to decide which smaller suppliers I can trust (although I probably want a dedicated server for this project).
   

 

[drmike]

VPS is mostly the same, tons of lemons.  It's issue of lack of skills of many owners, lack of proper sysadmin, lack of automation, lack of monitoring and usually a ton of server oversubscribing vs. the physical resources.

 

[graeme]

I should have made it clearer that I was replying to this: https://vpsboard.com/topic/7994-how-visitors-can-trust-on-your-hosting-business/?do=findComment&comment=103013

Certainly here are lots of lemons sold. I do not have the insider knowledge of the business that the providers here do, but I do know a lot of the people who lack skill and resources seem to go bust. On the other hand those that provide a good service do well. This means there is an incentive to sell good services - so although it is a market in which lemons are sold, it is not a market for lemons in which it is pointless selling good quality goods or services.

 

[CenTex Hosting]

Its really up to your personal preference Really. You can say both good and bad about small companies as well as large ones.


Example would be look at hostgator. Since EIG bought them out everyone is saying that support went down hill and so on. So it really doesn't matter the size of the company if they are going to be able to take care of you or not.


If you pick a small company do research. If they don't even have an ssl on the site then pass them over for sure. See how long they have registered a domain for. Gives you insite if they think they will be around. Put in a support ticket and see how long it takes them to get back to you. start a chat and ask questions and so on.

 

[graeme]

I thought about this while reading:


https://vpsboard.com/topic/8501-why-people-pay-so-much-for-big-brand-vps-and-cloud/?do=findComment&comment=104833


You want to be trusted. Give people the information they need to decide whether they can trust you. Tell them who runs the business, how long its been around, what skills your staff have, let them see your accounts to prove you are financially viable. In short have an about page that is actually informative. By far the best I have seen is this:

https://www.bytemark.co.uk/company/

 

[DomainBop]

You want to be trusted. Give people the information they need to decide whether they can trust you. Tell them who runs the business, how long its been around, what skills your staff have

Adding two things to that:


1. when telling people about your staff, please, please avoid saying "our staff has a combined xx years of experience" because it tends to decrease trust not increase it, and it actually makes your business seem smaller if the customer can do basic arithmetic. 


2. not only do you need to tell them who runs the company on your about us page,  but on your TOS you need to accurately state the name of the legal entity that the customer will be entering into a contract with.  Guess what, if you're not a registered company and you're a sole trader/sole proprietor then you need to put your own name on the TOS because you need to be a legal entity to enter into a contract and your non-registered hosting business isn't a legal entity (legal entity =  a registered company or an individual who is of legal age to enter into a contract) .  UK sole trader / serial hosting entrepreneur Ash is one of the very few sole traders who actually get this right on their TOS  ("You're entering into a contract with the sole proprietor, Asxxx xxxxxxxx, who in this instance is trading as "xxxxx" and will be referred to as: "Provider" or "xxxxx".).  If you fail to state the name of the real legal entity on your TOS then your TOS is basically worthless if there is a dispute and anyone calls you on it (and if you're not old enough to enter into a contract and your business isn't registered your TOS is also worthless).  Incorrectly listing a nonlegal entity as a party to a contract will decrease trust and drive away many potential customers (and the buyers who don't care about this are generally not the ones you'd want: spammers, abusers, children)..

 

[graeme]

I do not think that is right. My understanding (of UK law which is what I know best, although its probably the same in most common law countries) is that a sole trader using a trading name in a contract does not affect its enforceability. However it can cause problems if there is doubt about your identity.


If a company contracts without revealing its real name it is breaching obligations under contract law, but contracts are still usually enforceable.


A contract with a minor is often (not always) voidable by the minor, but can be enforced by either party until it is voided. It is a one-sided opportunity to wriggle out - but I do not know what the precedents are for a minor running a business. Employments contracts can be enforced on a minor: http://www.lawandparents.co.uk/minors-entering-into-contracts.html

It is definitely good practice to have the proper legal name on contracts, and I agree entirely that not having the proper legal name on contracts will decrease trust, particularly if there is nothing on the website to identify the legal entity involved. I would not enter into a contract with a minor without legal advice.

 

[graeme]

If a company contracts without revealing its real name it is breaching obligations under contract law, but contracts are still usually enforceable.

Should read

If a company contracts without revealing its real name it is breaching obligations under company law, but contracts are still usually enforceable.
 

 

[graeme]

I have a question for providers: why are you not doing the things @DomainBop and I suggest? It may be a deliberate business decision - for example if your target market is geeks who want somewhere to test stuff, or backup servers, or for hobby stuff.

A lot of good providers do not do not provide much information. I just had a look at the Ramnode, BuyVM and Secure Dragon sites - I think there is a consensus here that they are all good?. None comes anywhere near the level of disclosure we suggest. They seem to have no problem acquiring clients, so we should we conclude that their strategy (i.e. selling to people like me rather than people like my clients) is a good one and DomainBop and I are either wrong, or advocating just one of many possible strategies?

 

[VPSclub]

LLC + Premium domain + Custom website design + SSL + Excellent support + Live chat + Public WHOIS + Address and Phone number published on website + Competitive offers + Tutorials + Activity on top hosting forums

 

[drmike]

I have a question for providers: why are you not doing the things @DomainBop and I suggest? It may be a deliberate business decision - for example if your target market is geeks who want somewhere to test stuff, or backup servers, or for hobby stuff.

A lot of good providers do not do not provide much information. I just had a look at the Ramnode, BuyVM and Secure Dragon sites - I think there is a consensus here that they are all good?. None comes anywhere near the level of disclosure we suggest. They seem to have no problem acquiring clients, so we should we conclude that their strategy (i.e. selling to people like me rather than people like my clients) is a good one and DomainBop and I are either wrong, or advocating just one of many possible strategies?

All providers should listen to the input on this thread.  No matter what stage / age they are.  Clearly missing a bunch of stuff and lacking proper disclosure and image, your brand will suffer.


What @graeme in particular did you find with Ramnode, BuyVM and Secure Dragon did not meet @DomainBop 's disclosure level?  Honest question there and perhaps each provider can learn and realize what is 'deficient' from a buyer who is not in these communities and stumbles into their site solely.