QuΖick and sincere support with a website is a must for your online success. Even if creating a website with WordPress is a breeze, you will eventually hit a brick wall as a beginner and need help as you progress. In this post, I want to share with you experiences I had regarding “support” at two different places, HostGator and Wealthy Affiliate University.
Started Out With HostGator
I initially signed up with HostGator for my web hosting. I picked a plan called “Baby Plan” and it was about $8/month. No big deal.
HostGator is a hosting service and that is about it, so it doesn’t teach you how to build a website, let alone how to build a website that makes money. I needed to look for somewhere else for that information, and I found Wealthy Affiliate University.
What is Wealthy Affiliate University?
Wealthy Affiliate University, or simply Wealthy Affiliate is an online program that teaches you how to succeed as an online entrepreneur.
It comes in a package of (a) Websites, (b) Hosting and (c) Tons of Courses that you can learn from. Above all, it is free to join. I thought, “Why not give it a try? If I didn’t like it, I could just leave.” So I signed up and began right away with their “Get Started” Course with 10 lessons for free.
Before I went through the first 3 lessons, I realized that I came across a gem. With Wealthy Affiliate, I was learning things in a week that would have taken me months to figure out on my own. The 10 lessons you receive as a free member covers the fundamentals of online marketing. How to choose your niche, how to build a website, what SEO is, how keyword works for rankings, etc. By the time you finish all the 10 lessons, you will have a clear idea as to how you want to start your online business. Here is my Wealthy Affiliate review.
10 Lessons offered at “Get Started Here”
How is the HostGator Support Team?
Ok, back to our topic today; Support.
First, I want to share with you an experience I had with HostGator.
One day I needed my FTP (File Transfer Protocol) information for my website running at HostGator. Right, I even didn’t know what FTP was nor how to look for it. You can tell how novice I was huh. Anyway, I needed support, so I contacted Hostgator as below.
24 hours passed, and I never heard from them. Two days passed, three days passed, and no response arrived. I tried live chat, but it kept asking me questions about my question, and in the end I didn’t get to chat with anybody. On day 4, I gave up to rely on their support team. I had no choice but to go about it in a “traditional” way; Google it and search for the solution. I struggled for a while and finally obtained my FTP information.
You know the feeling. You are new in the field, seeking an answer and nobody is there to give it to you. You feel stuck, lost, unsure and frustrated. Of course, it is not efficient for your business either to put it on hold while you are seeking one answer.
I needed my FTP information because I was considering to migrate the website from HostGator to Wealthy Affiliate. This particular experience convinced me more than anything that I no longer want to have a business with HostGator. I decided to go ahead and transfer my website from their hosting to Wealthy Affiliate.
How is Wealthy Affiliate Support?
I contacted the Wealthy Affiliate support team right away with the limited information I had. I did not expect to hear back from them at least a day, as Wealthy Affiliate has over 300,000 members and I could easily imagine how busy they are. Well, guess what? The support team replied 90 minutes later! The communication continued (as in the screenshot below) and with their splendid support the entire migration process was completed within a few hours. I was so impressed to see how genuinely they care for their members. This is the kind of support you must have when you first start out as a new online entrepreneur. It makes a world of difference, and you certainly have it at Wealthy Affiliate.
I am sorry that the screenshot does not indicate the specific time to show you how swiftly they responded to me. I didn’t take the screenshot on the same day as I was not going to write about this experience initially. However, I thought I would share this with my readers only because I heard from HostGator. Yes, they finally replied to me after 6 days.
Why Are You Contacting Me Now???
HostGator finally contacted me with the information I requested 6 days earlier. Please note that I received the following message AFTER I canceled their service.
In summary, this is how they handled my simple request.
July 24: I sent an inquiry
July 28: I canceled their service (Day 4)
July 30: They finally replied (Day 6)
What do you make out of this? I have a feeling that you are thinking exactly what I am thinking; “The company is only interested in making money out of their customers, but not providing the best service for them.”
Test Their Support – Are They Trustworthy?
Do not waste your time and money with a company like this. Before you sign up and pay money, you can quickly test and see if the company is trustworthy by sending them a question. See how soon they will respond (I suggest within 48 hours at most), or they will ever respond to you. See how they treat you when they are not earning any money from you yet. It tells you a lot about how they will treat you after you become a member.
Thank you for reading this post and I hope the information here will spare you from unnecessary frustration in the future. If you have any comments or questions, please leave them below.
Yuko π
P. S.
After I posted this blog I found another message from HostGator. They are offering me a discount and asking me not to cancel. I appreciate that they took the time to send me an apology, but this message somewhat made me sad. I am now curious if any of you had a similar experience with HostGator.Β
I used Hostgator some years ago and did not like the service they provided. I did not receive any reply back from them with my query. You are lucky that you got a reply, even if it was a bit late.
You seem to have found a better place to host your website now. It looks to have an excellent support network which is a major consideration when working online.
Hi Christine,
Oh No, so I was not the only one huh. I don’t understand how their business could survive with such a poor customer service… I didn’t stay with them too long so didn’t lose too much money, but I would not recommend their service to any of my friends. Yes, I am very happy now with the wonderful support Wealthy Affiliate offers. Thanks for the comment π
Yuko
This is a really great post – I, too, am a member of Wealthy Affiliate, and can really vouch for the great, supportive community here… without this community, I’d be nowhere near the stages I’m currently at with my online business.
I can’t say I’ve ever used hostgator, so can’t say much about that one though…
I personally didn’t experience any hosting problems with HostGator but it seems that there were huge issues back in 2014. I heard many businesses couldn’t access to their websites hosted with HostGator and lost tons of money. They said HostGator then didn’t deal with their customers sincerely. When it comes to support, there is no place like Wealthy Affiliate. π
Yuko
Very good site Well written and a lot of attention to details. I too had a similar experience with Hostgator. Plus it’s very difficult to navigate their site. I had been debating about cancelling, but now I’m sure.
Thanks, Deanna
Hi Deanna,
There was one more issue with Hostgator that happened after I posted this article. They charged me for another month 28 days after I cancelled their service. I had to contact them again and ask to please refund my money, which they did in the end. If you are going to cancel their service, be sure to keep all the emails until you make sure that they did stop charging you. I am a strong believer that any business would not survive without sincere and respectful customer service. Let’s see if Hostgator would be still around 10 years from now. Thank you Deanna for visiting and your kind comment. I wish you the best of luck with your online business π
Yuko
Hi there Yuko,
My first website is built on SiteRubix hosting so I never get to experience other hosting services before. I have heard lots of hosting ‘horror’ stories but after almost 2 years, SiteRubix hasn’t given me any problem yet.
In fact, at one point, I totally forgotten the log-in password for my WordPress site. Thankfully, with SiteManager, I was able to reset my password and go back into my site within minutes. The problem resolved on its own without having to contact any support.
I thought that was a very clever system π
Hi Cathy,
You are lucky to be in a very good hand from the very start! SiteRubix is awesome, isn’t it? I remember I was super impressed to see how easy and quick it was to build a website on their platform.
Great that your issue was easily resolved with SiteRubix due to how the system is designed. It sure is clever. Even if you encounter a bigger problem in the future, rest assured. Their support team is awesome as well. They are so quick respond and so helpful! Thanks for commenting π
Yuko
Hi Yuko
Website support is crucial to your business nowadays. If your website experiences down time then your business will not make money for you during that time period.
I really like the hosting and support at WA. I just wish that they could offer us C-panel. Bluehost is also not that bad. I hosted some of my websites with them without any trouble.
Hi Viljoen,
Thanks for commenting. Website support is definitely crucial for online success, isn’t it? There are tons of information on the internet that we can easily access, but there is not many real helpful companies/community that we can count on. I have tried some other online platforms and nothing compares to the support we receive at Wealthy Affiliate.
I hear good things about Bluehost. I shall look into that as well. Thank for sharing Viljeon π Best of luck to your online business!
Yuko