 Surely
you have noticed that in today's web hosting world almost
every offer you see is for thousands of megabytes or even
hundreds of Gigabytes of storage space and often thousands
of gigabytes of transfer and what we offer seems tiny by
comparison (we have even seen one offering 1,000 GB
(1TerraByte) some even go so far as to promise
"unlimited"... all for unbelievably low prices. So you may
wonder why our plans don't offer as much.
In the November & December
issues of a major magazine I saw one of the scariest things yet-over
6 times in total !
Unbelievable if you think of it but
this was the "plan" offered in their ad...
"If you are looking to make big money
Start Your Own Web Hosting Business Free!"
Unlimited disk space and unlimited transfer for
12 months FREE!
(then it told of the huge market for web hosting-you can
make a fortune from home...etc. etc.)...then:
Start your own hosting business, we will
"white label" your free plan
so it looks just like you are a
major hosting company...feel free to offer your customers as
much space and bandwidth as they want-charge whatever you
want-it's all pure profit for your first 12 months!
Of course the
"plan" is that a percentage of the people looking to make
"fast money on the Internet" like all those infomercials
talk about this sounds great and they will get customers
from friends, family, maybe advertise or whatever. Then of
the percentage that get some customers during the "free" 12
months some will be making enough money they will pay the
higher than average fees to continue with the company
offering this "deal" when the 12 months is up. Can you
believe it..."unlimited everything" for someone who knows
nothing about the web or hosting to sell to you through a
"white label site" so they look like a real host!
Sadly I wonder how many people will sign up for this "free
money for 12 months" offer and then sell BIG plans-or even
unlimited for low prices like $2-$5 to get customers
(probably will have a special "yearly" fee) then when it's
not free anymore the college kid or "get rich quick" schemer
will vanish with his 12 months of free money leaving all
their customers with no host? Of course the people
making this offer hope a good % will "stay & pay" and in 12
months they will have paying customers...but I can't
help think of human nature and how many people will use this
opportunity to make some quick money then leave the
"customers" wondering "where did XYZHost go? I have
no web site or e-mail! To me such advertising & "marketing"
gimmicks should be illegal. There are no "unlimited" hard
drives if you search for the biggest you can find and all
bandwidth (even the low quality slow lines) costs money; but
they are offering anyone who signs up "your free &
unlimited everything" web hosting business"; for 12 months!
The people signing up can be anyone and may or may not
"have a clue" about web hosting. Some may just want a few
quick bucks...whatever the result to me it's totally
unethical. After a year you will think one "company" is your
host but he's actually just one of many all selling as much
as they want of the same server and you would never
even know the company that really has your data!
So much for my "news insert...here's why they can get away
with this ...
In hosting there is
what hosts call the 98% rule. That is 98% of customers will
only use a fraction of what a plan offers them (most web
sites are from 5-25MB and most only use 1-3GB bandwidth a
month at most, the majority are less than 10MB and 1GB
transfer).
98.7% of our web hosting customers are business users, their
sites MUST be fast and must be "up" when customers come.
(and they need great backup & e-mail security)
Even one of
our larger currently hosted sites is less
than 500 MB and even though it has several MySQL
databases, it's own internal search engine, several videos,
an e-commerce "store", many background
"scripting" operations, and a very active forum
with hundreds of visitors a day it usually uses between
5-10 gigabytes of bandwidth (or transfer) per month (part of
this is due to our use of Zend Optimizer and eAccelerator on all our systems
for optimum performance).
This means
even our Super Value plan with 500 MB of storage and 8 GB of
bandwidth is
far more than enough for many web sites and our larger hosting plans
will cover almost anyone.
That's where our old-fashioned honesty, integrity, ethics
and consumer education comes in.
We have been
hosting web sites with our "niche" company for over 8 years and understand
well what the average user
really "uses". As an example most web sites
use less than 50-75
MB of storage space, many even less than 10-25 MB, but
even our most basic plan includes 500 MB+ and that's
guaranteed!
Not only is it guaranteed it's on a Fully Mirrored hot-swap RAID
array for disk failure protection and THEN is still backed-up
off-array nightly, weekly, and monthly. It just doesn't get
any better. We use minimum 100MB/s connections (most hosts
use 10MB/s) and nothing less than Xeon dual-core or quad-core
CPU's with minimum 4GB ECC RAM on ANY sever! NOTE:
Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery but in the last
year some new hosts have started doing what we have done for
8 years-offering no overselling: BUT many of these
companies know nothing about no-overselling, some obviously
still oversell. Only we have specialized advanced software,
refined over the years to make SURE no aspect of our
services are oversold. We have never been anything BUT a
non-overselling host. Why does this matter to you?
Today every host knows that over 98.5% of all web
sites use far less than even these average resources. So today
almost all "hosts" engage in what is known as "overselling".
That is the term for "advertising" far more resources than their
hardware and network is actually capable of delivering. So we
could easily offer our plans with far more "advertised"
storage and bandwidth because it is a proven statistical fact
that 98% or more of you would never use even a fraction of what we
"sold" you in our advertised plans if we advertised
those huge amounts.
To the uneducated consumer
the question immediately arises "why should I pay $10.95
for a plan here when I can get the
500GB plus 4,500GB of transfer for $3.95 or even "unlimited" someplace else?".
That may be
a logical first thought to those who don't know a great deal
about web hosting,
but in my opinion it's an unethical business practice. It is unrealistic to think a
company could provide those resources at those prices and make
a profit. (Think about it, 500MB is an entire, large hard disk
drive, do you really think ANY host can give you your own
disk drive for $5 a month?)
The same way so many people find out every day that
the
"free" hosting gimmick some hosts use, isn't really free at all. We host 2 web sites with
extremely busy forums with hundreds, sometimes thousands of
visitors and posts a day, another "way cool" site is for a
Hollywood graphics & computer animation studio (with credits
like Polar Express®
and commercials like Nike®
& Dell® )
AND NOT ONE of them used over 10GB average transfer per
mo. in the last 6
months! We host another site for a church with many (3 years
& growing) of archived files for audio downloads and
streaming---and handle their higher traffic loads with no
strain at all on our system--not even a "bump" in their
account loads.
These are custom built sites with very high traffic!
See it's just that those crazy offers for tons of Gigabytes of size
and huge amounts (or unlimited) transfer are not real...they
are ALL just advertising gimmicks, and I'm in the "over 50"
crowd and don't believe in gimmicks. My equipment and
network connections from Equinix Chicago can deliver every megabyte
for every customer on every plan even if every one of them
was using all of it at once. And that never happens,
that's why those other people promise the moon, BUT if you
use to much somewhere in the "fine print" they will cut you
off.
Here you will fine no gimmicks and no "unreal"
offers. Just rock solid, fast performance and personal
support; if that's what you want
& need from a host.
We believe our hardware and
network should be able to provide every customer with
every
bit of the resources you are paying for even in the
very unlikely
event every one of our client's sites was using their maximum at the
exact same time (another scenario almost statistically
impossible that all hosts are well aware of).
So we offer realistic plans that can do just that; offer
everything we advertise anytime you need it. We use
"over-powered" servers in terms of the CPU's RAM, and RAID
and network connections so
that EVERY customer always enjoys blazing fast speeds plus
reliability.
It is also important to know
we do not offer
"reseller" plans. Not that we couldn't, however
often
hosts camouflage huge overselling inside reseller plans. In those
plans the reseller gets their own IP addresses and name
servers so a check of the "host" you might do with some tools
on the web doesn't show all the clients
under those IP's and name servers so literally 100's of
"unseen" sites may be on any server.
Don't believe it,
look at what some hosts offer "resellers" for $20 or less!
In fact you might be buying from a reseller on that
"bargain" plan and never even know it! In fact
today many reseller companies offer integrated billing
software & the entire system "white labeled" so the
"reseller" can put their name and logo on their plan so your
won't ever know it!
Which
brings up the next question..."Why should I care if it
won't affect me?"
If an "overselling"
web host is
smart they will add more resources to cover themselves when their
"overselling" practice eventually catches up with them. A very few do and it that case
you might not ever notice. But by far most of these
type hosts don't, and all their customer's
(your) performance begins to suffer as an overloaded server on
overcrowded connections tries to handle the loads it was
never designed for.
We have seen as many over 1,000 sites crammed on
a single server with one CPU by these type firms. Like any computer that's
overloaded the server runs hotter at
high loads and the sites get slow because the "port" or
connection to the Internet is overloaded (some of these
servers only have 10mbs connections, just like the DSL or
Cable connection on
your home PC)
NOTE: Some say nobody can really promise to not
"oversell" because something will be "oversold"... CPU power,
memory, disk space...something; So to prove them wrong as of
Jan 27,2007 and continuing still through 2008 & on we started
a continual upgrading and rotation model and now our "minimum"
is DUAL 64 bit Quad-core
processor Xeon servers with extra 8GB ECC RAM and mirrored
RAID hard drive arrays PLUS backup drives and 100MBs
connections...on every
server! As technology grows faster and more powerful; so do
we. Since EVERY server has Mirrored RAID, ECC (error
correcting) RAM, dual Xeon quad-core
processors we continue the process of advancing with
technology:
And by specializing on doing one
thing very well-offering top-quality "shared"
hosting which is really the most efficient and
cost-effective service and what the majority of web site
customers really need when the resources are properly
delivered at full speed!
We have the power to
deliver what we promise even though our older single
processor servers from 2006 recently replaced; were at less than 1/3 the capacity
most hosts cram on similar servers! We replace all servers on
average at 2 years or less for reliability-our hardware is
all brand new with all our 2 yr.-old hardware being replaced
in Feb.2010!
Why does
all this
mean you will get far better performance with New Idea?
Because the same "98%" rule still applies to
almost all of our sites. Most of our customers will never use nearly all the
resources our web hosting plans allocate to them even
though our "plans" seem much smaller--we know what people
REALLY use--our hardware and network is capable of
delivering the full 100% capacity we advertise.
That means when one of our servers is "sold out" it may
still only be operating at 1/8-1/2 or less of it's capacity
at any given time. (our newer multi-core servers usually run at 1/10-2/10 of base level load which is
less than 1% of what most hosts consider a "normal" load).
We also do not host sites like porn or pyramid schemes to
"get rich quick" which are often fraudulent and/or prone to
problems YOU don't need on a server you share with your
important information...even if it's just a personal blog
but especially if it's a business.
To you that means
superior performance for your web site and lower "loads" on
the server & network greatly increasing speed and reliability for
you and everyone on the server.
Compared to
other web hosts our servers are "loafing"...and we like it
that way!
Even before one of our servers actually "sells out" we
easily add more through our expandable resources at the
top-rated Equinix datacenter in Chicago. That translates into
full-time performance and dependability for our customers and
still allows a reasonable profit for us (unlike the
"overselling" hosts who try to make thousands of
dollars per server). A
reasonable profit allows us to offer better support and to
expand with even more features today and room for future service improvements. (And current customers will
automatically enjoy these features as they are added.)
We
offer the most comprehensive suite of anti-virus and
anti-junk mail features available to every client (anti-virus
at 6x-updated every 4 hours) as well as
value-added features like Fantastico, and our incomparable Pro-Site Builder and custom
easy to use control
panels.
Also because our
servers are never "straining" we easily have the
resources to offer FREE nightly backups standard on
all accounts as well as weekly & monthly backups,
most hosts
charge extra for backups and some don't even offer this extremely important service.
We even offer one-click backups from your personal control
panel so you can compress and download your entire site and
account to your PC for FIVE levels of protection.
We are so sure we can meet
your needs; here is the extra "deal" we will make
with you like nobody else offers.
Try our service. If you find you need more megabytes or more transfer than what you are paying for
we will add it at no extra cost.
ALL our plans
are set to alert us when you reach 80% usage.
At that point
we will give you more-and keep on giving more until you
reach our next plan. At which time we will upgrade you to
that plan and the "free upgrade" process starts again--so we
are the perfect host to grow with.
You can even grow to
Fully Managed VPS or
dedicated server hosting with our partnership
with a friend/provider located next to us in Equinix with
all their server services as good and support like you get
from us...You Can Never Outgrow New Idea! And we hope
you end up needing TONS of space and bandwidth we can easily
deliver because your web efforts are so successful!
This is easy of
course. But as an example let's say you have a hosting plan
using 1GB of storage and want to install some extras or
upgrades that will require more-so you need it before
hitting 80%--say you needed a an extra GB to do what you
wanted. Just ask and we will upgrade it. The same is true for transfer. Of course if you
have no idea what you will need and find you purchased a 1GB plan and need
5GB (as an example) you will need to upgrade
to our plan with 5GB to give yourself room to
grow. The same would be true for transfer rates. (Legalese:
Final determination of "free upgrades" or the need to move to
larger plan will be made solely by us, but it is simply
based on common sense.)
If you are not satisfied you may cancel your
web hosting or domain name service with us
at any time with no penalty and we will even keep your site
files available for 15 days to give you time to save or move
them all.
We never use extended contracts or
long-term commitments to "hook" you; even on our special offers!
Be honest with us and we will be
honest with you. We think you will be a satisfied customer
who will stay with us for years to come, and you will tell
others about your web host, helping our business to grow and prosper.
Over 99.7% of our web hosting customers
from 5 years
ago are still with us.
Our old-fashioned honest business model may not
seem "right" today's
web hosting world. But I am old-fashioned and really believe
honesty is the best policy even in web site hosting. If you are looking for a solid stable
web host with real guaranteed uptime, good support, excellent performance, and
someone who
cares, you have found your host, and we have gained a friend as
well as a customer. We believe there are enough people like
you to make our somewhat unique business model work, and we
look forward to serving you.
We also have the
industry's top affiliate program where you earn a cash
bonus as well as 20% per month of what a referral customer
spends if you referred them "For Life" as long as they
remain a customer--no limit! Bringing your hosting costs
down in a hurry...but wait a few months until YOU are as
sold on us as our current customers. I know you will finally
fell "at home" and enjoy worry-free hosting that's fast and
reliable--the two most important things for any site.
We keep growing & offering more.
Now we offer our Updated Pro Web
Site Builder, and best of all it's FREE!
Build your own
professional web site quickly and easily with NO need
for any programming skills or software on your computer!
You can sign-up today and have your new
professional web site on-line tonight. It's fast
and unbelievably easy and you have hundreds of "looks" to choose
from. You can even import FrontPage, Dreamweaver,
Microsoft Word or
other work you may already have easily into your
Pro-Site Builder
site.
Step-by-step, YOU choose the pages you want (including
forms & other "special" pages) and build your own
professional web site quickly and easily. Make any
changes whenever you want. Your choice of fonts &
layout, easily upload your images & photos, it's YOUR site.
Why pay an expensive "web designer" or buy $200+
hard-to-learn software when you can do-it-yourself with
our Pro Site Builder? No one will ever know the difference
but you! And no
downloads or software is needed on your computer at all. Plus
all pre-installed designs are customizable so you never appear
to have a "cookie-cutter" site.
For those who are a bit more experienced but who want an
easy
starting point we also offer hundreds
of starter templates to choose from and customize just the way
you want them and we'll get you started with the search
engines.
PLEASE NOTE: While we do not ever "oversell" our disk
space or bandwidth and performance & transfer capabilities of
our machines; once a signal leaves our servers it is beyond
our control. We use one of the top-rated datacenters in
the nation (hosting many Fortune 500 companies) and they use
the top backbone fiber providers but service times may vary based on
overall Internet conditions or your local service provider's
ISP) network conditions beyond our
control.
About the Owner & Author of
this page:
I'm not a "20-something" or college student
with my first business. I'll gladly email you the "long-story"
about how as the owner of my own non-Internet related business
over 25 years I rose to prominence in that industry presenting
many seminars and I am continuing to teach others how to market and
grow businesses in that field by providing exceptional value
and honest service and how in the process became a part-time web
host for that
niche market. Then
after a series of unexpected circumstances related to my
health, led to my decision to try this
experiment of using the same time-proven methods of building a
full-service business based on the same principles of
honesty and customer satisfaction in the world of web hosting.
A business that would be unaffected by my physical
limitations. If you want to know the "long version" just email me at
The Owner's Story.
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