200,000 Web Hosting Clients and Climbing
Written by Brent Oxley on September 10, 2009 – 6:36 pm -HostGator recently reached 200,000 active customers and we are on pace to break 300,000 within a year.
I remember when I’d be out celebrating if HostGator managed to get two signups in a week. Now, we’re seeing thousands of signups a week. Back in the day, my celebrating consisted of nothing more than dropping the Ramen noodles or the tuna can I had in my hands and grabbing some sushi for an hour before scrambling back to work. At the time, I was a poor college student who invested every penny I had back into the business I was building.
The HostGator.com domain was registered on October 10, 2002 and here are some statistics about how many active customers we’ve had at a few points since then.
- 2/1/2003: 112 active customers
- 2/1/2004: 1,031 active customers
- 2/1/2005: 6,892 active customers
- 2/1/2006: 21,434 active customers
- 2/1/2007: 50,213 active customers
- 2/1/2008: 92,752 active customers
- 2/1/2009: 157,432 active customers
- Today: 200,000+
How HostGator Came To Be:
I’ve been an entrepreneur since I was a kid. In sixth grade, I sold candy at school and had all the kids in my neighborhood working for me. When I was 14, my cousins and I had a business where we sold watermelons from a truck on the side of a road. The deal we offered was simple, but effective: “2 for $5.”
Ain't no Glory in Selling Watermelons
It wasn’t until I was a sophomore in high school that I got hooked on trying to make money on the Internet. What sucked me in was the paid to surf programs such as AllAdvantage, Bepaid.com, Cashfiesta, and the like. These companies claimed they would pay you to surf the Internet while looking at ads. I created my first website on a service much like GeoCities and was able to generate over 50,000 referrals between all the programs I was enrolled in. One by one, I learned that all of the programs were a scam. I made $65 when I was entitled to over a million.
After the paid to surf venture failed, I decided to create real web sites and sell my own advertising inventory. The network that I created was called The Freak Network and consisted of scfreak.com, dfreak.com, and wcfreak.com, all of which were named after best selling Blizzard Entertainment games (Starcraft, Diablo, and Warcraft, respectively).
My network was making me about $40 a day, which was impressive given that all of my pimple covered friends had to get real jobs and make less money. Everything was going great until the .com bubble bursted and my advertisers began to cheat me out of money. I was left with no choice but to find alternative sources of income and that’s when I had the epiphany to start selling web hosting on the side. My network of websites was receiving tens of thousands of page views per day and I already had the servers, so selling web hosting seemed like the perfect plan. Freakwebhosting.com was born. My plan was to use the traffic from my gaming websites to gain customers.
Freak Web Hosting
I built Freak Web Hosting to just shy of a hundred customers that consisted mostly of gaming sites. The problem was that I wasn’t a system administrator and that I wasn’t that technical. This resulted in poor security which lead to hackings, horrible uptime, and a never ending series of technical issues that kept me from running a successful business. I hated being a webhost at the time! I was able to get the business but no matter how hard I searched I couldn’t find someone to take care of the technical issues at a price I could afford.
I spent years trying to make my network a viable business and another year trying to get my web hosting venture running smoothly . The final straw was when the Data Center claimed that my server was “compromised and outgoing malicious traffic.” To alleviate this problem, they ordered OS reload after reload, which drove me to a point just short of insanity and a state in which I felt life was over. (In hindsight, I believe the datacenter lied to me about the malicious traffic in order to get me to leave due to the amount bandwidth my sites were using. The deal they gave me at the time was too good to be true and that’s exactly what it ended up being.)
I could have kept on fighting, but it would have been a futile effort. I was left with no choice but to scale down operations. I did the right thing by refunding everyone’s last month of hosting and even refunded those that prepaid for a year in advance. At the time there were three annual customers that I didn’t have enough money to repay, so I contacted them to let them know my intentions and eventually paid them back a few months later.
By the time The Freak Network and Freak Web Hosting failed, high school was coming to an end. I didn’t have much time before I would have to decide what to do with my life. I felt like a complete failure and had nothing to show for all my years of work.
I wanted to be a success and make some type of difference in the world and I felt as if I couldn’t accomplish this by going to college. I was very close to joining the army and even went to see a recruiter. I believed that if I joined the army, I’d have purpose in my life and be able to make some type of difference. Just days before enlisting, my dad talked me out of joining the army and helped me get into Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, Florida.
I spent a few months living on campus and attending classes without deviating too much from the life of a regular student. That’s when an old friend contacted me telling me that he started a server company. He knew that if we went into business together I’d have no problem getting the customers. He begged me for a week to get back into hosting and eventually convinced me to partner with him and try hosting again. After failing the first time around, I was against the idea and didn’t want to try again unless I was confident I had someone with technical abilities to keep the servers up and running.
The deal we came to orally was that I’d run my own business and I’d give him half the proceeds for keeping the servers secure and up and running. I quickly revived the old Freakwebhosting.com brand and reached out to all my old customers. I managed to convince a majority of them to sign up very quickly and within days, I was once again a web host and once again in the hosting industry.
It only took a couple of months for reality to set in . Servers began having multi-hour outages on a daily basis as a result of the datacenter going offline. I was bringing the business in while my partner was failing to uphold his end of the bargain. The servers weren’t up and running; they were failing.
I decided to break the partnership and venture off on my own. I ended up purchasing a few servers from Dedicatednow.com and managed to find a system administrator who would help me as I needed and bill me by the hour. The combination of the new Data Center and system administrator made Freak Web Hosting more stable than ever.
With things running so well and the old Freak Website Network being dead, I knew the company needed a new design and a new name. I searched for days and tried hundreds of domain name combinations before I narrowed it down to two names: HostGator and GatorHost. I was torn on which domain to choose. I didn’t know which one sounded better and couldn’t afford both domain names. HostGator may sound like a much better name now, but at the time and without all of our branding, they both sounded the same.
Original Web Site for HostGator
Business was booming and my freshman year of college was coming to an end. By this time, every second of my life was spent in class, doing homework, or taking chats and answering emails on the computer.
I was a 24/7 one-man operation. I was being woken up numerous times a night with phone calls and there wasn’t a single class I would make it through without having to leave at least a few times to take a business call. I knew I was on path to be making more than the average college graduate in about six months. I also knew it would have been impossible to finish another year of college while running HostGator, so I decided to drop out of school and follow my dream of growing HostGator into the world’s largest hosting company.
Understandably, my family and friends were all very much against my decision to dropout. I had many businesses that failed to pan out and the chances of HostGator succeeding were slim. In the end, everyone expressed their thoughts strongly, but supported me in my decision. To me, it was a no-brainer. If things didn’t work out, I’d just go back to school and be miserable. If they worked out, I’d be pursuing my dream.
Things continued to go well for the Gator at the expense of living life, having friends, and never being able to leave the computer. Within minutes of leaving the computer there would always be some type of emergency with a service going offline that would require a restart and I’d have to run back to my computer. More times than not, I’d make it half way to my wherever I was going before getting a phone call or an alert and being forced to turn back to resolve the issue. This was before the iPhone, smartphones, air cards, or any other type of mobile tool. What amazed me is the fact that I was not that technical, but was still able to help most of my customers by simply taking their question and applying common sense or finding a work around.
When HostGator had just started, I hated resellers because they required a large amount of relatively technical service. What’s ironic is that as we grew, I saw how easy it was to obtain reseller customers. Before long, obtaining reseller customers is where most of my focus and advertising money went. Ideal timing allowed us to fill the reseller niche while the competition focused primarily on shared hosting. Today, shared hosting is the source of most of our new business, but we continue to remain the worlds’ largest reseller hosting company.
If a major issue ever came up, I’d be helpless when it came to actually solving the problem. I was at the mercy of an hourly system administrator who usually had something more important to do than fix my servers. In the early days, HostGator was inadequately prepared for drives failures and similar large-scale issues. When one happened, there would usually be data loss and days of little to no sleep while I helped customers recover. I continued life in my apartment prison for another year before the company grew beyond what I could handle myself and I hired my first full time employee, Ben Welch.
Ben would arrive at my house while I was sleeping and immediately get to work taking calls, chats, and tickets. When I woke up, I’d head over to bedroom and get to work with him. At approximately the same time, I hired an Indian outsourced support company. The support volume was more than Ben and me could handle alone and it was impossible for us to man all of the stations all of the time.
I don’t believe in outsourcing, but at that point, outsourcing was the only way I could have 24/7 coverage of email and chat support that I could afford.
In hindsight, outsourcing was a big mistake. Choosing to outsource our supported resulted in the loss of customers, a damaged reputation, and low caliber support. As soon as we could afford an office, we rented a 1,600 square foot office in Boca Raton, Florida and began replacing our outsourced employees with in-house employees. We learned our lesson with outsourcing and have had 100% in-house support for several years now. There’s absolutely no chance of us switching to outsourced support in the future – it just isn’t worth whatever we’d save in the short run.
When we first moved into our first office, I thought that it was overkill and I wasn’t sure how (or if) we’d ever fill it. In no time, sales and growth caught fire. We had people working in closets, hallways, and I had to share my office with another employee. The office wasn’t that bad of a place, but there was one major problem. We had a single stall co-ed restroom for over 24 employees to share and nobody to clean it. If you had to go, you’d usually end up holding it or driving home.
I continued to wake up numerous times a night to take support calls and contribute to our service and support as much as possible. This took a toll on me, though. At the ripe old age of 22, I began to develop a very serious case of carpel tunnel syndrome. It slowly progressed until I was at the point where tapping any finger on either hand would feel like needles piercing me to the bone. I ended up trying a few alternatives to typing, including holding pencils in the palms of my fists and hiring someone to type and move the mouse for me. Typing with pencils only helped so much and hiring someone to communicate what to do ended up being a nightmare.
Eventually, the pain worsened to the point where it affected everything I did. If I went to a movie, all I could think about was my hands hurting. If I drove home, the pain would be so intolerable that I would have to alternate sitting on my hands so they would fall sleep to allow the pain to temporarily go away. Technology began to improve and I soon learned of Dragon Naturally Speaking speech recognition software. This was a lifesaver for me and while it wasn’t perfect, it did allow me to continue to perform my duties, just less effectively. I ended up using Dragon for a few years before my hands recovered to a point where I’m no longer in pain and I’m able to type without any discomfort. I’m sure if my old lack of sleep and constant typing routine came back, my problems would as well.
Eventually, we ran out of closets in our Boca Raton office and had to find a new location. We were also severely understaffed and couldn’t find the people we needed to keep up with our rapid growth. Boca Raton is where people go to retire not find a job. It’s so bad that the locals would always joke that Boca was “Heaven’s waiting room.”
We initially searched for office space in South Florida, but found the prices to be astronomical for the size we needed to maintain growth. We began looking in Dallas, Texas for a new office and somehow ended up looking in Houston. Soon after, we found and purchased the 30,000 square feet office building that we’re currently located in. The office was perfect for us since 16,000 square feet was available for use and the rest was leased out. We currently occupy around 18,000 square feet of the building and I anticipate that we’ll be filling the rest in a little over a year .
When we first moved into the new building, me and a few other employees took up residency throughout the building. There was very few employees at first and nothing but empty space. Many people that I met had no idea what web hosting was and were convinced that I was a drug dealer. They believed this because I was so young, successful, and living in an empty building with a bunch of young adults in what resembled a frat house. It also didn’t help at the time I had just gotten back from Brazil to open HostGator Brazil.
The Future of HostGator:
I still haven’t reached my goal of HostGator becoming the world’s largest hosting company, but as one of the world’s largest and with how well things have been going, I can definitely see it happening within the next eight years. In order to achieve this, we’ll need to go more mainstream. This includes launching a brand to compete with GoDaddy, more billboards, starting TV commercials, and hiring many, many more high quality employees to continue supporting our customers.
HostGator has been a real blessing in my life and I couldn’t have gotten us to where we are today alone. I owe much of HostGator’s success to our customers as well as to each and every employee who has put their heart and sweat into this company. If it weren’t for all of you, I would most likely have to return to college. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh!
Thank you!
Tags: history, statistics
Posted in Gator Politics, News Bites | 142 Comments »
142 Responses
to “200,000 Web Hosting Clients and Climbing”
3 Trackback(s)
- Sep 10, 2009: Dodgy | Sue Bailey
- Sep 30, 2009: Choosing a web hosting provider? May I recommend? | turcanu.net
- Oct 9, 2009: Are You Ready to Quit? So was He! | At Home with Heather
By DazzlinDonna on Sep 10, 2009 | Reply
Congratulations! I’ve used lots and lots of hosting companies over the years, dumping one after another for bad experiences – but Hostgator never lets me down. I love y’all!
By Angelica on Sep 10, 2009 | Reply
Man, congratulations!
Hope you reach more 200k soon!
By Brad on Sep 10, 2009 | Reply
Best of luck reaching your goal! I don’t think you’ll have any trouble becoming #1.
By Brandon on Sep 10, 2009 | Reply
This is a great article, you have a great GREAT service here and I love it.
Ive tried so many hosting companies and I have to say, this is the best one yet. I am a reseller currently (with resellerspanel.com) and plan to resell with HostGator soon.
I absolutely love the speeds, support and prices. Thanks for keeping it up man, if you didn’t we wouldn’t have this great provider to host our websites and programs with.
Keep up the good work man, and maybe someday we can compete with each other haha (I could only hope).
By Rafael Lopes on Sep 10, 2009 | Reply
Gator eats up the competition :)
By Robert Wright on Sep 10, 2009 | Reply
Brent,
Reading your story all i can think about is myself and how your dream is coming true and mine is materializing. The part about one man show 24/7 and fear of unforeseen obstacles/technical challenges, is an everyday reality for my business.
Right i bend over backwards for my customer base and am extremely grateful, because its their great referrals that have exploded my business.
I only have one question, why Gator? Is it because of a certain university in Florida?
Thanks for the superior service you provide
Robert L. Wright
By Scott Lovingood on Sep 10, 2009 | Reply
Great write up of your experiences in overcoming adversity!!
If I wasn’t a TN fan I would easily sign up :)
But even given that I am looking to add reselling and like your offers. I have also heard a lot of great reviews on it too.
Keep up the good work.
By Entrepreneur on Sep 11, 2009 | Reply
Well done Brent – I have some idea of what you went through during the early days as I started a one man courier business when I was young and was usually stressed to breaking point 24/7 – eventually grew it into a successful enterprise which I was able to sell for a very nice price.
By Rahul Nimawat on Sep 11, 2009 | Reply
Great Brent! Impressive story…. keep it up, you will achieve your all dreams.
By Joe Regan on Sep 11, 2009 | Reply
When you were doing all of that typing, were you typing from a keyboard tray, or on top of a standard desk?
My pain seems to be getting better now that I moved to a keyboard tray, I am assuming since my hands are now pointed down instead of up?
Not sure why that matters.
By Brent Oxley on Sep 11, 2009 | Reply
I wasn’t sure anyone was going to read this posting with it being so long.
The name really came out of desperation just trying to find one that wasn’t taken. If I recall correctly I think I tried hostlion.com first. Gator prob popped into mind being in FL and having gators all over the place. There was a place near my house we’d go to once in a while and see them at night. It’s illegal to feed them but every time we went there someone would be feeding them marshmallows and they’d go nuts.
I always typed from a tray. Now a days I use the Microsoft ergonomic keyboard which I believe makes a big difference. It can take a few weeks to get use to it but once you do you’ll never want to switch back.
By Natraj Kanoor on Sep 12, 2009 | Reply
Nice. . . Congrats in advance, you will reach 300,000
By Shawn Herrin on Sep 12, 2009 | Reply
Good read!
Looks like I was one of the first thousand! I’ve been with Hostgator since early 2004.
Sometimes it was a tad rough in the early days and I swear there were times I called support in the middle of the night after my customers called me and the dude who answered (it was Brent) sounded like I just woke him up (I know now that I did). Even though it seemed dodgy at the time he fixed my issues when I called. Being able to call a person made a difference to me as a customer.
I remember when support was outsourced for a while. IT SUCKED. Even then though, email support came through in the end so I stuck around.
My experience with Hostgator has always been relatively positive. In the end, I have never been anything but satisfied. I’ve recommended Hostgator to many colleagues and friends and never been burned.
Now I know that I was one of the first thousand and my quality of service hasn’t changed now that I am one of 200,000 plus. That says something Brent.
I appreciate your companies focus on customer service in this industry renowned for crappy service. It has kept me with Hostgator for a long time, even through hard times because I knew in the end it would get taken care of.
Shawn Herrin
By Micah Cooksey on Sep 12, 2009 | Reply
Wow, that’s really fascinating! I had always kind of wondered about HostGator’s history!
By Irfan Pathan on Sep 14, 2009 | Reply
Great Clients and Climbing……… Ha Ha Ha
By supportfacility on Sep 14, 2009 | Reply
We appreciate your hardwork towards HostGator…!
By AB! on Sep 15, 2009 | Reply
wow! that’s great.
It seems like what happinging to me now!.
you are giving me the hope :D
By Jay on Sep 15, 2009 | Reply
Great story. Very inspiring. I like how you don’t outsource customer service. Sadly, that’s a rarity these days.
By Millard on Sep 20, 2009 | Reply
Keep up the good work. I can’t have my hosting company going out of business.
By Niyi on Sep 20, 2009 | Reply
Wow,
Just a few days ago, I was telling a friend about those early days cos I remember them very well. I think I delved into hosting business just about the same time you started hostgator cos I used to communicate directly with you, after a bad experience from globat.com. Your customer service is cannot be compared to another. Wow! Just keep on keeping on. Congratulations.
By Web Hosting News on Sep 21, 2009 | Reply
Great story, I always wanted to know more about hostgator history.
Although im not a customer but I did read alot of positive reviews about your company.
I wish you more clients and good health :)
By Kayol on Sep 21, 2009 | Reply
Very inspiring, was wondering if finishing post secondary education is something you may one day finish? Doubt you we’ll need school to fall back on at this point in your life but do you ever feel incomplete due to dropping out?
By Brent Oxley on Sep 21, 2009 | Reply
Hi Kayol,
I plan on furthering my education in other areas that can be applied in my life. I do not plan on going back to school for a degree.
I’m currently studying to receive a private pilot license. I also would one day like to learn a second language.
It’s actually quite the contrary. I felt empty when I was in school.
By Joe Regan on Sep 22, 2009 | Reply
I think it will help if you start selling domain names. People like having everything on one bill..
By bri on Sep 22, 2009 | Reply
Very good article – positve stuff -I’m sure you will keep prospering
By Dwayne on Sep 24, 2009 | Reply
Hostgator is definitely the #1 hosting company
By Pierre on Sep 24, 2009 | Reply
Another shout in a huddle of praise: HostGator is one of my favorite companies. No other service offers as much as you do for the price that you do. Cheers!
By Matthew Lazarou on Sep 28, 2009 | Reply
Hello Brent,
I’d like to start off by saying great blog :). Your tale is definitely a triumph and your story I am sure is very motivating which will help others recognize that nothing is impossible. In addition, you help paint the picture that if you hit hard and stay devoted to your work results will come. Also, you mentioned the following:
“In order to achieve this, we’ll need to go more mainstream. This includes launching a brand to compete with GoDaddy, more billboards, starting TV commercials, and hiring many, many more high quality employees to continue supporting our customers”
I can’t agree with you anymore. Also, I wanted to add that I saw your sponsor at the latest UFC 102 event which took place just 2 weeks ago. I was extremely astounded to see HostGator on the shorts of the fighter and on the back banner. I believe it was for the main event or co-main event.:). Regardless, you’re absolutely correct, in order to compete or go head to head with the large Brands you will definitely need to revise your venues.
Good luck and all the best in the near future.
Sincerely,
Matthew
By ChrisCD on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
What a great story. Thanks for sharing your pitfalls and triumphs. Gives all of us hope. Way to stay the course and follow your dreams.
I’m sure it was tough, but now (hopefully) it was all worth it.
Well done.
cd :O)
By Kenny on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Fascinating and inspiring story!
By shawn appleton on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
I remember when u had 100 customers and we were working on your seo. That’s when seo didn’t even exist really haha. You have done great for yourself. Can’t wait for the plan hehe.
By Paul on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
WTG Brent! We found HG a few years ago and we have been so overwhelmingly pleased with your services!
Our ventures haven’t progressed as well as HG, but we are still trying. Knowing that HG is there – along with the AWESOME support staff, we are sure to have all the support we need.
Best of luck in the future and we’ll see you at 300K????
Sincerely,
Paul
By Rich S. on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Brent, good for you. It’s always nice to see hard work rewarded.
By Thom on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Congrats on the 200 000 clients. WOW.
Now when will you hire a web designer? :)
By John on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Great history and it’s very inspiring. I felt the same way when I first started my business.
Congrats with all of your hard work and wish you continued success. Thank you for the great service.
By David Brown on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
What an awesome and inspiring post. I’ve only ever had good experiences with hostgator which is something I never expected to say about a company dealing with computers.
I hope you get even more successful and I hope you write about it!
By webhosting on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
What I like most of Hostgator is its dedicated and competent support team. All my problems are quickly resolved by the staff. Thank you Hostgator.
By Vincent on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Congratulations on all your success Brent. HostGator is great, and most definitely the best hosting company that I have worked with. I’ve been through the ups and downs with bad hosts, and when I found HostGator, it was a blessing. In the 3 years or so that I have been with HostGator, I have not had a single problem that I can recall. Every time I need help with something, the support team always handles my problem with light speed. I could not be happier with the service. All in all, I’d have to say that I truly love HostGator, and Brent, you have my respect.
By Goonie on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Congratz for Hosgator. So Far Hostgator is still my best choice to host my site.
Goonie
By Moe on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
You deserve it. Hostgator is one of the few web hosting companies that have an excellent customer service. However, I wish in the soon future would provide their OWN web-hosting PLUS building website HTML editor that is friendly user and not third party. Thank you for providing such quality service.
By Pierre-Philippe Emond on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Nice Brent! What a story.
You were the first good host our web site had. It was back in 2003 or 2004. I remember talking to you on MSN a long time, while I was describing you my website’s need. I had a pretty popular video web site here in Québec, Canada. It was before YouTube and all those other sites appeared. You ended up putting my web site in a empty ASP box, and I stayed there without any problems for many months. My website grew and I had to get a dedicated server elsewhere. In 2007, things slowed down and I came back to your company, using a reseller account.
I noticed when calling that your one-man company was now something really big. Congratulations for your success and live a good life!
By Nishant on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Great story. I love your service. I can foresee this:
2/1/2011 – Half a million!
Wishing you all the best!
Nishant Kasibhatla
By Kamal on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Dear Brent,
A BIG Omedeto Gozaimasu!! or Congratulations from Japan!
Your story is indeed something very amazing.
Through all the ups and downs, you remained determined to pursue your dreams and look today through all your hard work, efforts and continued persistence, you are the best web host around !
I hope many young people will read your post so they can be inspired to do some great things just like you have done with Host Gator!
You’re the best Web Hosting Company with the Best Support.
Congratulations once again to you and your fantastic team and Warm regards from Osaka, Japan!
By James Schramko on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Well done!
Nothing great comes without a little struggle. You made it!
Keep up the excellent service!
By Chase on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Nice to know the history of hostgator. I would definitely say this is the best host I’ve ever had – so much so that I take it for granted. The only time I ever even come on this site is to pay my bills. That’s what all hosting companies should be like. One thing, you mention “The deal they gave me at the time was too good to be true and that’s exactly what it ended up being.”, aren’t you being a bit hypocritical here, since you offer unlimited bandwidth for $5/month? If someone started using too much bandwidth, wouldn’t you force them off too?
By Kevin on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
bent let me say your story has been a real inspiration
i started my reseller account with Host Gator way back in 2005 i had no problem except minors.
maybe i am the first Jamaican to use your services
By Cynthia LaLuna on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Great post! I think we always assume people will be bored with our long stories – not so!
One thing causes me concern though – I love HG, recommend it to my clients, and became a reseller not long ago.
HOWEVER – SlowDaddy is currently the largest host in the world – and, as I said to their tech support when it was taking me 3 DAYS to launch a client’s site (something that would have taken 15-45 minutes from start to finish on HG, limited only by the speed of screen refreshes and clicks) – IT SHOWS.
I wish you all the success in the world, but PLEASE don’t emulate SlowDaddy! If that happens, I’ll be forced to find the next up-and-comer.
By Gobala @ Work at Home on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Hi Brent,
I’ve been a customer of HostGator since 2005, and now have about 3 dedicated servers with you guys. Support has always been great.
It’s inspiring to hear your story, and I’m sure HostGator will be the largest hosting company in the world. It is already the best in the world.
By Andrew on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
I must say I have used about 10 hosts in my time, but I have been with hostgator for the longest period. Screw you old webhosts. Now I get twice the service for half the price.
By George on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
I am your customer mainly because of the quick response time to issues.
Price is awesome and offerings are awesome in comparison to other hosting services. I was with websitesource but switched to you guys due to consistent downtime and lag in issue resolution.
Congrats on the milestone. I refer folks to you when they ask about hosting. Godaddy is okay, but some folks I deal with don’t want to be associated with the GoDaddy image… go figure
By Justin on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Brent & Hostgator Team
The story of your humble beginnings and widespread success in a short amount of time has long been a source of inspiration to me. I am also fortunate enough to be a Hostgator customer for a few years now and I am regularly impressed by your top-notch personalized customer service.
I have also been running my own business from my bedroom for a number of years, in the web development industry, which is why your story is particularly inspirational to me. Thus far I have learned to never look back, always look forward & try to do a little better each day.
Keep up the good work & thanks for keeping it real.
Justin.
By Henry on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Awesome, and grats! I’ve been with you guys for about 4 years now and have NEVER considered leaving.
One of my friends now is signed up on here after me and another guy told him how great it is!
Grats Host Gator!
By Brian on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Congratulations to all at HostGator! Great story!
Your are the best hosting company, we currently using 3 others hosting companies in different countries and no one compares to Hostgator for support, uptime, and value.
Yes go after the Godaddy market.
Thanks
Brian
MarketingHits
By Expedito Segovia Jr on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Hi Brent,
Congrats…
I love Hostgator…
Being an Affiliate I will bring more clients to Hostgator.
I’m excited to received my first commission this October.
Thanks Brent…
Expedito Segovia Jr
Cebu, Philippines
By John W. Collins on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
That’s awesome to hear. In fact, just this week, I sent an email out to my list and wouldn’t you know it, my “other” host went down. So, there I was having a lot traffic go to a site that was down… And, with that I officially switched all of my hosting and email services over to you guys. Don’t know what took me so long. Thanks for saving my promotion and keep up the good work!
By Verjel Ferrer on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Dear Brent,
That was a great story.. I have been a customer of Hostgator for a years now and currently handling few of my clients hosted there, I didn’t know that the founder was as young as me. Indeed story. Well, i considered that you already up ahead than godaddy. I was a customer of godaddy before and i saw the differences. As i recalled that was 2003 one of my friend bout a dedicated server from hostgator and i was the one who controlling the server virtually, i was amazed because the server never shuts off or had a downtime for a year, the server runs smoothly until i left. Honestly, i referred few of my friends to get a host in hostgator and even one of my old employer before. why?? simply reliability.
Thanks for sharing your story Brent, Good luck for the hostgator briliant future.
Fr: Verjel Ferrer (Phils)
By Andrew on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Congrats! I really love your service! I’ve had tried many other web hosting and so far I find Gatorhost to be the most reliable.
Your pleased customer,
Andrew
By Saad Kamal on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Congrats Brent.
I am a proud member of the HG Family! And I have recommended HG to all my friends, colleagues & clients.
By Denny Harianto on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
We have been with HostGator since Feb 2007. Yes, they have the best customer supports :) Thank you for your inspiring story, Brent :)
Regards,
Denny Harianto
By Andy on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Keep up the great work and please never sell out to another company! One of the things that keeps me at HG is that I feel like you are in it for the long haul and I don’t have to worry about you being bought by another hosting company, which in the past with other hosts has always forced me to leave eventually due to poor service. Thanks for what you have done so far and keep it up!
By Eric Holmlund on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Congratulations Brent! A terrific success story. As one of your top affiliates since January 2005, it’s been a pleasure to help grow the business :-) I look forward to sending thousands more customers your way.
By Bob C on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
congrats on hitting 200k customers! It just goes to show how dedication and hard work can pay off. I’ve been happy with HG since I joined in 2007, I’ve been happy every since. Keep up the great work, and again congratulations on all your accomplishments.
By john on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
after all these years i never knew hostgator used to be freakz which is amazing since i was one of the first customers of freakz way to go guy determination is what it takes we took a $20 a month business and grew s you did to over 5000 a week now and well we didnt give up on the pay to surf craze lol.
By Shola on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Congratulations to you and your team. You guys are doing a great job. Keep it up
By Jim Poppell on Sep 29, 2009 | Reply
Brent,
I have truly enjoyed being one of your resellers. Being an old (65) southern boy I have a hard time understanding the Indian tech support folks. Your Texans are easy to understand and verrrrry helpful.
Thanks for HostGator or GatorHost or what ever you are!
Jim
By maldiveslive on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
You are doing well, keepit-up. Well done.
By Jim Poppell on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Almost forgot, I told you I was old. Why did you name the company HostGator? Why not HostOwl or HostHooters?
Jim
By Manish on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
amazing… it feels like a wake going through my body. a true example of hardwork although i will say hard work brings smile on our face.
By Vinayak on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Congrats man !
By Bernard Kerckenaere on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Hi,
I’ve been with hostgator since 2005, and I can honestly say that I’m extremely happy with the service I’ve gotten over the years.
I’ve only experienced two problems with service interruption, and each time (as with the other few times I’ve contacted support) I was helped quickly, by people who knew what they were talking about, solving the problem pretty much immediately.
Keep up the good work!
By Joe on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
What a great story. Congrats on hitting 200,000!
By Graham on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Brent, I enjoyed your story and can empathize as a 24/7 one-man gang running my online businesses. You guys are doing great! I hope to have a few employees of my own one day so I can get the balance back in my life. Thanks for sharing your history.
By nishant on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
hi Brent,this is really impressive story ,you got such a great vision,you will reach your goals soon we are with you.God bless you
By Steph on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Good Work! Keep it up, we value your service.
By brent oxley on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Thom were actually very interested in finding an awesome web designer to bring in house to our Houston location. I’ve taken a look at your portfolio and liked it a lot! You being in Canada though would make it very hard to get you a visa however.
Frozen fire very good point. Believe it or not I come across $5ish customers all the time using over 5,000 gigs bandwidth. We pretty much have unlimited bandwidth due the amount of servers we have so bandwidth usage doesn’t bother us. We do however endup having to kick people all the time for crashing the servers from cpu / memory. A dedicated server is completely different they can crash it all they want.
By Johnson Opigo on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
After my initial signing up problems with Hostgator that drove me into the hands of an inept and incompetent reseller company, I tucked my tails between my legs and returned to HG. We made up and time has confirmed that it was the best decision in the world because it has been worth it. Nice story and very inspiring for some of us trying to make it in the hosting business. Please keep it up and congrats for this important milestone.
By John Gore on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Congrats, and thanks for sharing your story.
I have a similar story in many ways, and am very glad I found HostGator a few years back. No other hosting company can match your service, and quality.
Congrats again to u sir!
By Bonnie Bunter on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Hi Brent
Am absolutely beyond satisfied with your service. Your support team are second to none. Efficient and courteous no matter what I throw at them……and really really fast. Have never had to wait for any help.Always been available instantly.
Have recommended you to may others. Long may you reign !
Bonnie
By Arthur Charles Van Wyk on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
I have been with Hostgator for a little while, however I have been having chats with your consultants for over a year.
Being a blogger, I have been told by other bloggers that Westhost and Bluehost are way better.. but I went where I got the best assistance – without being a client.
I finally became a client a month or so ago, and I am experiencing the best service ever.
Thank you
By Tommy on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
I once had some problems with my site – someone hacked into my account. And I’d like to thank the Hostgator support here for solving the problem in just one day and getting my site back up and running. Thanks – great support!
By Chris Eaton on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Congrats Brent, we have had a resellers account with you since 2004 and your service is the best.
Its great to read your story, I had no idea, I always thought hostgator was something set up by a big corporate.
I too have been an entrepreneur since school, Ive had my successes and failures. But your story motivates me further, Congrats on your success and here is to the next 200k
All the best
Chris
By Steve Pohlit on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Quite a ride Brent. I started an ISP in 19995. Right about the time you were starting Host Gator I didn’t want anything to do with my own servers. Getting out was fast as I had my entire business stolen by a tech person I had begun to partner with. The domain was http://www.flanet.com I woke up one morning to find the ownership had been maneuvered to him in cooperation with Network Solutions. Looking at that there was no way that could have happened without inside cooperation with someone there. I moved on. Today I am delighted to have Host Gator and am equally delighted to see equipment cost come down. I am nearly at having “throw away PC’s” with machines costing $500 that were once over $3000.
I have been a Host Gator customer for quite some time. I believe it has been 5 years. I have never thought about changing. I rarely need to call support and when I do you guys are great. Just this morning I called about an email issue with one of my domains. I was live with your support in about 3 or 4 minutes and I was calling about 9:30 AM EST on a Tuesday. So that was quick and my questions were quickly addressed.
I recommend your company all the time. Great job building this business and a great example of working through numerous issues knowing you are pursuing your dream.
Sending you and your team wishes for continued success.
Steve
By BrandSmit on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Your story is amazing, and yet, who can’t associate with so many parts of it? The instant noodles and can of tuna is something I know all too well, and trying and failing and trying again…
I’m glad I made the switch to HostGator. Good luck with the future!
By download messenger 9 on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
great! a very good real story
thank u
By Master on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Waaaooo!
This is quite encouraging and I must say congrats for standing the discouragements and failures at the beginning
By Marty on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Great story. I’ve had various side business start-ups with many of the same problems you described. It was really interesting to hear how you made it all work out. Congrats on your success.
After years of stressing and struggling with various hosting companies, it was dumb luck that I stumbled into HG. You’ve made my skies blue, that’s for sure. Thanks for being so dedicated and ethical.
By Cecilia Hope on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Hi
Wow that sounds like my story except I am 42 now. I have always being entrepreneurial but I had to wait for my family to grow larger before getting going. Even so I still worked 24/7 and still do like you plus I have been in and out of hospital. I do everything including the accounts and I have had a very serious problem with my back hip and leg (the same as you had with your hands)as a result from sitting at the computer. It was so bad that I could not sit down for even 5 minutes. My leg would be on fire and I would be in such agony. I had to stand all of the time. Being an artist and digitiser, trying to design a website etc. under these circumstances was terrible. I had to lie down and type on the computer and that was extremely painful too and caused other problems. Trying to Sleep was almost as painful. This took over 3 years to get better. I could not drive or even go out anywhere to sit and have a coffee. Things eventually improved by years of not sitting at all. You can imagine trying to keep your dreams alive like this.
I finally started to get somewhere when my computer was stolen. I then had to have an operation and the surgeon has damaged my bladder. It is terrible I still have not reached 100 customers due to all of this and being a one man show completely plus looking after a family even though I am one of the best digitisers in my business. I seem to spend most of my time dealing with technical issues and customer service than actually producing designs.
Reading stories like yours are truly inspirational. I know I will get there in the end the question is can I survive long enough.
I am an artist and a perfectionist and I always give the best possible service and like you am always available to customers but it takes a serious toll.
I have always been very happy with your service and have had other people trying to get me to move hosts but I am not interested. I have always found your customer service to be of a very high standard and I will always stay with you. Please do not sell.
Great Stuff..Keep going.
By Nation Security & Protection,llc on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Congratulations, we are glad to have a ‘Host’ like yours on our ‘team’. Keep up the good work and may God Bless. Lawrence W. Heyliger
By Brett on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Great story!
I’ve been running my own businesses for a few years now and very few people realize that it is indeed a 24/7 thing for almost all small business owners. They also don’t understand the level of competition you face – I hope this will help people understand the reality of it.
I also agree 100% with you about schooling – especially when all the info in the world is right there on the ‘Net. My ma would agree with your ma about it, though :-) That’s ok, we have Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Scott McNealy on our side.
I’m quite pleased overall with Hostgator, and unless you give me reason to, I’ll never leave – datz how I roll. Keep up the great work!
By mike michelini on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
very inspirational! Again, it gives us all hope an confidence to take the plunge and follow what we are meant to go after in life.
never be afraid to fail, and never give up….thanks for this post
By Henry Zeng on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Congratulations Brent. Thanks so much for your inspiring story!
By DarkDog on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Brent, you wrote, “to compete with GoDaddy.” Please, compete with GoDaddy all you want, but don’t ever become ANOTHER GoDaddy. The GoDaddy crew has so completely lost their customer focus that I believe they’re on the brink of turning their success around and heading back down the hill.
HostGator is what it is Brent, primarily because of the interest and effort you’ve put into it and the fact that your customers have all FELT that personal investment you’ve made. Being big is wonderful, but being the best is better.
By Mike on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Hey Brent, Great story! The only thing I wasn’t buying was that your carpel tunnel syndrome was from typing. It was from all that gaming as a youth :)
All the best to you and your company!
By Matthew on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
A rags to riches story. nexta stock market float. Then a google buyout…
Seriously I am in the process of trying the same thing by reselling your products. Hopefully with a bit of hard work in this highly competitative market I can have some success.
Well done.
By Perf on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
This is really wonderful story, I am happy to read this at this very moment of my life.
Keep the good work man!
By David on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Very touching story, congratulations on your success. I too, hope to become a succesful online entrepreneur one day. And by the way im a customer of your hosting plans and they are top notch. Keep it up!
By hnai altanbour on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Dear Brent
they have the best customer supports :) Thank you for your inspiring story, Brent
By Rex Turner on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Hi Brent,
WOW! To me this was fascinating reading. I love these “instant success” stories where behind the scenes people such as yourself are working there butts off for years. Then others look at it and think it was easy. We can tell from your story it was anything but easy.
I have been with you since 2006 and have just recently added SEO hosting. This is because of the great job Hostgator has done for me.
You obviously deserve the success you have achieved.
And to confirm your decision to leave college to be your own boss, I will point to many people such as myself who got a degree and worked in industry for over 30 years at the same job and still get laid off. There is no security but what you make for yourself. I don’t regret my path and glad to see you don’t regret yours.
I also am now an entrepreneur tossing my degree in the trash. I am loving it.
May you have continued success. After all you host almost all of my websites! DOH!
Rex
By Marius on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Congratulations!!!
I think I was one of the 1,031 customers back in 2004 and stayed with you since then. Never had any problems or complains and the customer service was always awesome and quick.
I hope all your hard work pays off for you.
By William Rice on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
I truly admire the work you put into your business. I had about four services before you and each one of them really got on my nerves and I finally landed at Host Gator after reading some threads on web hosting. I couldn’t be happier that I found a home that has been so friendly and helpful.
Your mention of outsourcing and then deciding it wasn’t worth it was a smart move because two of the other hosts I was with had outsourced their support staff and they absolutely stunk and that is the reason I dropped them. I tried to get an issue with my stats program resolved for more than six months until my contract was about to expire. I told them I was leaving because you couldn’t fix the problem. A week within telling them I was gone the problem got fixed. I said too late. You ignored me too long.
Best wishes for your continued success. Your story is one I will remember.
TKS,
Bill
By Rick on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
It’s great to hear your story, and I hope you continue to have success. My only comment as you try to take on companies like GoDaddy is to stay away from using sex to market your product. It cheapens the brand, paints your reputation a certain way, and probably attracts the type of customers you’d rather not have. GoDaddy has forever lost me as a customer. It’s not all about numbers.
By Dave R. on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Great read. I started with Hostgator probably 4 years ago, after reading an online review. I was new to website stuff and was surprised how helpful the tech support was in helping me get the settings on my CMS correct.
The prices were great then and they’re even better now, so I’ve purchased another plan recently, and again your tech support was very helpful and I had issues resolved within minutes.
It’s rare nowadays that I am completely happy with a business, from the product, the support, attention to details etc., but Hostgator is an example of such a business. I recommend Hostgator to anyone who mentions wanting to start a website.
Thank you and your team for making Hostgator what it is and best wishes for continued success.
By Lennart Sauter on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Congratz and thank you for the story – it really gives hope to all the little sites out there :)
Keep your service up!
A thankful customer
By Dan Masters on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Congrats on the growth and for having one of the best hosting companies around! I have been a customer for 3 years and you guys have been great, you have great uptime and always respond to support tickets quickly.
Thanks for providing a great service!
By fas on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Super stuff. A request please have cheaper dedicated hosting, the current $174 is very unaffordable at the moment for people who want to shift from shared to dedicated, a nice $80 plan is highly welcome.
By Peter on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Brent in 2004 you were my sales account manager trying to get my company to switch from another Reseller Program at a now extinct competitor. After a year or so of reselling I was very skeptical of your “sales pitch” thinking your program would fit our needs just right but what was the catch?
After 5 years of excellent service and support (I like the in house support 100% better than the out sourced one) I found out that was the catch!
I am glad your vision has taken off! We have grown right along with you being in the niche Market we are in. We are glad to know that we have a great hosting company standing behind us we can count on!
Peter ~ CEO
http://www.CTKsoftware.com
http://www.CTKhosting.com
http://www.CTKdirectory.com
By Patrish Dehler on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
That was nice to read. I like to read ‘how I got here’ stories. I’ve been with you for several years and always recommend you to others. Love the control panel and I’m please with the support. .
Remember bigger is not always better and being the biggest should not always be the goal. If you are happy and have a good income then that is a goal in its self.
Congratulations.
By custo mer on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Thanks for sharing your story!
Just curious…how could an 18 year old at the time make a statement of “I had no issues getting the customers”….who in the world would take you seriously at that age and what was your clientele profile? Buddies? Students?
Thanks again and keep up the ‘up time’ :)
By Serge on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Great story! And I suppose it’s not over yet… you still have a long way to become the world’s largest hosting company.
I hope you succeed and I also hope you’ll keep on providing quality service.
By Matthew L on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Wow,what an inspiring story. I especially love it when the CEO writes himself, something you rarely ever see. The CEO of companies are usually never seen publicly. I must say that all of your dedication and hard work seems to have paid off. HostGator is by far, the best service, pricing, and support that I have had the pleasure of working with.
HostGator is simply the best. I continue to tell myself that HostGator will always be my only choice for shared and/or reseller webhosting, and it definitely will be that for as long as I need it. I’ve had nothing but great experiences with HostGator and I hope that it stays this way or continues to get even better. Congratulations on the 200,000 clients brent. Perhaps you’ll reach 1 million soon!
By Mick on Sep 30, 2009 | Reply
Brent: I have been with you since 2004, and have to say I’ve never been happier with any company! (in any field)
From our correspondence and my observations over the years, I’ve come to know you as a person who truly treats people with respect, and you consistently “do the right thing!”
Please thank your dad for me will ya! He raised a great guy and saved him from heading off to a pointless invasion.
By Ken on Oct 1, 2009 | Reply
Wow!!! what a story. Im working hard on building my SMALL hosting business and sold my first account yesterday. Your hosting service deserves to be where it is today. I have been with you for some time now and look forward to upgrading as my business builds. Congratulations!
Ken
By Uttoran Sen on Oct 1, 2009 | Reply
nice success story,
am a college drop out too :D
By shon on Oct 1, 2009 | Reply
Conrays! I will be switching over soon
By brent oxley on Oct 2, 2009 | Reply
Hi lebisol2,
I was able to get them one at a time. It wasn’t “easy” but was very possible with hard work. The trick I used in the early days was going on forums and other websites in search of people that complained about their web hosting support.
I would message them personally offering to assist them free of charge. After I helped them with all their issues I’d casually let them know that I was a web host and that if they were ever looking to switch hosts I’d personally be there to help them 24/7.
I’d usually be able to get about one customer a day following this technique.
Then with time the word of mouth from all the customers slowly began to take the place of the hunting and gathering process.
I’m positive if I was starting over from scratch today without the financial backing I’d be able to start over following this same process. You have to be good at sales but rather then pull the scummy typical car salesmen approach you sell with honesty.
By Jay Gumbs on Oct 2, 2009 | Reply
Love the success story. Shows that real success doesn’t come without failure and pain.
By John Odubele on Oct 3, 2009 | Reply
Very inspiring and I am encouraged.
By John Odubele on Oct 3, 2009 | Reply
Inspiring and encouraging
By Hasan on Oct 4, 2009 | Reply
I start a web site http://freeonlineearning.com & it was popular within short time. Because, its a site of free online earning tips. But,the problem was hosting!Often it was in offline. But, when I comes on hostgator,every problem is solved. Really super hosting & I am really surprised on Hostgator starting story. Its try & try, you will get the success. Hostgator is the proof.
By Shajjad Hossain Washim on Oct 7, 2009 | Reply
Hi,
Congratulation on this success!
Success is a continues process…
Wish you all the best and more services and more business.
Thanks,
Shajjad Hossain Washim
By Mrinmay Bhattacharjee on Oct 8, 2009 | Reply
Congrats :) I loved this post very much
Hostgator Rocks :)
By Anthony on Oct 9, 2009 | Reply
I love these stories and read every word of it to see if there is any chance I can get through the tough times in the business and make it myself.
I have just moved from my own servers to you as a reseller for the main reason that I am in a residential area and cant get the upload speed any faster than a mum and dad rate due to the distance to the exchange – blah blah but lets see how I go :)
Also it was refreshing to see a story that had not been through the pr department and censors!
Anthony
By Rocky Garcia on Oct 10, 2009 | Reply
Hostgator really grows dramatically. I really love HostGator, especially the Customer Service.
By qatar world on Oct 10, 2009 | Reply
awesome article .. this is come after haaaard work …
By Carl Thomas on Oct 10, 2009 | Reply
I read all of that and laughed out load at much of it, especially the drug dealing part. You have a talent for writing as well as hosting, Brent. I found HostGator after trying a few hosting companies, including Godaddy. It’s very frustrating finding good hosting with good customer service but I’ve so far been very happy with HostGator. This blog puts a human face to HostGator which is cool. good luck for the future and think about adding some pictures of your workforce as this type of engagement always interests me (don’t know why!!).
By 'Bunmi Akinmboni on Oct 11, 2009 | Reply
I am from Nigeria. My story started just like Brent’s which is very encouraging but after I located Hostgator, life has really been easy to manage. However, your reseller packages does not give one room to expand like you did years ago.
Well done Hostgator.
By Papilinux on Oct 13, 2009 | Reply
go host gator, I understand. I wanted to start my own hosting company years ago, but did not have the technical back round either.
Keep growning
By Jeffrey on Oct 13, 2009 | Reply
When will Windows shared hosting be available? It’s been a loooooong time since last time I was told it should be available soon.
By Mark on Oct 16, 2009 | Reply
Congratulations, that’s a hefty accomplishment in this climate. Would love to see you offer strict blog plans with auto installers.
By Jeffrey on Oct 16, 2009 | Reply
Congrats!
Are you still planning to provide Windows shared hosting?
Jeffrey
By Brian on Oct 21, 2009 | Reply
This was a great post. Fascinating to follow the birth and growth of a great company.
I don’t know if anyone will ever read this, but if you do — please, PLEASE when you’re ready to really take on GoDaddy, please don’t end up like they did. GoDaddy was a really great up-and-coming company like yours, until they started all their unethical advertising, with sneaky hidden add-ons, etc and a really sketchy series of ad campaigns. They have fantastic support, just like HostGator, but their business image is getting morally, ethically, and aesthetically filthy.
By Dean Mapa on Oct 28, 2009 | Reply
I don’t remember anymore the year I signed up with HostGator. All I know is I joined several hosting companies (and yes Geocities was one of them) before that. But when I signed up with HostGator, I never looked back.
A great service you have.
By kupon on Oct 28, 2009 | Reply
i congratulate hostgator but i believe that this climbing is bound to its huge affiliate system.
Of course your service is perfect especially your online help..
By Erik on Oct 28, 2009 | Reply
Fantastic! Very inspiring post! Congrats.
By web hosting on Oct 29, 2009 | Reply
Thanks Brent, it is very informative for us. I believe that next years, we will see hostgator at the better position. the more and more people choose hostgator hosting. Especially in my country.
By mike on Oct 30, 2009 | Reply
your numbers do not surprise me as the service is second to none. Just keep doing what you are doing.
By Joi on Oct 30, 2009 | Reply
Congratulations! I’ve been nothing but 100 percent thrilled with the gator for years now. Cool support people, fair pricing, excellent reliability , and the best dang logo and mascot in the world.
By web hosting unlimited bandwidth on Nov 4, 2009 | Reply
Great.Really inspiring.I am very satisfied customer of Hostgator.Already bookmarked this post.You really deserve this success.
Nikhil
By Rental advertising on Nov 11, 2009 | Reply
Hi
This post is awesome you always rock!
As a web master i appreciate you.