GeoCities Hosting Calls it Quits
Written by Chad Bean on October 26, 2009 – 7:20 pm -It looks like GeoCities, the Free Web Hosting service owned by Yahoo!, is officially ending service to website owners today. I’m sure many of you have used their service at one point or another, so it’s kind of sad to see them go down with all of the web sites they hosted. My first web site was on GeoCities, complete with a looping, low-quality instrumental midi file, and animated graphics. Many other free web hosting services like GeoCities have risen and fallen over the years because the free hosting business model just doesn’t seem sustainable.
It’s amazing how many web sites with no business model or profitability sunk during the .com internet bubble. Internet businesses, like any other company, aren’t immune from the age old philosophy of “you need to make money to stay in business”. Now there are a few exceptions to this rule. It’s still possible to come up with a great idea for a web site and receive funding from a venture capital firm (read: Twitter), but for the everyday web business owner, they understand the need to make a profit.
Many GeoCities refugees have migrated over to HostGator, and we want to welcome you all with open arms. We can assure you that HostGator won’t have the same fate as GeoCities because well, we’re a profitable company.
If you have a site with GeoCities and need a new home, post a comment and we’ll try to throw you some free months worth of Hosting at HostGator.
Tags: geocities
Posted in Around the Web, Web Hosting News | 5 Comments »
Talk to HostGator Live on July 29 at 8 PM CT
Written by Douglas Hanna on July 15, 2009 – 5:39 pm -Update: Thanks to all of those who participated! Our second Open Session was a success. A recording of the session is available on this page.
Due to the success of the first Open Session we hosted a couple of weeks ago, we’re hosting another one soon. This Open Session will be held on Wednesday, July 29 at 8 PM CT.
Just like last time, this Open Session will be a chance for both potential and existing HostGator customers to come into a live chat with other customers and HostGator employees and get tips, information, and have a chance to ask questions and get answers from the people who make the decisions at HostGator. Participants can either call in or just listen on their computers. There is also a text chat for people who would prefer to type their questions.
Some of the things we’ll be discussing include:
- Tips and suggestions on how to get the most out of your HostGator account from senior system administrators
- Discussion of HostGator’s upcoming Windows Shared Hosting launch, including questions and answers with the person in charge of Windows hosting here at HostGator
- Questions and answers about anything related to HostGator, ranging from what our servers support to what we eat for lunch in the office
- Discounts and/or free hosting to some participants who ask great questions.
Like last time, we’re planning on having our Deputy CTO, Chief Marketing Officer, and Customer Service Manager lead this Open Session. These three people are able to answer just about any question you can think of related to HostGator. There will also be senior support people available to answer more general questions and help out as needed.
Logistics:
TalkShoe worked well for us last time and we’ll be using it again for this Open Session. If you live outside of the US central timezone, check out this site for a list of corresponding times around the world. Right before 8 PM CT on Wednesday, head over to this page for instructions on how to join the session (it’s very simple).
Overview:
What: HostGator Open Session
When: Wednesday, July 29, 2009 at 8 PM CT
Where: HostGator on TalkShoe
Posted in Customer Service, Events | 15 Comments »
Chat with HostGator this Thursday at 5 PM CT
Written by Douglas Hanna on June 30, 2009 – 7:13 pm -Update: This took place and was a big success. HostGator employees answered a ton of questions about backups, VPS solutions, Windows hosting, affiliates, and more. We appreciate people taking the time to come by and ask questions.
This upcoming Thursday (July 2, 2009) at 5 PM CT (Houston-time), HostGator is going to be hosting an Open Session where potential and existing customers alike can come chat with HostGator employees and each other.
The Open Session is going to be pretty informal, but for some context, some things we do want to do include:
- Question and answer session with HostGator employees
- Tips and suggestions on how to get the most out of your HostGator account and website from our best support people
- Suggestions from customers about how HostGator can improve (customer service, Terms of Service, procedures and policies, etc.)
This is the first time HostGator has done something like this, but we think it will serve as a great opportunity to talk to our customers and hear their questions, opinions, and suggestions. If you have any particular items you’d like us to discuss or research, feel free to leave them in the comments.
Oh, and we’re also going to be giving out some free hosting during the session for both attending and participating.
Logistics:
We’re going to try hosting this session with TalkShoe, which allows us and other folks to call in using the phone and/or chat or listen online. If it works, we’ll continue to use TalkShoe. If not, we’ll explore other options. If you live outside of the US central timezone, check out this site for a list of corresponding times around the world. When Thursday at 5 PM CT rolls around, head over to this page for instructions on how to join the session (it’s very simple).
Overview:
What: HostGator Open Session
When: Thursday, July 2, 2009 at 5 PM CT
Where: HostGator on TalkShoe
Posted in Customer Service, Events | 1 Comment »
RankSense Review SEO Software with Coupon
Written by Chad Bean on April 9, 2009 – 3:54 pm -HostGator has partnered with RankSense SEO Tools to give away a free 30-day trial for RankSense and a recurring 20% OFF discount, all with a 90-day money back guarantee. Use coupon code: hostgator and sign up now for the special offer. This offer is valid for all HostGator Web Hosting customers and blog readers.
Search engine optimization (SEO) is all the rage these days. There’s a whole market that has developed around SEO services and tools and a lot of hype and fluff that tends to confuse and complicate things for the average web site owner.
Simply put, SEO is the process of ranking higher in the search engines (Google, MSN Live, Yahoo) to increase traffic. For most websites, increased traffic translates into higher sales, so there is no disputing the importance of practicing good SEO techniques.
Since search engines have secret algorithms that determine where a website ranks in their search results, there are tons of myths and piles of misinformation out there on the ‘net. Time after time, I’ve spoken with customers who are angry and feel misled because an SEO firm or consulting company promised that the customer’s site would rank on page one in Google. Unfortunately, most of the time, this is just not possible, and the majority of these offers and promises should be quickly dismissed.
Even with all of the myths and wrong information out there, there are still some generally accepted rules and tips on how to best optimize your website to rank well. On our SEO Blog, you’ll find many articles discussing some of these proven techniques.
Not everyone can afford a reputable SEO consultant, especially for smaller websites, so most web site owners resort to the DIY methods.
One method that comes in the form of a tool and caught our attention recently is RankSense. RankSense is a piece of software that has gained a lot of popularity recently (and for good reason). This software is able to cover just about every aspect of SEO and will save you, as a site owner, tons of time.
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SEO Tools included with RankSense:
- Discover Site Rankings – See which keywords bring users to your web site and see how many conversions they get for your site.
- Search Engine Coverage – Analyze your site’s search engine visibility.
- Detect Problem Pages – Detects, follows, and checks all links and shows broken links, dynamic pages, denials in robots.txt, and other errors that may be hurting your site.
- Sitemap Builder – Creates and submits an XML sitemap for search engines to discover.
- Keyword Selection – Identify and test potential keywords.
- Keyword Appraisals – See which keywords are better based on traffic, value, search volume, and conversions.
- Competitive Intelligence – Discover your top competitors for each and every keyword.
- Analyze Competitors – Analyze competitor web sites and learn what is working for the competition.
- Analyze My Site – Understand how search engines view the keywords on your site.
- On-Page Optimization Editor – Optimize your pages to maximize search engine leads.
- Link Structure Analysis – Learn from the structure of your competitors’ backlinks.
- My Link Structure Analysis – Understand the structure of your site’s backlinks.
- Link Text Analysis – See what anchor texts link to your competitors.
- My Link Text Analysis – Analyze the anchor texts linking to your site.
- Link Research – Find the URLs that to target for link exchange, sub-categorized by type (blog, directory, article, etc).
- Task Scheduler – Allows you to schedule and automate tasks.
- Search Analytics & SEO Progress Reports – Powerful, data rich reports providing detailed filtered report providing data on every aspect of your site’s optimization including search engines, rankings, landing pages, keywords, on-page metrics, off-page metrics, keyword, competitors and much, much more.
- Advanced Preferences –Identify preferred search engines, search the API, access market analysis keywords and competitor metrics, on-page keyword analysis metrics, common words, HMTL tags weight, keyword groups, human emulation filters, report header and footer and more.
Even if you’re not sure exactly what every feature listed above does, RankSense makes it simple by offering two modes: Smart Mode (easier) and Classic mode (advanced) and it’s great at walking novices through the wizard step-by-step.
Sign up today for your free trial, and if you decide to stay, use coupon: hostgator at sign up for a 20% recurring discount, and good luck on your rankings!
Tags: ranksense, SEO
Posted in Promotions, SEO | 14 Comments »
Google AdWords Coupon Promotion Code
Written by Chad Bean on March 16, 2009 – 12:46 pm -10/12/2009 Update: The Google AdWords Coupon code for HostGator Shared clients is now $50 (used to be $25)! Reseller coupons coming soon.
Ever run a Google search and notice the “sponsored listings” around the search results? Ever click one of those sponsored links? It’s likely that you have already visited a link that was advertised through the Google AdWords program and now HostGator is giving its shared web hosting customers the opportunity get started with Google AdWords by giving them $25 $50 in free marketing credits*.
HostGator has partnered up with the Google AdWords pay-per-click (PPC) advertising program and is now offering an AdWords Coupon voucher good for $25 $50 in credit with all Hatchling, Baby, and Business shared web hosting plans.
What is Google AdWords?
Google AdWords is a pay-per-click advertising program by Google. With AdWords, advertisers can promote their website’s products and services on Google.com’s search results in the “sponsored links” section. Quality ad text and relevant keyword buys will give you an edge over your competitors. And with AdWords, you can set your own budget and change your campaigns at any time – there are no commitments or spending requirements of any kind.
We at HostGator currently use Google AdWords for our own internal marketing efforts, and we truly believe that most businesses can benefit from the highly targeted traffic that this program can yield.
Great, how do I sign up?
New and old HostGator customers on qualifying plans can redeem the coupon code by visiting their HostGator control panel, navigating to the “Google AdWords Offer” link on the left hand side and clicking the “redeem now” link. It’s as simple as that.
If you don’t already have a HostGator web hosting account, take a look at our Shared Web Hosting plans, sign up today, and get started promoting your site!
* (the fine print our lawyers asked us to include): To read the terms and conditions as well as to learn more, visit the HostGator Google AdWords Coupon page.
Tags: adwords, marketing, SEO
Posted in Promotions, Shared Hosting | 26 Comments »
