I'm trying to get a handle on how long you can expect clients to stick around and stay hosted with the same company...

If you provide prompt and effective technical support to clients and keep them happy, on average, about how long do you think a client will stick around?

i think it depends on the client's site growth and budget. i changed hosts not because of bad hosting service, but because of my site growing and using too much bandwidth

I think it also depends on the type of client and your relationship to him. If it's a business client, he is happy with your service and you are not too expensive he maybe will stay forever :)

I guess I should have added more options.

If you voted more than 12 months, maybe you can take the time to post a more accurate response here. :D

I've had some customers for over three years already. I don't know about the other hosts here, but who is really interested in doing business with someone for one or two months?

I agree with Vince. We've had customers for over 3 years. We've found that when you keep your customers totally happy, pretty much the only time you'll lose them is when they just close down their site. Most customers don't go host-hopping every month, if they're truly happy. Most are willing to pay extra for more features etc. if they're happy with their current host. For most people, moving everything isn't worth the couple bucks a month you'd save.

I stick around with a host for as long as I like the service. The only reason i've ever left was because they were lacking a certain feature that I wanted or they simply got boring. Any good host should add new features or make improvements (there's always room) once in a while. It's also good to know that there's someone there, send out a newsletter with any news, updates, plans, useful links, etc.

Well its simple, provide A+ support, service their needs, and they will stay with you!

Kindest Regards,
ValuableHost

Well, we've stayed with a sucky host for 18 months. If we get a good one
--and I'm keeping my fingers crossed on our new host-- we'll stay
unless the service drops or we outgrow it.