Hi all,

We have launched our web hosting offering and I think we have a good product (Generous quotas, and an Ensim powered platform).

Now comes the tough part. Selling it!

Our site:www.theycommunicate.com (http://www.theycommunicate.com)

I have been doing some advertising on ca.tophosts.com and tophosts.com. I've made submissions to Inktomi, Dmoz & Yahoo, and am also doing some pay per click on google.

Were not getting the kind of results that I would like.

What has been your experience? What methods have gotten you the best results?

Regards

D.

We have been live for a while now (8 months) and it is still hard to attract new customers due to the saturation of the market. Your best bet is to hang in there and eventually your clients will start talking if you provide good service.

We used webhostdir.com and they seemed to build some brand recognition too.

Overall, just hang in there.

Your current advertising seems to be pretty good.

Yeah I realize the saturation of the market. Of course we also realize that their should always be room for a good service at a good price.

Patience is one virtue that I really would rather not employ right now though ;)

May try some print ads in local internet rags. Any feedback on that strategy? Especially in the Canadian/Toronto Market?

D.

I have seen some posts that some local ads may also work in web hosting, but I have never tried it, but it's maybe worth it - you never know before you try :)

Were not getting the kind of results that I would like.

Does that mean you're not getting the number of page views (from your advertising) that you would like? Or are you getting page views (visitors) but no one is signing up?

If you're getting page views and no one is signing up, you'll need to look at your site design/packages/pricing etc.

If you're not getting page views, you might check your keyword targeting. If you're targeting something generic and broad like "web hosting" you're just not going to be that successful. It would be better to pick a specific niche and then target customers searching for that particular service...i.e. php hosting, Windows 2000 hosting, reseller hosting, etc. Something a little more targeted than general "web hosting".

Regards,
Joe

I am just curious,

Even though you may have attracted a lot of customers to visit your site through all those ads. Have you consider that they just come by and can't find all they info they want and left ?

Do you think a live sales chat kind of service can boost up your sales ?

=)

Originally posted by dialuphost
We have been live for a while now (8 months) and it is still hard to attract new customers due to the saturation of the market. Your best bet is to hang in there and eventually your clients will start talking if you provide good service.


I agree. Patience is everything. The market is so saturated with
one hit wonder hosts that it's too easy for people to find a host
without even really looking for one. The longer you hang in there,
the more signups you'll get because eventually the thousands of
resellers that do exist right now will die off leaving people
scrambling for a new, reliable host. Our company has been selling
web accounts for almost a year, and we're just now starting to
develop a solid customer base. If I were you I'd definantly push
that ensim product, that stuff rocks!

We are just beginning to see returns on the PPC adds. One PPC company that we use was very helpfull in adjusting the campaign to deliver on clickthroughs.

We yeah the ensim platform really is rich. I think that it will help to position us well as the pretenders drop off.

I'm working on targeting our marketing a little more accurately right now.

I think that the serious dot com hobbyist/semi pro may be a market for us to zoom in on (don't get any ideas y'all ;) ) W'ell also go after some resellers (the freelancing web dev pro).


D.

To answer the questions:

We were not getting the click throughs initially but a couple of the PPC reps have been helpful (lesson learned: when it comes to buying PPC ads better to build a relationship with a real live person who may grow to care whether you succeed or not).

The rates are a little better now but we are just beginning to see conversions because the sign-up process needed (and still does) need to be more user friendly. I am working on that now.

Re live chat: I do not know if that would help much. What do y'all think?


D.

Hello,

One reason you may be having a hard time is your prices. It is hard to compete with people who give the world away for 5 dollars a month.... I'm not saying that your prices are bad - they are probably very realistic for your investment, but the people who may be looking at your ads may not appriciate or realize to true value of your company...

Those are just my thoughts after comparing the customers we have obtained through internet ads, and those that we have obtained through direct sales.

Jay.

Jay,

You found the direct marketing route to be a good way to get more discerning customers? What kind of DM did your use?

D.

Originally posted by daugustine

Re live chat: I do not know if that would help much. What do y'all think?


I think it all comes down to whether you're flexiable enough to customize packages for each customer. I personally was looking for some dedicated server last week. Here was what I did :

- Get a list of host from webhostdir or WHT.
- Narrow the list by looking at their plans.
- Email them individually.
- Go to their site and chat with them and ask TONS of question before I decide.

Some questions will take at least 5+ emails to reach the answer, but I think live chat can address that problem. For example. Question Sequence :

Q : I want to host in windows, do you support it
A : Yes , we support windows.
Q : how much will that cost
A : It won't cost you anything,
Q : What is the licensing issue then...blah blah blah..

If your competitor offers a BETTER deal before you can address all your customer's question, then your deal is spoiled.

Just my 2 cents =)

Honestly k6cheung I think that not everyone is as systematic as you are.

Moreover, really, there is usually someone with a better deal. That does not really mean that just the one company with the best deal in a certain category from an objective point of view is going to win out every time.

I think that the key selling point for the average customer is the perception of quality that they get from your company and whether or not they perceive that your product will meet their needs.

If it where always about the best deal, I don't know how much business Verio would do (BTW I'm not sure how many shoes Nike would sell in a best deal driven marketplace either). Verio however, does have a good over all presentation and they leave the consumer with the feeling that they are getting a quality product.

What say you all?

D.

I would just like to point everyone to a live chat client thats free and works great

http://www.clickchatsold.com

Thanks

Originally posted by daugustine
I think that the key selling point for the average customer is the perception of quality that they get from your company and whether or not they perceive that your product will meet their needs.


First of all, we can't compare fashion (NIKE) with hosting. The brand name effect isn't working very well in a quality driven mark.

My point is, would you agree if you can customize your product ( or host plan ) for your customer on-the-fly, that can help you close more deals ?

Web-based businesses are like you in your own store and not greet anyone when they come in. There are limited amount of work a web-based sales can do to close out deals.