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Website Hosting on Twitter

2009-07-28by Derek Vaughan

There are many websites devoted to web hosting reviews. Each of these sites offers something slightly different. Some focus on listing a large number of hosts in a comprehensive database. Others tout user reviews that grade the web hosts on a scale from best to worst. Yet others slim down the list to a ''Top 10'' format - listing just the top performers in website hosting. Using these hosting review sites along with forums devoted to web hosting can help form a strong opinion on a web hosting company. If you are searching for a reputable web hosting company to work with, you may want to tap into these resources.

There is, however, a new resource available that everyone searching for hosting should use: that resource is Twitter.

Twitter is a micro blogging service which displays ''tweets'' from registered users in 140 character snippets. While individual Twitter users are subject to wide variations in quality, taken in aggregate the Twitter community is a powerful voice for consumer empowerment. This is a huge benefit for those who are researching web hosting companies.

Here is how to use Twitter to assist in your website hosting search.

Step 1 - Find the Twitter Account for Your Target Company. Since all Twitter accounts have the same basic format (www.twitter.com/twitter name) you might think it would be really easy to find the company's official Twitter site. You would be wrong. For example, if you are looking for the official Twitter site for Go Daddy - the Twitter account is actually :http://twitter.com/GoDaddyGuy. This is because there is still a bit of cyber-squatting going on within the Twitter universe. So how do you even go about finding a company on Twitter? You conduct a Find People search. Simply type in the name of the company you want to check out in the box labeled, 'Who are you looking for?' and click search. It's usually pretty apparent who the official Twitter site is for the company.

Step 2 - Review the Official Company Twitter Account. So once you have found the official company Twitter site, you can conduct research. By now many of the best web hosting companies have Twitter accounts. Why? They can use it to speak to their current and prospective customers. You may see technical support advice, or special offers for services offered only on Twitter. That's great, because you want to observe how the company speaks to its customers. Look for responses that address specific problems. Does the web host offer enough help in a friendly manner? Are the answers handed out sufficient for you to see the resolution to the problem? The answer should be 'yes' if it is a good host. Additionally, you can quickly scan through the tweets to find any special offers the company may be running. Hey, you could save some cash that way.

Step 3 - See What Actual Customers Have to Say. This is where the power of Twitter and its large network of users really shines. First things first - go to the Twitter search page at: http://search.twitter.com. Then type in the name of the company you are researching. Let's say I want to compare two UK hosting providers: UK website hosting provider 34SP.com and Fasthosts. Here are some of the actual responses from each of their respective Twitter searches:

34SP.com (http://search.twitter.com/search?q=34sp)

amcewen: @jensenwilder I use (and in general recommend) http://www.34sp.com but they don't seem to do the cheap personal hosting anymore :-(

ebrandzUK: @moorjames Fair enough, but they all seem to be from the USA. 34sp is very good, and I used them for over 5 years. Nice people too.

steveavery: @iainclaridge a friend recommends these guys. http://www.34sp.com pretty cheap too.

Fasthosts (http://search.twitter.com/search?q=fasthosts)

XclusivRadio: is wondering if there could be a company with a worse Customer Service than ISP Fasthosts? "can't" "won't"& "no" in every sentence. Dire

psbook: @PoliticsPenguin Currently ringing Fasthosts billing to work out how to dump them after less than one month.

bhmediamarty: @benwerd totally agree, couldn't get away fast enough myself. Still trying to escape fasthosts.

schmintage: Fasthosts do indeed suck

All of these responses were sent out within the past few days as of the writing of this article. So the information is quite current. The question is, if you had researched these two companies on Twitter, which one would you use?

Good luck finding a great web hosting company for your website, and don't forget to include Twitter in your research!

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Author

Derek Vaughan

Derek Vaughan is a web hosting industry veteran, marketing consultantand writer. Mr. Vaughan has architected the marketing growth of severalprominent web hosting success stories leading to acquisition includingAffinity Internet, Inc., Aplus.Net and HostMySite.com . Prior to his entry into the web hosting industry, Mr. Vaughan wasresponsible for online marketing at The Walt Disney Company where hemarketed ecommerce for the ESPN.com and NASCAR.com brands. Mr. Vaughanreceived his M.B.A. from Vanderbilt University and currently serves onthe HostingCon Advisory Board...

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