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azoundria

New Member
Hello everyone. I am developing IsMyWebsite as a partnership with EvenHosting and am trying to get some input. Firstly some ideas I have:

Your account starts as a Noob account. After 3 weeks of activity and a good site built up, you are advanced to a Basic account. From there you can advance to an Advanced account, and finally a lucky few should make it to a Pro account. At every stage your site will be reviewed by experienced volunteers. Using this approach, I can give more system resources to those deserving of it, and help weed out the less deserving sites.

My second idea was to allow individuals to have almost full control over the placement and colouring of their ads. I realize this has a lot of potential for abuse, so anyone deliberately hiding or inappropriately displaying ads will be shut down the moment it is noticed without warning.

Other features I was planning:
• Sub domain(yoursite.ismywebsite.com)
• PHP support(limited in Noob account)
• HTML editor
• File Upload
• FTP(for Basic, Advanced, and Pro accounts)
• Auto-forwarder Email Address(yoursite@ismywebsite.com)
• MySQL support
• Noob 10MB storage space, Basic 100 MB, Advanced 1000 MB, Pro 10000 MB
• Noob 100 MB monthly transfer, Basic 1 GB, Advanced 10 GB, 100 GB Pro
• Forum for webmasters
• Link Exchange Program
• Custom Error Page(after Noob)
• Statistical Analysis

Is there anything I should add? Any thoughts?
 
U need to raise transfer, the account should start @ at least 100 / 1024 for ppl to actually take you up on your offer....
 
and how can develop thier sites without FTP PHP mySQL if i need free account really don't be upset but iwont go with you man coz this not helping me to get develope
 
Krak Joe is right and so is clan you are offering too little for me as a noob
to even go with your service...I am not going to ask the admin of the hosting company to upload my files :)
 
Krak_Joe: 100/1024 as in 100 MB Storage and 1024 Mb Monthly Transfer? I have upped to storage/monthly transfer for Basic, Advanced and Pro to:
10Mb/100Mb
500Mb/5000Mb
25Gb/250Gb
125Gb/1250Gb
I am also considering an option where a new webmaster can submit a proposal of what their site will look like, it's purpose, and when they will have it ready for display and get a Basic account immediately when theat proposal is reviewed.

Chanr3Flex: I will have a browser-based upload utility like Geocities or Freewebs or BraveHost. PHP is supported in Noob accounts, but some features are restricted.

DjNala: Is this better?

Update: Mailing list added at http://www.ismywebsite.com/ for anyone who wants to be notified of launch.
 
You are missing a key point for more advanced users looking for a free web host. You should allow users to host their own top-level domain.
 
The exact advance requirements are still being planned. Basically advancing to Advanced account requires a popular site(approx 100+ hits/day average) and Pro requires super popularity(approx 1000+ hits/per day average). Watch the website for when they appear.

Top-level domains cost to much to give away for free. And one of the purposes of the site is to attract clients for Evenhosting, which offering top-level domains with all these features would not do. You can pay for your own top-level domain and set it forwards, or use a DotTk.
 
• Noob 500 MB storage space, Basic 2.5 GB, Advanced 12.5 GB, Pro 62.5 GB
• Noob 5 GB monthly transfer, Basic 25 GB, Advanced 125 GB, 625 GB Pro

:S how are you going to offer 625GB bandwidth for free
 
As someone that jumps from paid hosting to free hosting, I have learned that hosting is not about what you get.

For crying out loud, anyone that uses 625 GB of bandwidth WILL NOT be on free hosting. And 62.5GB of space? Is this free dedicated hosting?

It's about reliability, professionalism and how nice the person who is hosting you is. I always try and exchange emails and IMs with my hoster. It's about getting 'in touch' with your users, being flexible and treating them like you would if they were paying you.

Don't offer stupid features, over quality service. Never!
 
I tried the Discussions section, and got very little feedback. So I was juggling the inconvenience to everyone here by posting in the 'wrong' forum and the benefits to everyone who would use my service by getting feedback from my intended audience.

I have been to just about every forum over the last month trying to attract a large following, but it's not really working. I just opened the whole front of my site up, including the 'Features', 'Planning', and 'Registration' section, but you can't actually sign up yet. If anyone could explain to me why people dont want to be notified on launch it would help a bit.

About the storage. Originally it was going to be 10MB, then 100, then 1000, and finally 10000. But 10 MB does not compare well to other hosts I was researching. The leader currently is ZeroMoola with 10 GB of storage per account. Knowing the average user never uses this much and it's all a big game I juggled between two courses of how to attract users who buy into this game, offering the high storage or educating everyone. And really if I saw someone trying to educate me that I don't need something other hosts are offering, I would be tempted to think it was a cop out for not having such abilities. I'm a little lost on how to deal with this whole issue, but really if someone is going to use this much space for something good then why not?

About how to offer these features, I am backed (read 'hosted for free') by my partner, EvenHosting. We split profits and both gain traffic from the site. They are lead by a really nice guy, and very friendly. They are on their way up in the hosting world, and IsMyWebsite can help with that by forwarding people ready to advance to paid hosting to their service. I just go from years of being hosted on a free host and months of research into the competition and feedback from people like you.

It's about reliability, professionalism and how nice the person who is hosting you is. I always try and exchange emails and IMs with my hoster. It's about getting 'in touch' with your users, being flexible and treating them like you would if they were paying you.
Click to expand...
It lacks reliability and professionalism?

About communication, I agree with this, and will do this too. If you look into the IsMyWebsite process your website is reviewed as you build it and advance account types. The person who reviewed your site is there to answer any questions you have and help you succeed. Initially I will be the reviewer, but as it expands I will have to appoint a team of friendly and knowledgeable staff to help with this. I will communicate with them on a regular basis and they will report any troubles users are having they cannot solve themselves.

I see a lot of free hosters as amateur web designers struggling to get their good ideas out there in a way that everyone can understand them. They need guidance, which most free hosts do not provide. They need inspiration, which most free hosts do not provide. They need freedom to place their own ads, not generic automated ads that make their sites look ugly.

Don't offer stupid features, over quality service. Never!
Click to expand...
'Stupid' features do not mean poor service.

Edit: Have changed storage to 100 Mb, 1 Gb, 10 Gb, and 50 Gb. Bandwidth to 1 Gb, 10 Gb, 100 Gb, 500 Gb. Any thoughts on my site? http://www.ismywebsite.com/
 
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Many reasons why a person wont trust that "hosting" site.

1. Poor webdesign.
2. TLD Redirects to "http://www.azoundria.com/ismywebsite/index.php" :tired2:
3. Space and Bandwidth is a "think twice" before applying.
4. Free Domains? Thats called false advertisement. (Fix: SUB-DOMAIN) oldman2
5. Sooo many spelling mistakes.
6. And I have a very long list.
 
1) Well thats what I'm asking an opinion of here. I've never been really good at web design, but I think this is quite an improvement over my main site, http://www.azoundria.com/. Would be a big help if you could point me out what it is about my design that you don't like, because I think it looks good.

2) I actually don't have access to create the subdomains yet, that comes later when I connect the domain to EvenHosting's current setup. My current host charges for this service, so I'm just waiting for it to expire and reregister. I have temporarily set my domain to forward to this page I set up. But how do I explain this to visitors?

3) Ok. I have once again lowered storage and mention I can increase it if necessary. How low should I go?

4) How about 'Free Hosting' then or 'Free Website'? Which is best? Many people dont know what a subdomain is and it doesn't seem that catchy as a slogan.

5) Have spell checked my pages. Found a couple dozen errors, but its all fixed.

6) Ok lets hear them and thanks for your help.
 
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Thanks for the reply. The time you took over the response really showed a lot. (That's a positive remark! :) ).

I've browsed the site, here's what I think:

1. Tell the visitor what the site is. If I don't get what I want straight away I'm gone. Make it clear. It seems like you were giving away domains (in the logo and page header) and not hosting.

2. Improve the logo. Tad plain.

3. Improve the presentation of information. Use bold text to highlight information the reader needs. Use numbered lists - it's a guideline for the reader.

4. Better writing. No offense. Be clear, concise and sell your product. You only have one chance. If you're serious hire a freelance writer.

5. You're overusing graphics (all the titles). It loads slowly on a bad connection. People can't be bothered to wait.

6. Maybe add a splash of colour?

Hope that helped.
 
1) I'll change the 'slogan' to 'Everything you need to build a great website - free!' tonight.

2) I improved the logo a bit, but I'm not sure what else to in... I experimented with making each word a different colour and it didnt turn out good. Maybe you could suggest...

New Logo

3) I use numbered lists whenever possible and helpful, as for bold text it looks the same as my titles, so when those are all converted to images I can add more of it.

4) Can you be more specific as to what is not written well? It all makes sense to me, and for the most part sounds well written. But I am not very good at testing my own stuff.

5) I already put the titles in the 'alt' for people without images. Most people don't have the font on their PCs and I want it to display in it. I am working on lower resolution copies of the images, so that should cut it down quite a bit. Is there anything else I can do about this to make it load faster?

6) Where would be good for the splash of colour?
 
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Wish I could edit my post but I'll have to double post...

1) Changed the slogan to 'Everything to Build a Great Website - Free!'. Is this better? I think this is a good slogan. Anyways it's more accurate.

2) I don't know what to add in to spice it up. I have no emblem or symbol I can think of to add, and I did try having each word a different colour but it looked silly. If you have any ideas let me know.

3) I believe I have numbered my lists wherever possible, but will add a bit more formatting.

4) You're telling me my writing is not very good. Can you show me specific examples you don't like? Maybe what you have trouble understanding or why you don't like it.

5) I have lowered the resolution of some of the graphics by 4 times.

6) Again, I'm not very good at adding colour so it still looks professional. Where do you suggest?
 
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