Nobody can say that BrowseHosts.com isn’t one of the top spots to check when looking for a new Web host. They have listing upon listing of good, solid information that anybody could gain from. Not many people know that the person behind the work is Pinny. Pinny is one of the nicest Web hosting professionals I have met to date. After becoming a regular on the BrowseHosts forums, Pinny was always one to welcome my ideas with open arms. Pinny has done a lot for the world of Web hosting. When the chance to interview somebody came up, I couldn’t think of a better person to talk to than Pinny.
Mitch: Pinny, you have your fingers in a lot of the Web Hosting world’s proverbial pies. I believe BrowseHosts has become your most successful venture to date though. What is it that has made BrowseHosts so successful?
Pinny: Good day, Mitch. First of all, I’d like to thank you for choosing me for this interview. It’s quite an honor, considering your past content. BrowseHosts.com has become our most successful venture mostly because of the investment in the site, both in terms of time and money.
We have always tried to stay a step ahead of the pack with what we offer the Web hosts. I think our site was put up shortly before the large multitude of “turnkey” directories, and we profited greatly from beating them into the market. It was easier for us to be taken seriously before those sites cluttered the market with redundancy. Additionally, our popular forum, which has a non-hostile environment to it, attracts some of the most decent folks in the hosting industry. This has translated into rapid growth as word gets out.
Mitch: There are a lot of Web hosting directories out there today. What makes BrowseHosts so different?
Pinny: Yes, Mitch- there certainly ARE many hosting directories out there. What makes BrowseHosts so different is that we offer everything the other directories are afraid to offer: Full reporting for the pay per click listings, and great incentives to deposit. We have over 1,000 hosts currently registered in the PPC system, ranging from your “next door neighbor” all the way up to the “industry leaders”.
We have served out over 75,000 hosting leads since we started out in August of 2002. And I don’t want to forget that we offer a 100 percent Anti-Fraud guarantee, something which other PPCs have been slow to offer. Our largest difference is that we have our hosts’ listings being displayed on 25-30 of the highest quality webmaster/hosting related sites on the net. We have been able to make strategic partnerships with such great sites as WebHostGear.com, HostLead.com, and WebDesignHelper.co.uk- thereby allowing our hosts to get a very wide range of exposure for the same low price, while administrating the listings from one convenient control panel.
Mitch: Would you consider the competition in the Web hosting world these days to be good or bad? Are there too many hosts or not enough?
Pinny: I think there are many positive results that come out of this specific competition as well as many negative aspects. The good that comes out of this is that the larger or more effective hosts are forced to provide low prices and this is great for the customer. However, there are a fair share of hosts out there who have either very little or not enough knowledge about that which they are selling. This results in many customers not getting the support they deserve. I know of many webmasters and business owners who are very turned off from the hosting industry because of that. It reflects badly on the rest of the hosts, making their efforts less realized.
In each industry, we have forms of “self-policing” that are run by the industry leaders. For example, in the medicinal field, we have the American Medical Association (AMA); in the legal field we have the American Bar Association, and so on. Unfortunately, in the hosting industry, we don’t really have much self-policing. Whether it is because of a lack of initiative or because of difficulty monitoring an online field, we have too much lawlessness going around. There aren’t enough standards that are set.
This is a major hurdle the hosting industry needs to overcome if it is to last. The fact of the matter is that 95 percent of webmasters don’t understand a thing about hosting. They get overwhelmed by hundreds of different features hosts offer and seemingly minute differences between each host. I believe a way to fix this is to create some form of self-policing by the industry, to deter scam artists as well as promote certain ethical standards.
Mitch: The BrowseHosts forums have become an important part of the BrowseHosts Web site. Do you feel like the addition of the forums as helped you build a bigger sense of community?
Pinny: Yes, we have definitely been able to grow due to our forum’s success. We gambled by not making a separate forum and PPC service and ended up winning big. Most of the successful forums out there today have been just that- only forums. We have been able to bring a community feel to our company through our forum, leading to more brand recognition and customer trust than would have been possible through divergent sites.
Mitch: Earlier I noted that you have expanded into some other areas of Web hosting. What are some of the bigger projects you are looking forward to rolling out in 2005?
That is it for part one of this interview with Pinny. Be sure to stay tuned for the second half of this conversation with a real leader in the Web hosting community.
