For those of you who always wanted to start your own website, be it a travel blog, e-commerce website, media portfolio website, or just a personal blog, this article might interest you. Since I started Travel Inspiration 360, I have been paying tons of monies and hosting it on a US-based, international web hosting company. While readers may take just 5 to 10 minutes on average to read an online article, they may not realise the huge cost, time, and effort that goes into writing that article, plus maintaining a website. After struggling with my previous web-hosting company, I finally left and migrated my entire website to Exabytes Singapore. Here are my 10 Reasons Why I Migrated Travel Inspiration 360 Website To Exabytes!
It’s always easy to start a business or a website, but the hardest part is to maintain your position. To give you an idea, below is a list of factors to consider to maintain a website:
- Hosting space (usually very small and expensive)
- Domain name
- Security of the website + enhancing security periodically
- Backing up the website in case *touch wood, in case you need to do back up recovery due to hacking of website (by the way it happened twice to me)
- Website bandwidth and speed
- Email accounts and spam/hack protection
- SSL certificate
- User-friendly control panel (also need it to be fast and not slow!)
- Monthly subscription and additional charges (I paid nearly $2,000 SGD every year for hosting Travel Inspiration 360)
- Good customer service to fix problems that arise from hacking, security, backup, or most than often just fixing bugs from new version patches or updates!
- Other factors – like Content Management System (CMS), Secure global network services like Cloudflare, etc
The above list is quite a lot to digest and that may not even be the full suite of items you need, therefore creating a website is not as straightforward as you might think, and maintaining the website is even worse! While it is as daunting as it may sound, it’s also critical for businesses or travel writers to have a website in this day and age, as it’s a digital shopfront or platform to reach out to more consumers/readers. As for me, without my Travel Inspiration 360 website, there won’t be Keith Yuen travelling around the world, and sharing the voices of the unheard with you!
My struggles with my previous web-host
For the past 8 years since I started Travel Inspiration 360, I have engaged services with a large US-based web-hosting company. To be honest, they did provide good services during the early years but it has been getting more and more expensive to continue the service with them. Even to the extent, where I felt like I was being held hostage by them. My website was hacked twice and each time I had to fork out thousands of dollars to engage the overseas IT tech support to help resolve and recover the damages to my website. Due to the time differences between Singapore and the US, fixing these website problems was a complete nightmare as my website could be down for many hours before they start working on the problem.
Why I Decided To Migrate My Website To Exabytes.sg
I always heard about Exabytes, but I also fear migrating Travel Inspiration 360 website as I have over 200 pages, thousands of images, and files. While I was worried about files going missing, I was also concerned about the tedious process of migrating, unmatching platforms, slow speed, and my biggest worry were about losing my well-established Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) ranking. When I received another costly $2,000 bill from my previous web hosting company, that was my last straw and I know it was time for me to make a daring move to migrate. I was inspired by the Wildebeasts who risk their lives and migrate twice within Serengeti National Park and Maasai Mara each year, seeking a better life. I believe Travel Inspiration 360 will also get better. haha (I hope) So, I decided to give Exabytes a try, knowing they were quite reputable in Asia & Singapore. Here’s my experience.
#1 Friendly Customer Service
First of all, it takes months to find a customer, but it only takes seconds to lose one. Customer service is the core consideration for picking a good web host. Especially when my IT knowledge has kinda perished, faded or I should say way past its “expiry date” for about 20 years! haha If IT is not your forte, you definitely need a lot of help and guidance. Time and patience are well appreciated. Exabytes has extensive team members who (so far according to my experience) are very professional and patient.
#2 Customer Care & Follow Up (They Do Care For You)
Exabytes do not wait for things to happen, they pro-actively look out for you! Yes, I was particularly impressed when Exabytes sent me things to look out for and gave me a list of things to pay attention to. They don’t just take my money and wait for you to contact them. They really take care and handles the website as much as they could and spare you the pain so you can concentrate on your other vital tasks. Initially, I was worried that my SEO would be affected, but they addressed my concern and even did a pre-migration check and reassured me that my SEO position will not be affected after the migration.
#3 Transfer Was A Breeze By Professionals
The best experience was actually when they perform the actual migration. Perhaps my anxiety level was very high due to the word “migration”. I was worried about many things. When preparing for the migration, I imagined it to be as troublesome as moving houses, having so much to be done or rectified during the tedious and complicated process. Turns out, my concerns are unfounded. Within a few days, my website has fully migrated without any issues. Amazing as it sounds, I was delighted. I did receive many emails from Exabytes, but these were just updates on the migration process. They did everything so efficiently and smoothly!
#4 Fast and Promptness
The website migration by Exabytes was seamless and smooth like butter. I recall contacting Exabytes using their chat feature on one occasion because of a plug-in update issue on WordPress (which is a common problem) and merely waited less than 5 minutes, and I was attended by one of their customer service representative, Theo. In comparison with my previous web host, the average chat waiting time was about 5 minutes during low peak, and 45 minutes during high peak. So far, Exabytes was swift in replying. Even though Theo didn’t manage to help me resolve my issues on the spot, they resolved everything within 2 hours. I received an email update on my problem and their resolution to the issues. Everything was a breeze. All I did was just copy and paste the screenshot onto the chat. Easy breezy!
#5 Professional 24 Hours, 7 Days, 365 A Year Technical Support
Here’s the thing, I have contacted Exabytes on a few occasions, and Exabytes was able to reply to my queries promptly even when I contacted them at different times of the day. It can be the middle of the night, early morning, or afternoon tea time. It shows their 24/7 helpdesk service promise is real and they take customer service seriously. Well, I certainly haven’t gained enough experience for the 365 days support part, but 24/7 support so far is a resounding YES! Let me update their services again after I clock a year! 🙂
#6 SEO Not Affected
When it comes to my biggest hurdle or barrier to changing my website host, my major worry is about destroying my SEO after the website migration. I personally did some tests and found out that my SEO wasn’t affected much at all. I was so grateful and thankful that the keyword search works well. My only regret was that I didn’t migrate much earlier which could have potentially saved so much money and pain over the past eight years!
#7 User-Friendly & Fast Interface
Once I have migrated my website, I logged in to the Exabytes.sg interface for the first time, and immediately I am able to navigate through the system. It was fast, swift, and efficient! I guess a well-established web hosting website needs to understand the basic website building design principles: Learnability (Familiarity), Visibility (Simplicity), Efficiency (Precisive), Error Prevention (Contextualise), and User Control and Freedom (Controllability). What I appreciate the most is the user-friendliness and speed of the interface, I didn’t need to spend too much time understanding the entire system.
#8 Unbeatable Price
Now, this reason is obvious! One of my major reason for moving is the cost! And why did I choose Exabytes? They simply have the most competitive pricing in the market. Need I say more? Just google it! Exabytes, please continue to stick to your pricing strategy, it works for many of us!
#9 No Hidden Cost – Package Deals
There are no sneaky hidden costs with Exabytes’ packages! My previous experience with the web host was a complete nightmare, every time issues arose, it was paying time. I kept paying for something that went wrong with the website and the previous web host left me with no choice but to upgrade my website features or space.
With Exabyte, there are no hidden costs, and everything is covered with lifetime services. You just need to choose your package according to your business need.
#10 Reputable Brand
Exabytes take pride in its reputation for reliability and is confident in its range of quality products and services. They are one of the rare web hosts who can offer 30 Days Money Back Guarantee. That goes to show how much confidence they have in their products and services. If anything goes wrong (touch wood) and you are dissatisfied with their service, you know there is an “out” within 30 days. haha
My Verdict For Exabytes & Its Promotion And Services
Overall, I am pleasantly surprised by Exabytes’ excellent services. I personally like to thank Kim from Exabytes for her swift replies, patience, and professionalism, and her wonderful teammates to help me migrate my website. If you are in the dilemma of migrating your website or even starting your own website, why not give Exabytes a chance? These are my honest verdict on my new web hosting. I hope next year, my tone remains! But for now, all is well! 🙂
Thanks to Exabytes, Travel Inspiration 360 is happy to share the following promotion and services with you! Visit Exabytes.sg for promotion more!
WordPress Hosting
- Free Lifetime Domain
- Free WordPress Course
- Super Speed Websites with Litespeed on SSD drive
- Complete with Website Security360 protection
- Link > https://go.exabytes.sg/h71tmG
Promotion (Check Out Exabytes For Promotions)
Your website is the window of your business. Keep it fresh, keep it exciting! ~ Jay Conrad Levinson
11 comments
Insightful 😊
🙂
Sounds like Exabytes is really a good choice
Yea it is a good choice if you are looking for a web hosting…
Thanks for sharing your experience, Keith! Exabytes sounds like an amazing web hosting company to use. I’ll consider migrating my website with your promo code. 😊👍
Thanks Roberto! You are very welcome! 🙂
Great, I am thinking to start from here
Thanks For Sharing
Thanks for sharing your experience, Keith
Great, I am thinking to start from here
Nice suggestions, but I would like to suggest the local taste in your chart.