Dotster review

Dotster features

» Free domain name for the first term.

» Lots of new TLDs. Very useful in today’s market because most of the (dot) com and other popular TLDs have already been used.

» Hosting is available for both Windows and Linux platforms.

» 24/7/365 support via phone, live chat, their vast knowledgebase and email tickets.

» Do-it-yourself website builders.

» Unlimited sites.

» Unlimited disc space.

» Hosting for WordPress sites.

» The servers are housed in the U.S.A.

» There are lots of installs available such as: Drupal, Joomla, MediaWiki and Magento.

Dotster’s commitment to its customers is a significant feature. This commitment has three main prongs.

One-on-one customer care: You have access to some of the best services and products that you would expect from a company that’s among the largest in its field. Despite that, you receive the type of customer care you want from a company that respects small business owners.

Innovative services and products available being pushy: You won’t face unwanted advertising or people trying to offer you extra upsell products or services you don’t want or need. Instead, the focus is on delivering secure solutions, innovative products as they become available (in addition to existing options) and believable deals.

Full range of solutions for your every need: As a company that has been in business for 15 years, you have full access to experts who will provide everything you need all in one place. This includes hosting, domain names, custom website designs and business emails. It’s a one-stop-shop to help you create your own long-term web presence, confident that Dotster is also in it for the long haul.

Your site(s) are secure with Dotster because of existing multiple backups, redundancies, fire-protection, earthquake protection, humidity and temperature monitoring, video monitoring 24/7/365 and much, much more.

The company has a new solution for marketing called Local Site Promotion. This has numerous features including:

» Targeting specific areas geographically.

» Budget-friendly options.

» Only pay for results, not impressions.

» Tracking campaigns, creating special offers and making search engines work in your favor.

Hosting types and plans

Dotster is unlike other hosting companies with its plans. There are three shared plans for Linux users. There are different three shared plans for Windows users.

You may prefer to use VPS so you have access to a dedicated server without the big price tag.

Dotster can custom design your website if you wish. There are other packages available for that.

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Customer support and help

» Extensive knowledge base and user guides.

» Live chat.

» Ticketing support.

» Phone support.

» Video clip tutorials.

» If you’re an Ultra Plan subscriber, you get “premium support” that gives you access to a toll-free phone number and faster response times.

» The company uses Facebook and Twitter for many of its interactions with customers. However, if you require technical support, you must ring them or submit a ticket.

Money-back guarantee

Dotster offers a 30-day money-back guarantee if you’re unhappy with the service. However, they will charge at least $35 as an early cancellation fee. The refund only applies if you use a credit card.

There’s no refund after 30 days of use.

Dotster offers 99.9% uptime and if you do have downtime, you’ll receive service credits as compensation.

Bonuses/Extras

When joining or adding new sites to your business, you get your domain name for free for the first term.

You get an extra 1 GB of free storage in the Cloud for videos, images and music.

The company provides $100 worth of Google Adwords advertising credits and another $100 for Yahoo and Bing advertising.

Pros and Cons

So, is Dotster any good?

Pros

» Dotster is rated a B from the Better Business Bureau.

» Unrestricted monthly bandwidth and disc storage space.

» You gain access to a range of applications and a 1-click piece of software for easy installations.

» Listed as advance tools, you have access to a web analytics tool, a drag and drop site builder and a filter to eliminate spam.

Cons

» Site seems difficult to navigate compared to other hosting providers.

» There’s no cPanel. There is a custom control panel that takes a lot of getting used to.

» The basic hosting plan only allows for one small blog and a single domain on a single account. It also only allows for 100 email addresses, 10 MYSQL databases and 5 FTP logins.

» There has been a lot of negative feedback about the loading speed of their pages.

» Others have complained about the efficiency and quality of support offered by the Dotster experts. Generic answers to specific problems was also listed as a major concern.

Summary

Dotster is certainly a successful hosting provider but it has quite a few idiosyncrasies when compared to other providers. As with all hosting sites, it’s critical to do your own due diligence before making any sort of commitment. Money should never be the only deciding factor.

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Dotster plans & prices

Dotster offers shared hosting and VPS hosting. Here below is an overview of their plans and current price list. For latest and most up to date prices visit Dotster’s website.

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