Recently I’ve noticed a disturbing trend among some of the bloggers I know. It seems that nearly every one of them have suddenly become experts on starting a blog or using WordPress - and you are incredibly lucky, because now they want to help you start a blog, too! Doesn’t that sound exciting?
Well, maybe not.
A new client approached me last week for help with her blog. Funny enough, she started blogging with the free “help” of one of my own clients. Let me break that down for you. One of my clients, who paid me to install WordPress and a theme just a few months ago because they didn’t know how to do it, is now offering to help others start a blog. Am I the only one who sees red flags here?
Here’s what happened. New Client registered a domain and signed up for hosting under Existing Client’s guidance, using Existing Client’s affiliate links. New Client purchased a premium WordPress theme and several premium plugins, again using Existing Client’s affiliate links. New Client even got Existing Client to design a free “logo” that is nothing more than clip art and text from MS Word. And now New Client has no idea what to do with any of it.
So after all that “free” help, this person is stuck with a slow site on a crappy host, a premium theme that has recently been abandoned by its developers, an ugly logo, and a bunch of plugins she doesn’t even need. And she is now paying me to teach her to use WordPress because the person who was such a blogging expert couldn’t give her the tools she needs to do what she wanted to do all along - start and grow a blog.
Nothing in This Life is Free
If you’re not paying for something, you’re not the customer; you’re the product being sold.
I understand bloggers wanting to earn money. I really do. And I understand the desire to do that through affiliate links - I use them myself. What I don’t understand is offering a “service” that is (1) beyond one’s scope and (2) doesn’t help the recipients of that service in the long run.
I am an affiliate for a handful of products that I use every day in my development work. I don’t recommend them just because I’ll make a certain amount of money from referrals - that isn’t helpful to anyone. But the biggest difference between me and some of the people I see offering free blog help is the fact that my recommendations are based on years of experience.
Let’s take web hosting as an example, since that’s one of the most common ways bloggers try to earn an affiliate income. (Like Pat Flynn from Smart Passive Income, who makes over $20k a month referring his readers to Bluehost, one of the worst hosts on the planet.) If a blogger you follow is recommending a certain host, you should ask yourself a few questions before you click that blogger’s affiliate link:
- How many hosts has this person used? If this is their first website and they’ve had it for 4 months, are they really qualified to say their host is better than any other?
- What factors are they using to evaluate the host? It’s not enough to say, “I’ve hosted here for a year and I’ve never had any problems.” Does this person even know enough about servers and hosting to recognize what problems may look like? How can you say a host has “great customer service” if you’ve never talked to their customer service reps?
- Does the person still host there? I mentioned Pat Flynn above. Now, I have met Pat and I have a tremendous amount of respect for him, but I dislike the way he touts Bluehost. His sites outgrew shared hosting a LONG time ago and he no longer uses Bluehost at all. So how can he recommend a host that he doesn’t even use himself?
- Are the “features” mentioned even really features? Nothing grinds my gears like seeing a recommendation for a host that is supposed to be great because they offer a one-click WordPress installation. Here’s a hint: ALL hosts offer a one-click WordPress installation. That’s not a reason to choose a host.
So let’s say you follow the advice of John Q Blogger or Pat Flynn and sign up with Bluehost. If you stick around awhile, you’ll realize very quickly that (1) your site is slow, (2) their custom CPanel layout is redundant and confusing, and (3) their customer service reps aren’t very knowledgeable. You’ll also find out that you have to pay extra for things like full CPanel backups. Oh, and there’s the fact that you have to prepay for your hosting account at least a year in advance.
What did you get for following that “free” advice? A hosting service that people are leaving in droves (just search for Bluehost on Twitter). And while you’re trying to figure out if you can get a refund and go elsewhere (you can), the blogger whose link you clicked just made $65. And s/he doesn’t care what kind of experience you have with Bluehost because s/he already got paid.
The Problem with Free Advice
The great thing about the internet is that anyone can start a website or YouTube channel and literally become famous. (However, that doesn’t mean everyone can, so don’t fool yourself into thinking you’ll be the next Marie Forleo.)
The bad thing about the internet is that anyone can say anything they want, whether or not it’s true. So someone who knows nothing about WordPress or coding or graphics can say they’re a web designer, take your money, and rip you off. Someone who is an intermediate blogger at best can offer you the opportunity to click his or her affiliate links as part of his/her “free” WordPress help, with no concept of whether or not those products and services are best for your needs.
Having the universe at our fingertips has made us lazy. People fail to do adequate research before opening their wallets or clicking a link - if you need proof, just look at all the random scams people repost on Facebook. Because of things like that, people with legitimate businesses and the knowledge to be a real help to you often get pushed aside in favor of whatever people think will allow them to make money on the internet with no effort or expenses.
People who actually know things aren’t going to tell you what they know for free. Think about your career and the time it took to gain experience, as well as the money you might have spent on training or college degrees. Would you do your job if you weren’t getting paid? Most people wouldn’t, unless they were getting something out of it.
The Bottom Line
It seems like everyone wants to escape his/her day job, earn a living online, and become some kind of internet guru. It’s easy to look at someone’s blog posts about all their online income and think, Hey, I could do that! Often, though, what you don’t see is the real breakdown of where that money comes from. If a blogger earns thousands of dollars a month from sponsored blog posts, for instance, you have to ask yourself whether that’s a sustainable business model.
If someone wants to help you get started blogging or making money on the internet, you need to take time to understand what’s in it for them. No one works for free, myself included - if a person is helping you, you can bet s/he is benefiting somehow. If you’re okay with that, by all means, accept all the free help you want! Just don’t be disappointed if the results aren’t quite what you expect.
Comments are now closed for this article.
Great article. I agree with most of it. The blue host referral thing is pretty sad. You now have a bunch of people / bloggers who work hard to build up their own credibility and actually do offer some decent tips only to destroy their own credibility by referring blue host because it pays them the most. You are spot on here.
Thanks for writing it / saying it/ pointing it out etc.
🙂
It always makes me sad to see people I respect selling out like that, especially when they aren’t recommending based on their own experience. Now the trend seems to be using affiliate links for WPEngine (another one I’ve had awful experiences with on behalf of clients) because they pay out $150 per referral. :/
I am not defending what Pat Flynn is doing, but if you look at his monthly earnings from Bluehost, you would have your answer. He is pulling in more in a month than some people make in a year.
Would you toss that kind of money aside on principal?
That’s a good point, and one I can certainly appreciate. Would I personally toss that money aside? Yes and no - I would instead recommend a host I could actually stand behind that provided good service. He could earn just as much promoting a decent hosting company.
May I ask why you guys don´t like the Bluehost? I personally never used their services. Only companies I have worked with are Go Daddy, Media Temple and Hostgator. They all have some negatives and I am just wondering which category Blue host would fall under???
In my experience, Bluehost has horrible customer service, long wait times to even speak to anyone, unknowledgeable techs, and overloaded/ancient servers. They are owned by the same giant company that bought Hostgator a few years ago (which is when Hostgator started going downhill) and owns probably 90% of the hosting companies anyone has ever heard of. The list of EIG-owned hosts (all of which should be avoided) is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endurance_International_Group
Woaaaw. I really didn´t know that they were owned by another company. I wonder how they can still brag about their hand built servers which they optimize so carefully for speed and performance.
Based on my experience, I can say that Go Daddy does a pretty good job for the money and if you want something more specialized, I would recommend either Media Temple or RackSpace.
By the way, all this free advice BS is nothing but a repackaged ancient content just with a different name on it.
The best system is always the one you create for yourself.
Thanks to this article, I searched around for website hosts that were not owned by EIG. Finally settled on Arvixe and I was about to set up an account with them this week! The sad news is that they were recently bought out by EIG. I’m going to take your recommendation and try Big Scoots.
Oh no! I’m sad to hear that another host is joining the EIG conglomerate. Hopefully you found out prior to the move.
Yes I did! Thanks for this post!
I agree with your concern about inexperienced people on the web “selling” their advice through bad recommendations and affiliate links. It seems that you only have to know a little more than the next guy to make a buck off him.
However, I do not agree with your assessment of BlueHost services. I have been a BlueHost customer since 2007 after leaving two other hosting companies that offered horrendous services. To address your concerns, the cPanel is not a mess and is very easy to navigate. It is a pretty typical setup for a shared hosting account. Prepaying for hosting on a shared hosting account is not only normal, but makes good business sense given the number of new websites that start and quickly close up shop. Also, I know of only a couple shared hosting accounts that offer full cPanel backups.
I can’t actually speak to the issue of speed as I’ve not compared my sites to other shared hosting speeds. But I can speak to the tech support. Bad support is the reason I left the other hosting providers. BlueHost, with only one exception, has answered my support calls (of which there have been a few dozen over the years) within 3-5 minutes. And I’ve never had an issue that they did not resolve in one call. There is also something to be said for tech support from native English speakers.
Regarding EIG now owning BlueHost and multiple other hosting companies, I don’t think that alone is a reason to criticize them. However, I would agree that this is something to watch. A few weeks ago I had my first tech support call that required a wait of nearly 10 minutes. That was a first and I assumed it was an anomaly. But I am watching to see if services degrade given the new corporate structure. However, I’m not assuming thing will get worse, I’m just paying attention given my recent experience. Nonetheless, they helped me solve my problem in minutes.
One last thing, thank you for the comment about one-click installs. It’s not only NOT a unique feature, it really bad practice. One-click installs create generic WP database prefixes and are simply terrible for creating secure websites.
Thanks for letting me share a different opinion about BlueHost, and here’s my affiliate link….just kidding. : )
Hi Jim,
Thanks for sharing your experience! I’m glad to hear that Bluehost has been good for you so far, and I really do hope that continues. It doesn’t mirror the experiences of many other people I know, so I hope it’s a trend.
I’ve had some really terrible dealings with Bluehost on behalf of clients, and I’m especially wary of them after several extended outages last year that affected a few of the designers I work with. I do think their support staff are very friendly and courteous, and I agree with you 100% re: getting a native English speaker on the other end of the phone. I think they are still in a position to turn things around, so it will be interesting to see what happens.
WOW! I am just beginning to entertain Ideas of going into business for myself as a freelance designer as coding and designing has been a passion of mine for a long time. Still learning a thing or two at the moment i must admit. So very glad I stumbled upon your site somehow. Last year I actually signed up with blue host because I stumbled upon Pat Flynn! Learn something new everyday I guess. Apparently I have lots more to learn but am eager and definitely willing to do so.
Hi Rich,
If you’re having a good experience with Bluehost, that’s all that matters. I’ve had some really poor examples of customer service and support on behalf of clients, but definitely don’t let me make you second-guess yourself.
There’s a lot of work available if you want it! Hope to see you out there outbidding me for dev work soon. 🙂
Thank you so much for this article. I just came across your website when searching for “what hosting company is Pat Flynn using”.
If he recommends them and speaks highly of them, how come he’s not using them? how can he outgrow them? don’t they have dedicated servers?
Don’t get me wrong, I love SPI. I learned so much from his podcast. But this makes me doubt any service/product he recommends.
We’ve been having an issue with Bluehost that hasn’t been resolved in 3 days. Every time we call we have to wait on the line for at least 45 min and the line was disconnected a couple of times after waiting for nearly an hour!
Also, our sites have been slow of a while now.
We’re not sure which hosting company to go with…I didn’t realize a lot of the hosting companies are owned by a single entity.
I don’t necessarily have a problem with someone recommending a service/product they don’t use IF they disclose that upfront and explain why. For example, my sites are hosted with Cloudways and I’m very happy there. However, Cloudways requires a bit more tech knowledge than your average host, so I don’t recommend it to people who are just starting out or don’t want to deal with the server end of things. I’ve had a lot of experience with Siteground and find them to be excellent when it comes to uptime and support, so I recommend them for most people who ask.
I’m an affiliate for both hosting companies because I believe they are great, not because they offer the highest commissions (they don’t by a long shot). But nowhere do I claim to host with Siteground; in fact, the one post on my site with affiliate links to both hosts mentions exactly what I just said above. I want anyone clicking that link to understand that, while I don’t host with Siteground, I do have recent and ongoing experience with them and think they are great, especially for beginners. I don’t understand why Pat isn’t more forthcoming with the reasons he moved away from Bluehost and why he still recommends them, especially since things have gone downhill so badly since the last time he hosted there.