I’m going to let you in on a little secret: You’re being lied to.
It’s true!
One of the worst-kept secrets in web hosting is that most reviews are fake, paid for by hosting companies.
When they’re not paying for fake five-star reviews on their own services, they’re paying for fake one-star reviews on those of their competitors.
Some of the bigger and more infamously unethical hosts simply bribe people with large sums of money and then let them do their dirty work.
Unfortunately, normal people – the ones not working in hosting – don’t realise this until it’s too late.
So here are some quick tips to help you to avoid getting fooled:
1. Repetition:
Are you looking at a website that lists the same 5-10 “best” web hosts as other sites?
If it talks about 1+1, Bluehost, HostGator and the like then the odds are it’s fake.
The web hosting industry is very large, and legitimate sites usually list both companies you’ve heard of and those you haven’t.
2. Length and depth:
Fake user reviews are often short, with zero details and lots of praise.
Legitimate reviews should look like Amazon reviews, not company slogans.
Make sure that they’re tied back to a real name and a real company as well.
3. Grammar:
Do all the reviews share a similar usage of letters (such as all-caps), the same punctuation styles and similar word choices?
If they look familiar, the same person probably wrote all of them.
Either that or they were created on mass by bots.
Final Takeaway:
As always, not everything on the internet is true!
But with a little common sense and the knowledge that not everything is as it seems, you should be able to tell the genuine reviews from those that are faked for marketing purposes.
Of course, if you’re in the market for a new web host then we’ll be more than happy to help.
We can point you in the direction of real reviews from our customers, but we can also put you in touch with a few directly if you’d like to hear it from the horse’s mouth.
Happy hosting!
