My 27-Year Web Host Journey: How Are GoDaddy & Namecheap?
As part of my journey as an online entrepreneur… an “ontrepreneur” (someone thought of that before me)… is to have a website and a website host. Let me describe my nearly 3 decades of website hosting experiences.
Over the years I’ve had a few sites. I can’t remember where I hosted my first site called silicus.com. It might have been through an Internet Service Provider I worked at called Linkeasy.net.
It was sometime in the late 1990s. Silicus was a word I invented that combines the words “silicon” and “abacus” (my fancy way of saying a silicon-chip-based computer in a different way).
I should’ve held onto that domain because a company called Silicus Technologies registered it in October 2000, after I let it go!
Even now, Silicus.com is worth around $1,000 (per Saw.com). In its heyday, Silicus Technologies might have given me good money for that domain!
That company was acquired in 2019. Now the domain redirects to the parent InfoGain and the domain is still being held by someone, probably InfoGain.
I also thought of registering Polanski.com back in the late 1990s, and I should have! Polanski.com is worth $13,000 (per EstiBot.com). Perhaps that’s partially due to the famous/infamous Oscar-winning director Roman Polanski (no relation to me).
Fast forward to July of 2009, and I missed having a website. I heard it was good just to secure your own name as a domain in case you’d like to have a personal or business website.
I wanted polanski.com but that was taken. At least charlespolanski.com was available, and I’ve had it ever since. I went with GoDaddy.com as my web host.
GoDaddy has worked well over the past 14 years. They have really nice support. You can get on a live chat or a phone call, 24/7!
I’ve never noticed any downtime with them. I even made a goof one time that wiped my database, but they had their own backup I was able to use to restore my site. (I just had to pay for that enhanced service of a full week of backups instead of my previous plan of just one day of backups on the site.)
I learned you should always download your own copy of the full website including its databases before performing any big changes!
In June 2020, I registered chuckski.com. This was to separate my business from my personal stuff. I also used GoDaddy as a web host. (Times change and now I’ve decided to use charlespolanski.com for building an email list where I offer various prosperity creating products as an affiliate).
To improve performance and save a little money, I moved charlespolanski.com to Namecheap in late 2023. Namecheap also has excellent support. It is 24/7 via online chat.
They were recommended to me by Igor Kheifets, in his E-Farming Program. They appear to be more catered to online marketers while GoDaddy is more for a general audience.
Which web hosts have you used? Any thoughts or recommendations?
I’m happy to recommend Namecheap or GoDaddy. Go and at least register your last name or full name with a .com, at least!
Be prosperous,
Charles
