COMMENTS
I agree. I think they are way over the top. Can you advise what service you use for your Captcha? I like it - easy to read. Ours is way to complicated.
I agree, it's ridiculous. And yet... that's where I went to buy a domain. They do a good job of getting new users, but they sure piss them off once they've got them.
I agree, the GoDaddy checkout process is lazy salesmanship and distasteful. But keep in mind the man behind GoDaddy used to sell accounting software via catalog advertisements for $10. Bob Parsons has never had any tact and never will.
More interested in the Go Daddy Girl, than a good customer experience.
I have to say I hired godaddy's hosting services and his support it's wasted. Lucky me, I just threw a month of my money. If you need a hosting choose anyone but goddady.
Last night I sent 100 mails to this so called support service, nothing, no one answer me.
Great way to loose a customer.
it ain't that hard at dotster.com. my question isn't 'why write an article about this?' but, 'why put yourself through this at all?'
Bob parson, a republican, has a blog where he justifies the iraq war. I moved on to another registrar.
I will say GoDaddy's support has left me wanting more but their checkout process is not all that bad...assuming you know how to use the internet and just skip all the add-on options.
I disagree. I have a 3 step checkout process. You just have to know how to skip. and I get support within 24 hours. and phone support is even better.
I like GoDaddy, but this is so true and has always just pissed me off.
I agree and I have used GoDaddy. The checkout process is horrible. Pretty brainless. It's obviously working so they have found no need to change the process, but imagine how many people have been turned off as a result. A usability specialist would be more suitable than a marketer here. And why the 10,000 offers? Now, not even I as a marketer have a good reason for this. It's the mass catchall approach, which we have learned does not really work. What happened to targeting your audience? Perhaps Daddy just needs to Go.
I can tell you GoDaddy is not a Domain Registrar internally. They are a marketing firm who just happens to register domains. They did the same thing as Parson's Technology. Marketing Firm that just happened to sell software. I can tell you first hand that the marketing staff is not genius. Great article!!
I moved my 10+ domains away from Go Daddy because of the checkout process. Any company that designs a checkout process to try to trick you into accepting addons and additional services is bound to do other similiar and worse crap in the future. So instead of waiting around and finding this out, I've just moved on.
Service and reliability is far more important than a couple of saved dollars. My current registrar is only slightly more expensive but I'm pleased with their ***professionalism*** and services.
Also, I never got the Bob Parsons cult that Go Daddy has tried to build. I mean, I couldn't possibly care less what the heck the CEO thinks about freedom of speech, the Iraq War, etc. Just shut up already and stop bragging about your military service - it's not honorable.
I totally agree with you. Godaddy's site and my account and checkout process is so confusing. But their prices are almost irresistable! Sometimes, I give up and just call them. Its so much easier on the phone. Oh, no 1-800 number? What a bunch of cheapos.
try Gochaddy.com its better.
(for ecommerce sites)
Yeah this is funny, I was just thinking about this a few days ago when i renewed a couple domains.. it is just awful that they put people through all that.. it was about half that before and I thought it was bad then, but now it's just a big pain to do anything like that.. then again I don't se anywhere that they say they offer fast service.. just every other offer that I could care less about, I mean if I wanted it I woudl order it.. what bugs me most is that they are trying to sell me things that I already have sometimes, at least they could tailor it to the specific customer with what might actually be useful to them
one word: 1&1 http://www.1and1.com/
cheaper, faster and way easier. And you get private listing for your domains for free.
Remember the GoDaddy TV commercial with the hot girls on the table in the marketing department? That must be really be how their marketing department is like, since these monkeys don't seem to be doing much.
the marketing dept must stink... somebody needs to tell them Danica Patrick sucks!!!
Try to register a .es domain. You'll see!
I started moving my domains away from GoDaddy about a year ago. For some reason they made it impossible to renew for only a single year, unless I called their support line and gave them a chance to talk me into more. I think they have reinstated one-year online renewals (I wouldn't know) but they've already lost my loyalty.
I gladly supported GoDaddy because of their David and Goliath battle with Verisign. But now that they're Goliath, Parson and his crew seem to be doing everything in their power to emulate Verisign.
I thought it was because I was high that it took me all night to register my first website.. $38 dollars later I still had ads.. I guess I didn't notice the other $43 I had to pay for the year among all the ads.
I PHONED them. Worked great!
You forgot to mention that, after this 16-step process, you'll also receive 2 or 3 phone calls from a GoDaddy sales rep, asking if you're REALLY sure you want to transfer this domain, or if you need any other services with your order... I used to love GoDaddy. I abondoned NetworkSolutions for them years ago... Doesn't GoDaddy understand or want to learn anything from the mistakes of their competitors? Oh well... Someone in GoDaddy Marketing is getting paid very well, to destroy their product and service - much the same as has happened to so many other sites and desktop software... This excessive marketing is no better than spam -- and these are their EXISTING customers who have ALREADY paid for something!
I hate godaddy as well. I highly recommend namecheap.com. They keep things simple(and no, I don't work for them, just love their service).
I feel ya brother. I have been doing the hoop jumping for years. I think at this point I am the dumb one for not finding a better domain registrar, but its a huge hassle to move a ton of domain names and expensive.
they do have a tedious checkout, and many things on their site are annoying, but once you get used to how it works it is easy to just ignore most of it. I think I can get through a registration now in just a few minutes but it is hard on the eyes.
I think if you cant figure out the godaddy checkout process, after one try....you shouldn't be buying domain names and hosting. These steps are ridiculous #14 read captcha code, #15 type captcha code in. yeah that defiantly required 2 steps. sheesh
Heh, couldn't help but chuckle at this. But to answer your question:
<blockquote>What do you think? If you were the head of marketing at GoDaddy would you change their checkout process?</blockquote>
I likely wouldn't as long as I get more positive results (read: more moolah) than negative ones. It's called "upsell like hell".
So true! I still don't know if I have any domains from GoDaddy or not. I think I registered a few last year but the whole process was so complicated that I never want to see a page created by the GoDaddy team ever again. They make all their money by getting Diggnation to falsely toute how great their service is. Yeah, I'm sure if I were friends with Kevin Rose and had a personal relationship with GoDaddy they'd treat me well too. Take a pass.
> It's called "upsell like hell"
It's closer to "come see the amazing egress" or "pump and dump" or "click here - enlarge you penis NOW!" ... which is to say, you CAN make money that way, but probably not as much as a consumer focused company. And while it may seem easier to go for the quick sell, you have to stress and deal with angry customers (or avoid them and get sued).
That's why you have to vote with your dollars. I stopped registering my domains with GoDaddy years ago for this exact reason - i now use namecheap.com and 1and1.com almost exclusively. I still have 5-6 domains registered with GoDaddy that I keep forgetting to move over before the expire. One of these days I'll be totally GoDaddy free!
I had a number of domains that were about to be expired. I turned off autorenewel (received the confirmation emails).
The next day I was charged for these domains. I had to call to find out what was happening. I was told that they were business services associated with the domains. I quickly received a refund but question goDaddy's business ethics moving forward.
When you cancel domain autorenewel - it means cancelling everything associated with the domain (since there are NO options to cancel other incidental charges associated with the domain).
Throw in a flood of emails (almost daily) with 'special offers' and this company is doing nothing but hurting itself.
Yes, you are not a marketing person! Their is a known secret for the amount of times that a person needs to see something before it gets embedded into their brain. This is the reason why you are always bombarded. It's clever marketing, but annoying to NON-Novice users (as yourself)
I just love how people can't decide if they want customer service or not. So you think the check out process is hard huh? Did you ever stop to read the screen? And for those who say they didn't get good service. Did you include information that would be considered helpful to resolving your problem? Did you ever think that sending 100+ emails and expecting a 2 second response was idiotic? Did you call in with none of your information and berate the person on the phone? If you don't want to get marketing emails - opt out. Stop being so lazy and expecting everyone else to think for you. The stupidity of the average person amazes me.
This is too funny. I am removing all my domains from GoDaddy. They have worked my last nerve after playing game after game. Their ecommerce system is a joke. Customer service is a joke. Trying to get anything done with this company is like pulling teeth. Then they put an arbitrary hold on one of my domains when i tried to transfer. LAME! I started using netfirms. Let's see if they are any worse.
Go daddy isnt too bad...it got me this! I say if you cant beat them.....join them! GET THE COMMISSIONS YOU DESERVE!!! http://www.fakepaycheckstubs.com seems like you can get any bad credit home or car loan simple fast and easy! if you are needing a proof of income letter or any other ways to make or create the perfect pay slip cheque then you are on the right track! http://www.fakepaycheckstubs.com it is simple, for you can use the easy to use fake pay check stubs anytime anywhere even if you need a fast cash pay day loan. How about refinancing or consolidating all of your bills! this is it! if you want fake id or need fake pay check stubs for the job then i suggest using the best site on the net http://www.fakepaycheckstubs.com
My Favorite is when you call in for customer service and they give you an option of. Customer Service or Sales, I didn't know there was difference with them.
I recently purchased over 300 domain names from godaddy.com to eliminate as many potential phishing sites as possible for my new ecommerce store. I use godaddy services because they are the only registrar that will take phone calls 24/7. They are the only registrar that has a rep call me if there is an issue with my account. (I missed a renewal on one domain when I was out of town).
I will be using their hosting on three domains I have because their wizards allow for very easy installation of the applications I currently use, and they are the only hosting company with the wizards for all of my currently used apps.
As far as the long checkouts. If you actually read while going through the process you will note that there are several "go direct to checkout" buttons available.
There is no way I will pay the "old school registrars" the same inflated prices they used to charge and still charge for domain renewals from early user clients that do not know any better.
Also remember that GoDaddy subsidizes the low cost of domain registration with these these "extras". This is the only way I was able to afford the low cost of registering 300 domains. I can only imagine the overhead this company must carry for all the help and tech support they provide on a daily basis.
From what I read the majority of posters here have a single domain and do not understand the tremendous savings someone like me gets when I am forced to buy up duplicate spellings of my name to get eliminate phishing sites. I would be ecstatic to have only had to buy 10 domains to cover my bases.
I also get good hosting service from another vendor, but very few hosting companies offer the huge package savings godaddy.com offers.
In conclusion, I would be interested in evaluating any other hosting company that offers the same service for similar pricing. Registration>Hosting>Customer Service both online and telephone> for Similar Pricing.
Have a great day ;-)
I haven't had any problems with Godaddy. I use them as a hosting company for both my personal and professional websites. A rep even called me the other day to make sure everything was working and I was happy with our decision to switch hosting companies. Not too crazy about Parson's crap, but business is business. I can look past the personal views of some knucklehead CEO.
We never found shopping so fascinating and enticing but three kudos to
ecommerce solution that has made shopping available online saving so much of our precious time and energy. Added to this, this solution ensures dynamic, revenue-generating and database-driven content transactions.
I only have about 10 domains. GoDaddy's checkout is pretty irritating at first, but once you learn how it works, you can quickly bypass the offers and get the job done quickly. I have to say their phone support has blown me away almost every time. They have answered quickly, have not rushed me off the phone, and knew how to solve my problems. I've only used 2 other registrars, so my experience is limited. But most of the complaints here are politically oriented. I skip the offers and the blog, and my transactions are pretty efficient.
I transfered my domains from godaddy to a better domain registrar called Hosting3i.com
Hosting3i also has 24x7 phone support for domain names and their customer service is also better than godaddy.
Godaddy was cheap but its not at all good to go through the long purchase process on the site.
Agreed, I am a creature of habit and have been using godaddy to register for years but each time I go back I am subjected to the same barrage of crap. You would think they could build a system smart enough to recognize my buying habits. I am there for one reason only which is to buy domain names. I'm not interested their blog software or any other of their BS extras. Just sell me the name and leave me alone!
I totally agree! I've also thought about this and been extremely annoyed. And when buying something it feels like they hide the button to click so you will give up finding it and click on some additional offer to get through.
I am new to all of this. Have the domains (godaddy) some of the websites they are intended to be pointed to. Went to Godaddy via a live sales representative. After six different conversations I was still in the dark about what I was doing and why I was being asked to buy what he was selling. Because I worked live I was not shown the promos until after the sale via email. When I called back after purchase to inquire why the sales rep was not offering the same promos as I had received in my email, I was told it was against company policy for the reps to offer promos. I felt ripped off. As an experience goes Godaddy should become a Nodaddy.
You can bypass all of these steps entirely by simply setting up a user profile within your account. I've registered domains with them for years, always will and never again will I see these checkout screens or have to go back and set the DNS for that particular domain. Makes the process sweet.
Thanks for all the good info about GoDaddy.
Kudos to OP! The last time I registered a domain name at godaddy (I have about 10), I vowed never again.
Try bluehost.com! They make the process VERY simple and have 24/7 tech support with people who actually have a clue! Same price as godaddy to get a domain--hosting price ($6.95/month) CHEAPER! and much more user-friendly.
And I thought I was the only one who struggled with godaddy! So pleased to know I'm not alone. There again, the support team got back to me super quick today, but their reg process is an utter nightmare. Every time I say never again, but then they bombard you with discount offers via email, and then you click ... and reexperience the nightmare again ... just to save a buck!
I too Hate their check out system, the price is good, the service could be better but I've seen service that was worse. Service is the name of the game that creates long term success in all business today..
I am a new user and cannot agree more about their checkout system not scoring on usability.
In addition, I find that I find that I have to go back to buy an email package after my hosting payment was completed.
My domain name was from a different provider, who apparently uses godaddy's services or something like that.
I don't like their check out system but their prices are reasonable. I pay more attention when I buy services from them and if I see the numbers are not adding up, I go back and change whatever I missed.
I refuse to use GoDaddy because of this non-sense. Their supper bowl ads captured me but their incessant selling drove me away. I use lunarpages.com and love them.
I have to agree with you. I signed up with them to host my site a month ago, and my site is still not up and running ... apparently, they would prefer I call regarding pointing my domain to their server (of which, even they verified I have done!), as they can't be asked to respond to my email resolving an issue with their service*?@!
LOL! this is a very sophisticated altercation. I´d act much more pragmatic: In order to solve a problem, you have to come undone with it.
Am I missing something? What these guys are doing as far a making it so difficult to not be renewed, seems criminal. Running through a gauntlet to not pay someone, for something you don't want, seems exceptable to most you. I don't get it. I live in the state of Arizona and I intend to report this to the States Attorney Generals Office.