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hosting365

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Horrendous and a frightening squandering of EI / Taxpayers money.

EI's 'mandate' is to support international export. How a template driven web design solution (which requires a physical visit to the customer) is ever going to get much beyond Dublin is a mystery.
 

Fintan

New Member
All depends on how much EI gave them.

Looking at their checkout process they seem to be part of digiweb, therefore the EI logos may just be an over eager search for legitimacy. And the funding may actually have been to other parts of the digiweb empire? :)
 

mneylon

Administrator
Staff member
The frontpage clearly states that it is EI funded. I don't see how that could be interpreted otherwise
 

Fintan

New Member
True, just trying to give EI the benefit of the doubt.

However how do they achieve the following "providing employment for knowledge workers based in Ireland."
 

myhost

New Member
Whats so "Revolutionary" about it, that's what amuses me. Have you seen the state of the portfolio ? They look like discarded website templates from the 1990's, you know the ones that come free with magazines!

Oh and the fee, is recurring (€399 / year) , of course it doesn't tell you that on the main site text (unless I missed it).

Rgds
Martin
 

myhost

New Member
Click on the "Become A Valued Customer Now" link at the bottom of THIS page.

You can see in the CART , Recurring Annual FEE .
 

TheMenace

New Member
I'm assuming nobody is planning on using Digiweb for hosting now that they're in direct competition with us? Especially seeing as they're selling useless placebos. Not the smartest move I'd have thought.
 

Cormac

New Member
Can I get a "woot woot" for a terrible introductory sentence?
Basically, what it means is that if you need a website, this is a different way of giving you what you need.
 

myhost

New Member
Lol I didnt notice that, well spotted !

The intro text is as "Revolutionary" as the Web Design on offer !!
 

figment

New Member
Perhaps I am missing something but I see nothing wrong with it (as a business. Designs are not to my taste.).
Knowing the level you guys operate at, Omniserve is definitely not in competition. If fact I would suggest they are taking the market segment who waste a lot of our time either because they don't have the budget or have to be on the phone every half hour to explain the basics to.
There is a huge international market segment that they are chasing and it makes a lot of business sense for someone to chase it. The budgets and margins are not there to make it worthwhile for the likes of us to do custom work for clients like this. It needs an automated system and that's what Omniserve is. When a business hits the limits of the service and know what they want, that's when they come to us. And to be honest that is the stage that I prefer a client to come to me at.

As for EI investing in them I can only assume they were presented with a good business plan. All EI want to know is if it can be internationally traded, can reach a million in turnover and employ more then 10 people. If the plan shows that and as it has the backing of Digiweb who have proved they can build a successful business then why wouldn't they invest. I haven't seen their business plan so I don't know at what stage Omniserve is at in their offering. This could be version 1 of 10 or of 100 so its pretty hard to speculate if EI invested wisely.

Template monster has proved that there is a big successful international market for this kind of offering. Just because someone else is doing it does not mean there should be no competition. Why shouldn't the competition be Irish and direct some of that revenue here.
 

Dan

New Member
Hi all,

Sorry - I just saw this now!

In terms of competition, how many web designers / developers would propose to design me a custom-built site with email and a domain, hosted for a year with free support for under 400 EUR?

I actually hope that small businesses, having already enjoyed the benefits of having an always-on website (the invisible staff member!) and email, subsequently plan an online strategy and start to move up the food-chain by taking custom services from web design / development businesses. In fact, we'd be delighted to make those introductions ourselves.

Omniserve and Digiweb's aim is to bring online the tens of thousands of small businesses who have yet to make the plunge into having an online presence and introduce them to the benefits available at the lowest possible price. We're offering the actual benefit: a functional website and email without the difficult learning curve of "log into your hosting account and start to learn how it all works".

Its also worth pointing out that the recurring yearly price is simply the cost of the hosting plan and domain renewal.

Dan
 

mneylon

Administrator
Staff member
Omniserve and Digiweb's aim is to bring online the tens of thousands of small businesses who have yet to make the plunge into having an online presence and introduce them to the benefits available at the lowest possible price. We're offering the actual benefit: a functional website and email without the difficult learning curve of "log into your hosting account and start to learn how it all works".

What's the difference between Omniserve and the sitebuilders that everyone else offers? Apart from the 399 euro fee
 

hosting365

New Member
At the moment, all the sample sites are fairly poor, and built in Site Studio (Hsphere's in built free editor). Other than physically visiting them (which I would image rather limits the business geographically) what are you offering that businesses cannot already get for free with almost every low cost hosting plan?
 

Dan

New Member
Hey there,

Thanks for the feedback - it seems that its not sufficiently obvious! I'll pass this back to the Omniserve guys.

The difference is the process - the site is built for you by Omniserve. You fill in a questionaire, and book a session with Omniserve. They then build the site for you, while you watch, in a webex environment. I'm not sure where you saw the physical visit bit?

You can ask questions while its built, see exactly how the MyWeb builder works, discuss and input into the design and build - you have a dedicated person for the duration of the session building it for you. At the end of the session, you have a fully built site, emails addresses created and the means to manage everything going forward via online control panels.

In terms of the MyWeb software itself, its far superior to any web builder I've seen. It is built around a number of application servers that provide additional pieces of functionality: forums, blogs, shops and galleries (and more) that are integrated with the actual template/builder bit and we automatically install (and crucially centrally patch / maintain, which no one else does) those for the customer.

Dan
 
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