Yahoo Customer Support 1hr 58minutes on hold!
Yahoo advertises 24 hour customer support,
I rang, and had to wait 1 hour and 58 minutes before someone actually answered.
Constantly getting hte answering machine - you are next in queue for the next aailable agent…

And when I did get through she couldn’t help me!(see previous post below),  because that’s the way it is for all customers - the Yahoo way!
And if you pay Yahoo (as I have been doing so for the past 6 years) , then you’re just a sucker!

I had a call with Yahoo who claimed -because they have 1  minute limit on access to phpmyadmin (yes 60 seconds), that to export any large satabase or even a large table, cannot be done.

Yahoo technical staff won’t even do it themselves for you,  to an area where  I could then ftp.

But they have no solution -

I have an advertising tracking tool, and 1 table has 100,000’s of views (and rows).
It cannot ever be exported from the yahoo mysql server - as it stands.

another with 14900 rows, could be exported if I split it into chunks of 3000 rows at a time.

So for the larger table - currently at 2.6 million rows,  I should split it into 866 different 3000 row tables and then I could export it???

That is yahoo’s solution.

They do not have one, they insist on their limit of 1 minute access to phpmyadmin, and therefore if you export a large file, it will timeout in the middle of the process.

Oh, what fun - Yahoo! - should be more like an Southwest ireland coloquial expression
- Ya who*e, ya!

Europesanirish is in the middle of transferring our host from Yahoo to EZPZhosting.

EZPZhosting support is unbelievably good.

It is like a different world to my existing host. Their C-Panel and host of services available with the package are outstanding.

1. I am looking forward to getting completely moved over, which they have assisted with completely.

2. I just wish I had done so much sooner, and not stayed with my current (previous) host - for which I am right now on hold on the phone for the past 37 minutes.

here I will report our experiences

Getresponse is prepared to address everyone of my concerns which is great and really pro-active.

1.  when a subscriber clicks to opt in, he/she is met with a list of advertisements. http://www.getresponse.com/k/1APn/p72w2Y2a5

RESPONSE:
Ads on the confirmation / removal pages may be disabled
at Campaign Settings>>Personalization>>Hide Marketing
Campaigns.

— Super - i look forward to testing this.

—-

2.   I wish to import the list of subscribers, (all having opted in to do so, and avail of alot of other website features by being a member), without all the email addresses being sent an opt-in email.
5. I am a media organisation and send press releaases to the media. We have an extensive media email list (several 100).
Importing this to be used for Press Release material, on getresponse.com - was an obvious reason why we joined, but if importing the email list means that 100’s of top media resources, editors and executives must first manually opt-in before accepting the Press release email, it just will not work (for us).
 Is getrespone a good tool for email marketing?
—-

RESPONSE:

As per importing your lists without confirmation, I have
forwarded your email to the Abuse Dept, as they will be able to help
you best with that issue. You will hear from them shortly.

—-

3.  On the front and test demo part of your website, you show that one may have 10,000 subscribers to numberous newsletters (campaigns).
When I created the first campaign, and added the first subscriber, it indicated that I could only added another 49, and that there is a limit of 50 subscribers on this list.

RESPONSE:

You may host 10,000 email addresses in your account free
of charge. If you have a larger mailing list, there is an additional
fee of $4.50/month for every additional 5,000 subscribers.

The limit of 50 addresses refers to Add Subscriber feature, which
allows to add email addresses manually. The maximum amount of
subscribers that you can add is 50 email addresses daily.

—-

4.  I wished to use getresponse for email marketing campaign,

I have a range of services for different email lists - X , Y, prospect  Z customers.
I wished to be able to create an email list of these businesses, and to be able to mail merge with your service - without any email-address receiving an opt-in email in advance.
Does getresponse allow this obvious email service, or does it add the restriction of having to send the email to opt-tin to all recipients.

RESPONSE:
You can create as many campaigns in your account as you wish.
There is no limitation here. Each one can be mailed separately.
You can also sent broadcasts across your lists - in such case there
is no confirmation email sent.

Yahoo claims 24-hour toll-free phone support

What Yahoo do not tell you is that it is only toll-free to USA customers.

On their Small Business Page - for their paid customers:
Questions?

Contact us anytime

Click it and you ae taken through their FAQ.

You also have a menu of support -not always ecactly what your problem is - so you need to sort of - guess which topic is closest.

Example - there is nothing about their problem and limitations of exporting a large database from your MYSQL PhpMyadmin Yahoo server.

Eventually you are given a FAQ

then

“Still Have Questions?

Call Yahoo! Small Business Technical Support: (800) 318-0783

(**THIS IS A TOLL FREE NUMBER ONLY ACCESSIBLE ONLY IN AMERICA - Yahoo don’t tell you that - you have to figure that one out for yourself)

Send us an email

Need help with other Yahoo! services, such as Mail Plus, Music, or Personals? Call Yahoo! Customer Care Central at (866) 562-7219.

Aha, this is a contactable number - but remember this is a USA number -not that you are told that anywhere,
So 001866-562-7219 is the number to ring from Europe.

And you are likely to be led through a menu of 5-7 selections before you are put through - to an automatic voice telling that you are in a queue and expected waiting time is 30 minutes.
And remember, you are now paying for this international call to USA!

Yahoo Web Hosting Features

Yahoo’s 24 hour Telephone support -
You go through 5 different automatic selections - where you press 1, 2 or 3  to select what you want.

Eventually when you do get through - I am told (by autmatic voice)  your expected wait time is 30 minutes, (this is during Yahoo daytime office hours).

A response to a critical problem by email - is 24 hours hours delay on average.

Is that the customer support you would expect from the 4th largest hosting company?

Advertised features:

24-hour toll-free phone support
Online getting started guides
Video tutorials
24-hour email support
Comprehensive help center

I have been hosting with yahoo.

They charge $19.95pm.

Yahoo won’t tell you this:

You can upgrade to a much larger and better service - and at €11.95 pm - with Yahoo.
I kid you not!

When you login to your webhosting- control panel, there is no indication or advice that you should change your plan.

There is a link - to

Change Plan | Add Extras | Cancel Plan

As I am looking to move to a new host, I had a look at the criteria for changing a Plan.

Guess what -

I could switch to a better service for 11.95 per month, but they never ever told me this!!!

Funny - I find this only when I am looking to leave them.

Might be more powerful (unlimited disk size and bandwidth, and 1000 email addresses, and unlimited email space), but still restrict to 100 emails per hour (not good for any mail merge packages), and limit to just 250 emails per day if sent via php mail () - so useless for automatic autosenders or newsletter subscription and sending - to lists > 250.

All email sent through the website - ‘registration’, ‘forgot password’, contact admin, etc - and newsletters - altogether a limit of 250 emails per day.

For URL redirection - you need .htaccess file - this is not allowed by Yahoo.

For URL re-writing - rewriting URL titles from dynamic to permanent html files, not allowed as you need .htaccess permissions.

These are important SEO points which are hindered by being with Yahoo.

And now to find that they are charging me $8 per month more for a lesser package, just takes the biscuit.

Add to this their ‘increases’ in domain  renewal fees from 9.95 last year to 34.95 this year. Madness!

After our first few hours of exploring, we have encountered a number of significant problems with GetResponse.com

These are according to the steps and guidelines detailed - and I have emailed getresponse today - so a respoose to the points below should be received tomorrow:

We already have 1700-2000 subscribers, who have each filled out a form and selected to receive our newsletter.

1. To add 1 email address to a newsletter list (subscriber list)  on getresponse.com automatically sends the email recipient an email to opt-in to receive the newsletter.

Our visitors are patient visitors, and we welcome and respect all to our website, but asking our subscribers to AGAIN opt-in to receiving the newsletter, after they have already done so, is not the way we wish to go.
This is just not a runner!

2. After we added 2 email addresses (to ourselves), it states 48 of our limit 50 emails remaining.

We were sold the idea that we could have 10,000 subscribers on a list, our first list is hit with a limit of just 50.

A major flaw from our point of view and a 50 subscribers list would not work for us.

 3.  When a new subscriber responds to the opt-in email - you must click on a link like this, to activate/confirm subscription.
http://www.getresponse.com/k/1APn/p72w2Y2a5

To my surprise, it is a page split with a confirmation on the left, and 6 opt-in advertisements on the right hand side, all by getresponse.com

For a paid service, to be flogging ads at the paid person’s subscribers is beyond a joke!

4. For European GAA News, we wish to be able to send news of matches and tournaments out to the media in Ireland and Europe, and to add the media list here, (on getresponse.com) but if you import a list, an email (opt-in) is sent to every email address.

This is not what we want - that a Media Organisation has to act on a pre-email before receiving an News email.

##

It appears to me that Getresponse.com first charge you for a service, but then wish to not trust you to use it honestly, and to mass email the world - and instead introduce their own brand of spam protection, by making all your subscribers opt in again to their service.

or maybe they have 1 or 2 ways to subscribe people and do not wish to look as alternative ways that do exist already for their customers.

We will see, and stop speculating now.

…

According to their website - they allow - Unlimited email marketing campaigns, autoresponders, follow-ups, lists and broadcasts.

they have a long list of features that would suit us.

Getresponse has great reviews.

DELIVER YOUR NEWSLETTERS
Launch your email marketing with GetResponse’s advanced newsletter hosting features and top email deliverability.

It seems brilliantly  cost effective for newsletter hosting

http://www.getresponse.com/newsletter-hosting.html

On their Email marketing Calculator, you may senf 10000 subscribers, 28 different emails (7 weekly newsletters at 10000 subscribers to each), for jsut $17.95.

“$17.95 per month for up to 10,000 subscribers”

It seems to have what we need.

Ordered.

Up until now, Europeanirish.com is hosted with Yahoo - the 4th largest web hosting company (share wise) in the worl.

It has a limit of 100 emails per hour from its email clients, and to send the newsletter subscribers automatically, via the website, allows just 250 emails per day.

Problem!

EuropeanIrish.com has 1000 subscribers to our general Newsletter, increasing by 50 new subscribers per week,
and it has 6 other newsletters - 4 regional newsletters and a sport and entertainment newsletter, being sent in all to another 700 subscribers

That’s 1700 emails to be sent via EuropeanIrish.com

Hmm!

Either we get a new email/newsletter sending service

or a new Host, without this tiny limit on sending emails per day.

(GoDaddy and other big hosts have similar limitations).