Who Really Owns Your Real Estate Web Site?
I encountered a scenario yesterday that has just made my blood boil, and It’s been simmering away in the background ever since, so I just had to get it off my chest, why? because it comes down to who really owns your web site, you or your webmaster. so let’s start by giving you the background to this little rant of mine. I’ve been hired to look at the SEO on a real estate web site for a client and yesterday I asked for access to their hosting Cpanel, that’s so we could start working on the site’s optimisation. I received from my client the following email they had been sent from their web master in response to my request, and I quote the email here for you.
“Unfortunately we do not provide any login details for any sites that are hosted by (&*&*&) as a policy. Giving you the login details would mean that you would be allowed access to all sites hosted by us.
Essentially your SEO specialist will need to supply us with all the code he would like to add to the site. Our Web Design will then need to review the code and if everything is order we will implement this onto the site ourselves. Please note that there is likely to be a charge involved with this”
Isn’t this the biggest load of Cr^% you’ve ever heard, lets have a look at several issues in this email.
Firstly who owns the site? If I’ve paid for it then It’s mine, or am I wrong in this assumption, it’s not hard to set up Cpanel access, most companies provide this when your site is hosted with them, well I know I do when I set up a hosting account for my clients.
Secondly, they are making themselves out to be the policemen, what right have they to approve any code or in fact any content on the site before they will agree to add it to the site, it is not up to them to approve anything, it is the owner of the site who should make that decision.
Thirdly, they did such a bad job of optimising and setting up the site in the first place, they haven’t got a clue what their doing.
Finally, they have the cheek to suggest they would charge a fee for adding the code, so really, this is what this is all about, milking you for more money to do a simple job.
So, to get back to my original question who really own this web site? you should. You’ve paid the webmaster for it and you should have the say over the future of your own site. My suggestion to all of you small business owners that have web sites is to go out now and make sure you own your web site and all components of it and take control.
You need to be the master of your own destiny not held to ransom by these arrogant companies who think you and I are fools.
By the way, if you’d like to know which company it is, just email me or leave a comment and I’ll send you their details.
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I appear to be in a potentially similar situations. Would love to know which company you are referring to?
Great article, I agree fully. What I have found is to ensure that the design be kept sepetate from the hosting, this ensures complete ownership and control, this way you can decide who is best to continually monitor and change the site for seo purposes.
Would love to know the company name – have a fair idea.
I ran into one who was doing this to one of the biggest car dealers in Brisbane. They purchased 6 months of SEO but we couldnt do it because the web company wouldnt give us log ins. Long story short and many heated words later, we rebuilt the clients site at half the cost and provided them with their own CMS.
The web company tried to hold onto the domain name since they registered it, but one call to the auDA fixed that.
Of the 12-15 businesses I see a week, this would be happening to 2-4 of them.
Dave