Last Thursday everyone’s Blackberry’s went crazy. Twitter also started acting funky. Well, in the midst of the apocalypse of the technology world, I had my own little crisis here at The Curb.
I was fiddling around with the blog and trying to update it to the latest version and, all of a sudden, BAM! Before I knew it, The Curbside Marketer had been lost in the abyss. All my posts and my theme, were gone. I sort of freaked out for a second. Then, I turned to Twitter for some help. After a few quick words of advice from Andrew Norcross I called the tech support line for my hosting provider, BlueHost.
After less than five minutes on the phone with a tech support dude, my blog was back, in all of it’s glory, and I only had to upload my Holiday Wish List post.
So, why do you care?
Well, for starters, it’s close to Christmas and I didn’t really have time (or energy) to write a full fledged post 
(just being honest!) But more importantly, this first showed me that your “tribe” of people that you’ve built on Twitter really can help you out in a sticky situation. I knew this was probably the case, but this was the first time it had actually happened.
Secondly, if you’re a blogger, I hope you can learn from my mistake without having to go through it yourself. Back up your data on a regular basis. If you use WordPress, get the DB Manager plug-in and back up your entire blog through your server on a regular basis.
Finally, I love highlighting companies who just do a great job in marketing, customer service, etc. and BlueHost definitely did that in this situation. I didn’t even have to touch my computer for my problem to be solved. I explained what happened, they told me what we could do (and the risk of losing the content), they did it, and I was all set. I don’t know how other hosting providers are with customer support, but BlueHost definitely earned my praise, which is why I have their banner in my sidebar (it is an affiliate link, just so ya know).
Anyways, that’s all I got for ya today. Don’t be afraid to ask your tribe for help, back up your data, and use BlueHost.
The end.
Image from Flickr user star5112
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Agreed that Bluehost has outstanding customer service – which is why I have been with them since I started blogging (even before Life Without Pants). Glad things worked out for you.
PS Really like your email and twitter icons – I assume you did them yourself. Do you do graphic design? Photoshop? If there's one thing I can't do – it's graphic design – it's on my to-do list for 2010 to become at least semi-respectable with that stuff. Nice work though man.
Thanks man! I got the Twitter icon off of some site that had a whole package of icons like that (I wish i was that good at photoshop!), but I made the mail one myself. I'd never used photoshop until we got it at work and I've been trying to teach myself the past few months from some free tutorials online and just experimenting and stuff. If you ever need help with anything gimme a shout!
I'll be sure to keep that in mind buddy. Thanks!
I'll be sure to keep that in mind buddy. Thanks!