Who gets my content? HELP, PLEASE!

[Becky Reich]

Okay, we have had a web co for the last few years that was fine, until they were recently bought out (with no notice to us). Now I am being charged higher fees than negotiated before and am worried about the future of our site. The other problem is, I don't know that we can afford to switch it all over. We just updated a few features in hopes to add some cheaper upgrades for the time being...and now a month later this happens.

Right now this company hosts our site, does design and content, and we have admin rights to make ahcnges. How does a switch work? Do we keep the content and ask someone else to host? Or is the content the property of the developer? Any ideas on how to save my content in case they do keep it (without copying and pasting)?

any recomendations on the best process for switching over to another company, what type of company I should be looking for, etc would be greatly appreciated. THANKS! [e-mail]

[Annac]

Can you give more information about your site? It's hard to give much advice without knowing more.

As far as content goes, I'd expect that you'd own any work done specifically for your company. However, you should look at your contract to confirm. There's also a chance that your site was built on top of a platform that the hosting company owns. If you do own the content you should be able to get all of it from your hosting company. Without knowing more about your needs/existing site It'd be hard to give advice about a new hosting company.

Are you referring to CICF.org?

[Craig Severance]

Hello Becky,
This is a great question and unfortunately the answer will probably not make you feel much better. Many companies that are developing websites for small businesses are either reselling some other companies product or selling something called " hosted solutions" which in short terms is a proprietary system that forces you to run your website on their servers to maintain any functionality such as content management, shopping cart, forms and many other features that give your site the features that it needs to be manageable. Unfortunately this also means that if you are in a hosted solution you are stuck there with no option to move your site without loosing all or most of your functionality. This is one of the dirty little secrets of this industry that many don't talk about. I do not know if this is your situation but you can find out by asking them if this is a proprietary solution and will I loose ANY functionality if I move my website? Also find out if there is a database behind the site and if so what type is it (usually MySQL or MSSQL) but not all sites are database driven. If our company can assist you in any way please contact us at your convenience. We do not offer hosted solutions and you can host your site on third party systems that offer MSSQL database hosting (industry standard) as well as Windows based hosting. Our sites are affordable and come with many features including a full content management system. I hope this helps you.

[Jennifer Swineford]

I'm so sorry to hear that you're having to deal with this. Best case senario, you can just ftp everything to a new host, no harm done. Worst case senario, your web design company believes this to be their intelectual property and will not allow you to take any of it with you when you leave.

My suggestion would be to just ask them what would happen if you decided to change design companies or hosts. There are some sleezy design companies out there, but most of them will be very up front with you.

Should you have any additional questions, I would be happy to meet with you and discuss your options in more detail.

I hope everything works out - again, just so sorry.

[Craig Severance]

Good Morning Becky,
The question you ask is a good one but unfortunately the answer is not that straight forward. It really depends on who you have been doing business with and who developed your website and what type of platform they used build your website. There are solutions called "Hosted Solutions" that are designed around a proprietary backend that requires your website to be hosted on their servers in order for your website to have the functionality that it has at this time. If your website is built on one of these proprietary solutions then your options are very limited and none of the options are going to leave you 100% intact. If your website is not built on one of these systems and can be moved then the process can be much smoother, but then the platform it can be hosted on becomes the new question. You will need to hire someone to do this research for you (unless you have these answers already) and then explain your options. I hope this helps you with your situation.

[Craig Severance]

I went to your site and saw that you are with Stellar Financial (neulogic). At first glance it appears to be a hosted solution (propriatary system) but tried to get a sales person on the phone to ask and could only get voice mail. You can ask them this question to get the quick answer.