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I had some initial frustration with their email templates, which do not save what you type yet also require you to log in again after an undetermined amount of time. You lose all you work after you are automatically logged off and you login in again.

I lost a lengthy email I had almost finished composing. If they had posted a warning I would have composed my text in Notepad and then copied-and-pasted into their form but I frankly didn't think of it because so many programs automatically save what you type, e.g., Gmail, or at least warn you about things like an automatic log off.

My biggest problem with Aweber occurred yesterday when I received an email in the morning indicating that my account had been permanently deleted because I violated their terms of service.

I had purchased subscribers to my ezine from Glen Hopkins' highly respected ListOpt.com program. These were subscribers who specifically requested my ezine and had double opted in to receive it.

It did not even occur to me that these subscribers could not be imported into the Aweber system. When I imported the subscribers I clearly identified them as subscribers obtained from ListOpt.com

I had already submitted three batches of leads over three consecutive days when I received the form letter via email from Aweber yesterday. My account was indeed closed; I could not access it.

I called Aweber to express my dissatisfaction for not at least calling me to indicate that I had violated their terms. The gentleman with whom I spoke was polite and professional. He explained their policy and their desire to assiduously avoid any potential accusations of spam.

I said I could understand their position but I would have appreciated a phone call explaining that I had violated their terms before they abruptly closed my account; terminated my service; and erased the list of subscribers I had gathered thus far, in addition to autoresponder emails I had written.

I wrote Aweber today via email requesting that they send me the list of subscribers and the autoresponder messages I had stored on my account. They replied that once an account is closed that the subscriber list and messages are no longer available.

I asked if that meant if it was literally impossible to retrieve such data or if they simply were not willing to do so. The customer service representative would not answer that question but instead simply repeated that the data was "not available."

I wrote to Aweber:

I understand now that I violated Aweber's terms. However, at the time I purchased those subscribers and imported them into my Aweber account I had no idea I was doing something wrong.

After all, these were individuals who had--as I specified in my import note to Aweber--already double opted in asking specifically to receive my ezine. I did not hide the fact that they were purchased subscribers. Why would I? I didn't think I was doing any thing wrong.

It would have been so easy for you all to call me and say, "I'm sorry Dr. Worthen but you can't import these subscribers." I would have then understood the terms better; I would not import any more leads; and you would still have a generally satisfied customer.

Instead you closed my account without notice; you didn't even have the courtesy to call and tell me; and you then proceeded to erase the data in my account!

I just sent that email so I don't expect to receive a response until tomorrow or Wednesday (30 NOV 06). I'll update then.

The critique of the SiteBuildIt site is that it is too promotional. I can see that point--they definitely try to persuade you to buy SBI. I also know that the company constantly tests and evaluates what works--the copy you see is generally that which has proven most effective at generating sales.

But whether you like the copy or not, please don't let it detract from all that SBI has to offer home-based and small business owners who want a web site that sells.

In particular, understand that a program like Microsoft Office Live--and similar web site builders like Yahoo's, Verisign's, and dozens of others--will cost you much, much more to produce a web site that sells than SiteBuildIt.

You can build a web site cheaper with those programs, heck, you can build a mini-site for free.

But the critical question to ask with any web site builder, including hiring a web site designer, is: "How will potential customers find my web site?"

Think about how you find a site:

1) A friend recommends it and gives you the link

2) You search on a search engine

3) You search on a search engine and click on a pay-per-click ad ("sponsored link")

4) You click on a link in an ezine, RSS feed, or another web site.

Of all those methods, the most common is, for the vast majority of people, searching on a search engine.

That means you will want your web site to appear when someone searches for a topic relevant to the services or products you offer. For example, the original post I responded to was about Virtual Assistants. If someone searches for "virtual assistants" will they find that person's web site?

So the question then is, "How do you get your web site to appear high up in the search engine results?" That is what the other web site builders neither teach you to do nor provide the tools to achieve it. At least not with their basic package. If you buy a number of expensive add-ons you can achieve mediocre search engine optimization for your site but at about four times the cost of SiteBuildIt ($1200 per year compared to $300). See the comprehensive comparison chart for details.

If all you need is a site that serves as an online brochure for your services, i.e., you only expect people to see the site if you tell them about it, then you don't need a sophisticated web marketing, site building program like SiteBuildIt.

But if you want potential customers to find you on the Internet, you need a web site that they will find when they search.

There are really only three choices if that's the case:

1) Hire a professional web designer and an Internet marketing specialist who provides search engine optimization services as part of his or her consultation (if you can find one person who does all that it's even better but many web designers don't know a lot about Internet marketing)

2) Become a web designer and Internet marketing professional yourself, e.g., learn HTML, Dreamweaver, SEO, persuasion and conversion copywriting skills, viral marketing principles, statistical analysis of web analytics, etc.

3) Use SiteBuildIt, which provides you with not only all the tools you need to build a web site that sells but also the education and ongoing support to learn how to do it. You won't be a web design professional or Internet marketing expert but you'll be darn close!

I have two web sites I built with SiteBuildIt. One is for my psychology practice. I've spent very little time on it yet it consistently brings me a steady flow of referrals of full-fee, self-pay clients. My other site, Best-MLM-Opportunities.com, pays for itself a dozen times over the original cost for SBI and I've only done a fraction of what I could do in terms of taking advantage of all the tools SBI provides.

So if you want a web site that truly helps you sell your products or services, either hire a professional (there are a number who frequent this forum) or use SiteBuildIt.