Easy Blog Networks (EBN): Easy Avoid Them

I have to say that after almost 1 year using them (inherited mistakenly) all I can see is that they are probably one of the shittiest hostings I've had in my entire life.

1. Everything is 100% blocked "for security" issues (namely, we generally work with blackhatters so we only expect bad things from you)
2. They announce as a "nice PBN hosting, for SEO professionals": Yes, I have read this 1K times in the forum. If the word SEO appears in a hosting, avoid it at all costs
3. 128MB capped WP instances. Are we crazy?
4. No FTP! These jokers have no paragon
5. You cannot even edit your WP code (functions.php/child theme)
6. They expect you to use a plugin for every single aspect in the world (need a code in the header or the footer? Use a plugin!)
7. They have designed a custom blocking system for certain plugins. For example, Updraft Plus! They say it impacts badly their sites
8. Theoretically, they hinder every single aspect in the world that "hinders" performance, but their servers are not super-performant (can they be with starting with a 128MB RAM cap?)
9. They might think they are cheap, selling at $2.9 per blog (or even at $1.4 per blog with 1000 blogs hosted on them). I've bought LTD 5GB 256MB RAM hostings for $5 many times in the past. This is not a big deal, in fact, you have to start with 10 blogs @ $29/mo which is a ripoff (because maybe you are only using 5 units, so you are paying $5/mo per ultra-limited blog). And as I say, I've eventually paid only $5 for a lifetime deal. So there is no deal in EBN
10. They hinder you in so many ways when exporting your site to leave them, that it should be almost illegal.

I'm not going to argue about footprints and all that s**t they advertise on their site because I have not done an exhaustive analysis. But all I can say, that why hosting 10-20-whatever blogs with them if they are 100% problems?

Someone will come and say:
"I've been with them for 3 years and all has been fine"

Dude, I hope you are not hosting PBN with them, otherwise you are a serious nab. In such limited-to-coding-system, you should NEVER host a PBN or the footprint you will be leaving will be massive.
And even if it's not a PBN, but regular sites... why waste so much money with so low and capped resources? Go find a better thing

Conclusion: They are a major fraud, as I say, avoid them as the plague. I had to write this review because after migration, I feel so frustrated for so many hindrances I've never seen in a single hosting in my life.

Thanks for the comment. I've been checking them.
$35 for 10 sites only now, we are in the high quality host range price for a small PBN network which seems crazy to me.
I like the diversity of hosts and IP but damn that seems way overpriced for the very little share of cloud you are describing and the very limited customization.

Any alternative you would recommend ?

Locking down wp plugins sucks , I don’t know why anyone uses webhosting like this

And also their customer services is bad. I had a bad experience before

Yeah we moved all our sites away from there haven't looked back.

Some domain providers come with a bit of free hosting.
Contemplating putting some html websites with those. Mostly hack free because no the is no Wordpress so no need to update and it would have basically has the same little space for hosting as this dodgy PBN service but for free.

How to check if the IP's they provide are bad to host your site on?

I’m the co-founder of EBN and wanted to give our side on a few of the comments.

Locking down hosting for security
Yes, our hosting is very locked-down. It’s annoying to some users but it does help a ton of others who don’t need to worry about security. Compared to other hosts which leave you to your own devices when it comes to cleaning up blogs after hacks, we actually do the full cleanup for you, no matter why or when it happens. Most of our users like this, but I completely understand if it’s not for you.

FTP
This has been such a common question, we have a help article on the topic. It’s related to the above-mentioned security, and it, again, annoys some users, but for most it’s a worthy trade-off.

Other limitations
If you’re looking for hosting where you can do custom installations, complex WP setup, etc., we are not for you. PBNs usually have relatively simple blogs that are mostly hands-off. If that is your use-case, then we’re a good fit. If you’re building an eCom shop or want to build a large content money-site, we are not the host for you.

Price
The price is competitive with other PBN/SEO hosting providers. You really cannot compare us to general WordPress hosts as we have a completely different setup.


I do take a *little* bit of offense at the suggestion that we’re dodgy or even a fraud. EBN has been online for almost ten years, our company has been founded in 2007, we’ve hosted tens of thousands of blogs for thousands of users, and you can find a large online footprint of our activities. Even my account here is 14 years old.

We are very transparent with how our system works and offer a 7-day free trial and a 30-day money-back guarantee. If you don’t like it, you can easily cancel in that period.

OP just wanted a cheap hosting to make autoblogging spam sites. I have been using EBN for almost 6 years and hosted 600+ PBN's. No speed issues with simple blogs and I don't need 99% of the blocked plugins anyway. And I don't see any footprint, especially after they added a lot more NS records.

OP You can't compare a niche hosting service with general hosting services just by price alone. That isn't a fair comparison. Economics of scale are completely different, and custom software in general is very expensive. Don't call them a fraud just because you're unsatisfied. Your pain points seem appropriate.

​

Nerevar said:

I’m the co-founder of EBN and wanted to give our side on a few of the comments.

Locking down hosting for security
Yes, our hosting is very locked-down. It’s annoying to some users but it does help a ton of others who don’t need to worry about security. Compared to other hosts which leave you to your own devices when it comes to cleaning up blogs after hacks, we actually do the full cleanup for you, no matter why or when it happens. Most of our users like this, but I completely understand if it’s not for you.

FTP
This has been such a common question, we have a help article on the topic. It’s related to the above-mentioned security, and it, again, annoys some users, but for most it’s a worthy trade-off.

Other limitations
If you’re looking for hosting where you can do custom installations, complex WP setup, etc., we are not for you. PBNs usually have relatively simple blogs that are mostly hands-off. If that is your use-case, then we’re a good fit. If you’re building an eCom shop or want to build a large content money-site, we are not the host for you.

Price
The price is competitive with other PBN/SEO hosting providers. You really cannot compare us to general WordPress hosts as we have a completely different setup.


I do take a *little* bit of offense at the suggestion that we’re dodgy or even a fraud. EBN has been online for almost ten years, our company has been founded in 2007, we’ve hosted tens of thousands of blogs for thousands of users, and you can find a large online footprint of our activities. Even my account here is 14 years old.

We are very transparent with how our system works and offer a 7-day free trial and a 30-day money-back guarantee. If you don’t like it, you can easily cancel in that period.

Click to expand...

You might have an opportunity here to loosen some limitations to improve customer satisfaction if other customers of yours have similar pain points.

We have discussed this internally more times than I can count. The complaints/comments mostly come from people who don't sign up or cancel within the trial, not from our customer base. To gain more users, we could loosen up limitations, but then we'd have to take away the security/cleanup we offer for free. That would bring a different problem - lots of users would have vulnerable WPs, and hacks would increase, leading to poor customer satisfaction and complaints about poor security on our platform.

This is why, in all past discussions, we decided to focus on what our users require, not what potential/trialists wish we'd offer.

Jeepy said:

OP just wanted a cheap hosting to make autoblogging spam sites. I have been using EBN for almost 6 years and hosted 600+ PBN's. No speed issues with simple blogs and I don't need 99% of the blocked plugins anyway. And I don't see any footprint, especially after they added a lot more NS records.

Click to expand...

Sell me some PBN links, dm