Looking back over the past year, we’ve experienced high growth, while still keeping the policies we stand by: no overselling, always high quality hardware and of course with the expert 24/7 support.

Unfortunately, it hasn’t been without the minor hitch, we experienced less than 99.9% uptime for two months, so we promptly moved to a new datacentre in Chicago (GigeNet). Which since then we’ve been able to provide 99.9% uptime or greater since moving. We still keep the great server performance, and an exceptionally good network with more bandwidth providers.

We have some big plans in the coming months, and I plan to keep the blog updated, seeing as my last post was July in 2011, I’ve been a little slack in updating it. We kept the 30% recurring discount going. But Easter at localnode (as well as celebrating two years in the business) wouldn’t be complete without a good discount.

Keeping in fashion with last year, we’re going to be offering a 50% recurring discount on any payment term for all of our web hosting plans (including custom solutions). Simply use the code “2YEARS” and you will receive your discount. This coupon will end on the 1st of May. So be quick!

So I’ll just run over a few things:
CentOS 5.6 was released in April. We promptly upgraded to that.
The 30% recurring discount is still going.
Currently advertising on only one forum. But that will soon change.

We actually got our first review ever, which is quite awesome, we’re all pretty happy about that. You can see that over here.

On the horizon: still considering the industry links bit. We’re also thinking about offering VPS’s. But our slogan being “the shared & reseller specialists” it would probably have to be under a separate brand. But it’s still not out of consideration!

Apart from that, Steam are doing some awesome deals through their “summer sale” there’s a contest going on, as well as some really awesome deals to pick up. I swiped Magicka and Torchlight, as well as a few others.
But Magicka really surprised me. It’s quite a fun game, and for the $10 or so it will set you back, it’s really worth it.

Following up on gaming – Assassin’s Creed: Revelations was announced not long ago. That will be released in November some time. There’s a nice trailer to watch. I will definitely be getting that, as I really do like that game series.

However, that’s really it for now. I’ll blog again soon!

If you’re an affiliate, you can easily make money by advertising localnode using a special link. We currently offer a 30% commission on all web hosting sales.

Lets do some quick numbers:

• You advertise localnode, which generated a sale of our Shared Basic plan, at a yearly rate.

Assuming the sale was also using our 30% discount coupon, that leaves $45.06. 30% of $45.06 is $13.58 straight into your account. As we only have a minimum withdrawal of $5, you can straight away withdraw the money after our 15 day maturity period.

How about one of our more expensive plans?

• You generate a sale of our Reseller Mogul plan, and customer uses the 30% discount coupon.

That leaves $206.23. 30% of that is $61.87.

Generating multiple sales can easily make you a decent income. Even if you aren’t skilled in marketing, if you have a website that generates traffic, you can still get that extra bit of cash.

A full list of our plans and the commission monthly/yearly is available here.
You can signup as an affiliate here.
You will have to create an account first. Creating an account is free.

We also offer a selection of banners, available on request. Animated GIF’s and Flash files at this point in time only.

Have any questions? Submit a support ticket.

May 1st marks the end of our anniversary sale, so we’ve gone back to the 30% recurring discount. We’ve seen some decent results from the promotion. So for perhaps another special occasion we might bring it back.

Not long ago, Prince William of the UK married Kate Middleton. They’re now the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. I watched the wedding personally, and it was quite good, I enjoyed it. I’m pretty sure it’s all up on YouTube if anyone is interested.

WHMCS 4.5 will be coming out soon, and we’re prepared. We’re going to be updating the WHMCS theme. It’s not as fancy as we’d like. So with the new WHMCS comes a new theme. Along with icons, and other goodies.

Apart from that, we’re going to be announcing our unique white-label option for our reseller plans. We’re just putting the finishing touches on the technical side. And might get a Press Release going. As far as we know, only 3 other providers offer this one-of-a-kind service.

There are some more things happening, but they are for another day
Stay tuned.

We’re very proud to now officially be 1 year old. As there are many fly-by-night web hosts, with many failing before reaching 1 year. It was only last April when we were at Softlayer Seattle, with our old prices and of course some growing pains (for example, some typos and such not being discovered until a couple months down the track).
As well as our help desk system having bugs which didn’t notify staffof new tickets, which left one particular ticket unanswered for 6 hours – we’ve since changed systems and all tickets have been answered within an average of 15 minutes – something we’re very proud of as well.

We’re now in PhoenixNAP, maybe not as equal a network, but none-the-less in a NOC which was built in 2010 and comes with 100% uptime standard. We can’t quite offer that, but we do offer 99.9% uptime backed by our SLA. We have maintained it thus far.

We’ve been monitoring our performance and uptime through Pingdom since December. Previously through BinaryCanary – which unfortunately does not have public stats, which prompted the change. With their prettier public reports (which were in beta until April 6 this year) we have some lovely statistics to show other than just uptime. Take a look here.

We’ve made some slight changes to the website content. As well as the slider showing our lovely anniversary special, and cake. That will be removed come March and will go back to normal, unless we find something better to put there.

What’s on the agenda?
Possibly a toll free number, though phone tech support isn’t offered, sales and billing is.
Maybe a design change.
Industry links (maybe in the blog, rather on the actual website) soon.

The special is 50% off recurring. Use the coupon code “1YEAR” this expires come May 1st!
Applicable to all hosting plans, and all payment terms. A great coupon if you plan on paying yearly.