Leading provider of Web hosting, domains and related services, FatCow, announced that during the first 3 months of 2009, its customer base grew by more than 29%.

Spurred by a commitment to the Customer Experience and a new marketing strategy, FatCow Web Hosting has increased new signups dramatically while improving new customer satisfaction rates.

FatCow was founded on the idea that if you treat customers well, they'll return the favor," explains Paul Bukhovko, Marketing Manager at FatCow. "FatCow's customers are engaged and give us great feedback. By listening to their advice, we're able to make real improvements. For example, we've been able to increase customer satisfaction with our support team by 16% since this time last year."

FatCow credits most of its growth to a few key initiatives. Late last year, the company rolled out its "HeiferCratic Oath, which offers free hosting if FatCow fails to meet its seven-point service guarantee, which includes answering calls in two minutes or less on average.

To ensure satisfaction among existing customers, FatCow initiated a new Customer Experience department, which conducts usability studies, focus groups and a variety of service- and product-related surveys. The studies led to improvements in speed and functionality on fatcow.com, as well as improvements to the control panel, availability of online information, and the CGI and MySQL platforms. Early returns indicate that FatCow has made it much easier for new customers to create Web sites and e-mail accounts--the key foundations of any Web host's success.

The FatCow Web Hosting Company also expanded its hosting offering tremendously by removing storage and transfer limits. It was among the first hosts to integrate into its control panel a number of tools designed to improve search engine optimization and site usability, including Google Webmaster Tools, Google Custom Search and SubmitNet search services.

FatCow increased its advertising budget this year, and Bukhovko saw drastic improvements in conversions in most of FatCow's advertising and affiliate channels. The improvement coincided with enhancements to its hosting plan, tools, platform--and the company-wide commitment to staying customer focused.

Bukhovko concludes, "Our customers are happy, which means they're staying with us, buying additional accounts and referring new customers to us. Our external marketing efforts are more successful because our reputation has gotten even stronger. And we're not going to stop here. Next quarter, we'll be utilizing social media to reach out to our customers and develop a better understanding of who they are and what they need from us."