Due to the interest generated by our coverage of ePerks and the apparent abandonment of its users by CEO Ben Behrouzi, we’ve decided to bring you some pre-launch coverage of Ben Behrouzi’s newest startup which is launching tomorow, iHype.com. Not surprisingly, one day before launch, the 800 number goes to what sounds like a cell phone with a generic “the person at this number can’t take your call” message.

Off To a Bad Start. iHype.com  is slated to launch tomorrow. We think. The problem is that while tomorrow, June 2nd, is shown on the Ihype.com home page (less then 24 hours from now), the countdown ticker indicates that we have a full 1 day, 16 hours and 34 minutes to go from today, June 1st at 5:43 PM. This would indicate a launch of Tuesday, June 3rd, somewhere around 9 am, not June 2nd.

Execution. Since iHype is a paid blog post platform, it would make sense that they eat their own dog food by implementing paid posts as part of their marketing and launch campaign. There is only one problem with the paid posts implemented by iHype to raise awareness about their company, the bloggers they have paid are are promoting Hype.com NOT iHype.com! That’s right, this post, this post and this post are paid posts where the paid reviewers are reviewing the “Ihype.com” launch on June 2nd, but actually discuss the energy drink called “Hype” that is found at hype.com, ouch.

iHype Paid Post Promoting Wrong Product: an Energy Drink.

The Claim:

“iHype employs thousands of online publishers, bloggers and content generators worldwide” – iHype.com website

Reality. The iHype system does not contain a single real paid post opportunity. In fact many of the links do not even work, so it isn’t possible for publishers to navigate the system without receiving errors. (click image below to view full page of sample opportunities)

Overpromising, Underdelivering. One area where consistency can be found. If the test jobs above that pay $5 per job are representative of what iHype expects average payouts to be, bloggers will only need to write 2000 blog posts per month or 91 posts per day working a 5 day work week to earn $10,000.

Support. Having the correct phone number so that you can support your users is overrated.

When we wrote about ePerks, we noted that while the ePerks registrar information was inputted using a false name and address, Ihype.com’s contact information was actually correct. Shortly after our post, Ihype updated their registrar details.

Before BrokerScience Ihype Coverage Two Days Ago.

After. Ben as decided he no longer wants his name, phone number, address, or email address to be public information.

Shared Hosting. Shared hosting is when a consumer or amateur webmaster purchases hosting on a server that is shared with others for a much lower price (they can start as low at $3 per month) than if they paid for a dedicated server. Since most websites receive very little traffic and need very little in the way of resources, a dedicated server is overkill. On the other hand, commercial ventures that receive significant traffic necessitate a dedicated server(s). The screenshot below shows that there are thousands of other sites sharing this server / IP address with iHype.com, indicative that is is on shared server. This means that it will take very little traffic to take their site down and the question isn’t if, but when they will put their site on a dedicated server. In order to have a successful launch with no downtime, switching the website to a dedicated server would ordinarily already be done and would almost NEVER be a task delegated to be done with less then 24 hours to launch. While it makes no sense, it speaks volumes about where iHype.com is at in terms of organization.

Other Thoughts. iHype.com might consider fixing their layout. We are going to hold off on criticism of the large amount of bad links and database errors one will encounter while navigating the iHype publisher system until they have had time to properly launch. That being said, based on the execution of ePerks and everything we have seen so far, this is not going to be pretty. My prediction is that any PayPerPost.com or similar platform users that are so bold to even consider trying iHype will quickly abandon it when they get a taste of the Ben Behrouzi school of customer service and product execution.

UPDATE JUNE 2ND, 2008

Mission Aborted, Failure to Launch. The countdown launch timer page was briefly replaced last night with a website following the format found at beta.ihype.com and then taken down again. This morning the countdown timer was deleted and as of 12:30 Pacific, there has been no launch. There have been no messages regarding a delay or possible launch date from company representatives and the 800 number still goes to a cell phone sounding voicemail that does not mention iHype.com. Updates will be provided if and when iHype.com launches.

Related posts:

1. ePerks: A Case Study in Greed and Self-Imposed Brand Destruction