95% of vBulletin customers would not recommend VB

[Fergal]

The Licensed Customer Feedback forum section at vBulletin.com is a section of their forum that can only be seen and used by those that own a vBulletin (VB) licence. In other words only paying VB customers can use it and post there. Unfortunately the feedback in that section has been extremely negative since VB released VB5.

I posted a poll there, with the simple question "Would you recommend VB5 to a friend?" The poll has had 39 votes to date. Only two voters said that they would recommend VB5 to a friend and the remaining 37 said they would not recommend VB5 to a friend.



The poll has been open less than 24 hours and considering that the people voting are VB customers who are visiting VB's own forum, that has got to be a very worrying statistic for the staff and management of VB.

 

[AndroidOS]

That's interesting Fergal, I'd be worried if I worked for VB. Can you keep us updated as more people vote in the poll?

 

[Fergal]

I will AndroidOS. VB staff have been caught posting false reviews of VB on review sites in the past, so I wouldn't be surprised if they did something to distort the poll results. I suppose what I'm saying is, that the initial replies to the poll, might be more reflective of the true views of VB customers.

 

[CyberFreak]

I have never really liked vB. Mainly down to the software being quite bloated and messy but also down to the way vB treat customers.

With a company like vB, I only think the people at the top will care when they can no longer afford to run their heated swimming pools and the electric bill for their mansion. At the moment, vB are still getting people paying for licenses/support and while some lower staff might care and want to do something to change it, I imagine the people at the top who probably don't care aslong as they are still making money. It may be less then they were making but no doubt they look at how much work is needed to get them ahead of the game again and then think that it is not worth the effort so are happy to keep pocketing any profits vB make for them rather then paying out alot of money to possibly change things an improve their reputation, software and more importantly their customer service. That is my view on it anyway. Personally I think it is a case of a company being complacent and greedy which is getting more and more common these days. Apple I feel is another prime example of a company that has become complacent and greedy.

I am not a huge fan of Xenforo but atleast they seem to care about the customers more and the software they produce and do not seem to be out to push people sub-standard software for a high price.

 

[Ashley]

I'm not surprised in the slightest. VB has been going downhill since this whole lawsuit began.

 

[Fergal]

...down to the way vB treat customers.....

I've invested money and lots of time into learning how to admin and use VB. I keep hoping that they will turn around and improve, but it just never seems to happen.

There have been more votes in the poll, 61 in total, but the percentage has stayed more or less the same.

 

[Commander]

I gave up on VB a long time ago. First it was their prices that put me off buying their...at that time..."revolutionary software" (this was back in the VB3 days). Then VB4 came along...wasn't too bad, but wasn't as good as VB3. Then VB5....and the dispute with XenForo....but VB5 is just terrible. I even browsed their own support forum, which uses VB5. I was disgusted. 😕

 

[MasterA]

This is very interesting. So many people dislike it but they still use it or have a license. vBulletin is also very expensive and I think its not worth it. I think most people now prefer Xenforo.

 

[Fergal]

So many people dislike it but they still use it or have a license

I still use it because one of my forums is running quite well on VB4. I own the licence and I know how to admin that forum, it would take a lot of work and learning for me to change the forum software used by that site.

 

[pandaa]

Recently Digitalpoint changed from vBulletin to Xenforo, and if that's not an indication of what the voters in this poll are thinking, I don't know what is. If the switch to another software is worth over a year's work, and a rewrite of 1.5 million lines of custom code...

Interesting thread, Fergal. Has a staff member there responded to it?

 

[CyberFreak]

So many people dislike it but they still use it or have a license

I still use it because one of my forums is running quite well on VB4. I own the licence and I know how to admin that forum, it would take a lot of work and learning for me to change the forum software used by that site.

Also when you have an established forum, converting forum software is far from easy and will cause a period of time where you will annoy many users with downtime, missing/changed features and a different feel to the site. vB4 is supported so there is no need to convert yet. When vB4 stops being supported and you are stuck between upgrading to vB5 or converting to another software then you can change. Whatever route you go down will be a big change to the site and will annoy users with a different feel and changed features.

 

[Ashley]

Recently Digitalpoint changed from vBulletin to Xenforo, and if that's not an indication of what the voters in this poll are thinking, I don't know what is. If the switch to another software is worth over a year's work, and a rewrite of 1.5 million lines of custom code...

Interesting thread, Fergal. Has a staff member there responded to it?

I've heard about that and I was quite surprised. From my understanding, DP has been on Vbulletin for years, haven't they? So for them to up and convert was a major shock. So when a well known forum like that converts software, you know something screwy is going on on the developer's end!

I gave up on VB a long time ago. First it was their prices that put me off buying their...at that time..."revolutionary software" (this was back in the VB3 days). Then VB4 came along...wasn't too bad, but wasn't as good as VB3. Then VB5....and the dispute with XenForo....but VB5 is just terrible. I even browsed their own support forum, which uses VB5. I was disgusted. 😕

I was always turned off because of their pricing. They had a good thing but almost 200 bucks for a new license is ridiculous.

 

[Casper]

It's sad to see a once highly praised software turn into something widely disliked.

 

[E07.NET]

These days Xenforo is good!

Most of vBulletin users are changing to Xenforo..

 

[Ashley]

It's sad to see a once highly praised software turn into something widely disliked.

Well yeah, something that's been almost worshipped for years all of a sudden goes downhill? That's insane and it didn't take long either.

 

[spyka]

VB3 was great, VB4 started to go down hill and VB5 is just a mess.

I think VB's problem was that VB3 was so good, they felt like they had to change it a lot to get people upgrade.

I know plenty of active forums still runing on VB3 and they're unlikely to move away.

 

[Fergal]

There have now been over 100 votes in the poll.

 

[Rick Ace]

While I'm not surprised that vB is unpopular, I really don't think Xenforo is the solution, especially not for business/premium sites. Just look at dP.

 

[Allan]

Not surprised either, I have an option to get VB for a decent price but was sure if I really wanted it.

 

[Ashley]

There have now been over 100 votes in the poll.

Are the staff still cheating their votes or whatever you said they were doing? If so, I'm not surprised. I've heard of incidents before on hosts where staff would create false reviews on how their site is so "great" when in reality the exact opposite is true. It's disgusting, really.

Not surprised either, I have an option to get VB for a decent price but was sure if I really wanted it.

Well, this poll would've definitely convinced me not to go for it, that's for sure!