WebsitePulse review: What you should know

W

Websites are critical to the success of a business. But your job doesn’t end once your website is up and running. You need to monitor it to ensure it works as it should, 24/7. Websites crash and sometimes take too long to load. Without proper monitoring, you might end up losing potential customers who get fed up when they encounter such problems on your site.

This is why website monitoring tools are so important. 

Website monitoring tools check different aspects of your website and provide you with reports, giving you a complete picture of its strengths and weaknesses. Once you know how your website works, you can take the necessary measures to rectify the issues. The result? Your website works perfectly in all aspects.

In this article, we’ll look at a leading website monitoring tool you might want to consider: WebSitePulse.

WebSitePulse features

WebSitePulse is a web-based remote monitoring service that allows you to monitor several components critical to the proper functioning of a website. Here are some of the tool’s top features:

1. Server & Network Monitoring

Every second your website is down is lost revenue. One of the more essential aspects of your website is page uptime and page load speed. These are also critical SEO elements.

WebSitePulse monitors your servers in real-time to detect issues that might ruin your website’s user experience. It does this by looking at the servers and network devices from around the world as frequently as every minute. Once it detects an error, it sends you an immediate alert.

2. Webpage Monitoring

WebSitePulse can scan your webpage for issues that may ruin the browsing experience. It checks to ensure your webpage content is delivered correctly. It also checks for connectivity issues, webpage defacement issues, unauthorized content changes, and the website download speed & uptime. 

These checks ensure users have a pleasant experience on your website. It also boosts the reliability of your website and, by extension, brand.

3. Web Transaction Monitoring

WebSitePulse looks for any problems in the transaction process and alerts you of any issues. These issues include connectivity and performance hiccups. This monitoring allows you to improve transactions for website visitors and app users.

WebsitePulse monitors web transactions by simulating real user experiences. The simulation helps the tool see the issues users experience when performing web transactions. It, then, alerts you of such issues, allowing you to fix them before they impact the user experience and your bottom line. 

WebsitePulse provides several web transaction monitoring products, including:

Performance Transaction Monitoring assesses the transaction process. However, this monitoring doesn’t check for CSS, Javascript, and images. It is ideal for most corporate and commercial websites.

Full-page Transaction Monitoring assesses the availability and performance of a web transaction. It downloads the components of a webpage, including images, HTTP requests, and scripts. It also measures DNS resolution, redirects, and connections.

In-browser Transaction Monitoring assesses multi-step web transactions from the user’s perspective, i.e., through a real browser engine. This monitoring is ideal for platforms based on AJAX and Java Script.

Custom Transaction Monitoring checks the availability and performance of custom transactions and the individual steps involved. For example, it can test the add-to-cart, checkout actions, submitting forms, SQL database, and opening web pages.

4. Email Round-trip Monitoring

The email round-trip monitoring is used to check and highlight issues with incoming or outgoing emails. For example, it shows when emails get lost or delayed. 

To run this test, WebsitePulse sends a test email to a specified email address. They then retrieve it from the mail server. Doing this allows the system to detect any errors they may encounter while sending or trying to retrieve the test email.

WebSitePulse’s email round-trip monitoring feature is critical, especially if you want to boost your email marketing efforts. Plus, it supports multiple protocols and authentication methods, primary and secondary manual server configuration, and multiple mail delivery and submission scenarios.

5. Vulnerability Monitoring

WebSitePulse scans your servers for vulnerabilities and assesses your firewalls. They do this by simulating real digital and online attacks on your website. It checks your site for more than 60,000 known security issues, revealing holes and weak points.

After the scan, WebSitePulse will recommend ways you can make your servers more secure. 

WebSite pulse works with all operating systems and databases. You don’t need to install anything either. All vulnerability scans are done remotely. This makes WebSitePulse’s security scan easy to use.

You can prevent data leaks and tamper with this kind of monitoring.

6. Blacklist Monitoring

If you suspect business communications are not being sent through, you may have fallen into a DNS-based blacklist.

WebSitePulse allows you to see if mail providers have blacklisted your domain.

Source

The monitoring tool checks up to 82 different blacklists around the globe. This lets you know if your mailing domain has been compromised.

WebSitePulse will provide you with detailed reports of each blacklist you ended up in. You can use insights from the report to appeal to the blacklist administrators and have your email domain removed from the list.

7. Certificate Monitoring

WebSitePulse downloads and scans your SSL/TLS certificates. It checks the certificates for expiration, configuration, and validity. This ensures that your certificates are well configured and functioning, preventing website visitors from receiving security warnings while trying to access your site.

Well-functioning security certificates should also boost your daily traffic, as users will feel more secure accessing and browsing your site.

8. Custom Monitoring

WebSitePulse offers varied monitoring solutions for any company. With WebSitePulse, you can configure your own monitoring package. You will only get what your website needs, which ensures you get a reasonable, custom price.

Custom pricing is something not a lot of digital monitoring services offer. With WebSitePulse’s custom monitoring, you can save on business expenses. 

Websitepulse pricing

WebSitePulse’s pricing is a bit more complex than other SaaS and web services. For one, they don’t have set plans to choose from. Their pricing is based on per feature.

Pricing will depend on the following:

  • The type(s) of monitoring you want
  • Monitoring-specific parameters (i.e., Total Steps on In-Browser Application Monitoring)
  • The interval of the monitoring (i.e., Every 1 minute or every 24 hours)
  • The number of targets and website locations
  • How long do you want to keep logs for
  • Do you need customer support to take over in case of problems?

WebSitePulse’s services can range from $1 a month to more than $2M monthly as a result. 

WebSitePulse Pros and Cons

WebSitePulse has great product offerings and an interesting pricing model. However, it also has some drawbacks. So, here’s a list of the pros and cons of this platform.

Pros

  • Per-feature pricing allows you to only pay for what you need.
  • WebSitePulse is scalable, allowing you to change, add, or remove any features anytime.
  • WebSitePulse’s vast selection of monitoring solutions makes it great for any business type.

 Cons

  • WebSitePulse has no free version. 
  • It can be overwhelming to decide on a monitoring plan, especially if you don’t know what you need.

You may need to consult your system administrator before opting for WebSitePulse’s services.

In Closing

WebSitePulse is a complete website monitoring tool that gets you the reports you need. From WebSitePulse’s recommendations, you can improve your website and prevent costly malfunctions.

But WebSitePulse may not be beginner-friendly for some prospects. This is due to the complex pricing model and the absence of a free trial.

However, once you get the hang of it, it’s a cost-effective, scalable tool that you can use to your advantage. Your website can achieve outstanding performance with WebSitePulse.

About the author

Nicholas Prins

I'm the founder of Launch Space. We work with global companies helping them scale lead generation through SEO and content marketing. Head over to the homepage to find out more.

By Nicholas Prins