Yahoo! Small Business Websites and Yola are two of the top-ranked website creation and hosting services. In terms of name-brand recognition, Yahoo! has a decided edge. However, in the realm of real customer satisfaction, Yola wins decisively.

Our expert reviewer summed up Yahoo! as offering a respectable range of features that are neither a bargain nor offer the widest range of available features, while advising that there were “numerous reputable alternatives that are less expensive, less difficult to navigate, more flexible or ‘all of the above’ compared with what Yahoo! offers.”

Yahoo! fares worse than this middling assessment in the customer sentiment found in online reviews and forums, where the discontent far outweighs the satisfaction expressed. In general, there is a lot of dissatisfaction expressed for Yahoo!’s functionality and service, with many complaints about Yahoo!’s control panel, the difficulty of configuring systems, and the poor quality of technical support. A good number of Yahoo! customers describe being unhappy with the discontinuation of Geocities, lamenting what they see as a decline in service after being forced to switch from Geocities to Yahoo!.

Many customers also describe Yahoo!'s fees as being too expensive, which jibes with our expert reviewer who noted that after your initial term on Yahoo! expires, each domain will cost you $34.95 per year, “which is expensive compared with all leading competitors identified by Comparz.”

For Yola, on the other hand, the number of glowing reports and praise far outweigh the amount of discontent expressed. Yola has built a solid reputation by striving to provide easy-to-use web creation tools and exceptional service at low prices, and customer testimonials reflect the success of the company in achieving those goals. In general, users find Yola’s tools more modern, user friendly, and glitch-free.

As our expert reviewer noted, “Yola's streamlined, consistent offerings make choosing a construction and hosting package more simple and straightforward than it is at the sites of several competing providers.”

The pet peeve users have with Yola is the lack of free e-mail and the alternative choice of Yola Mail, an option priced at $9.96 per year per mailbox.

For small businesses who do decide to go with Yahoo! or Yola, it is worth considering their premier service offerings. Yahoo! Small Business offers complete Web site design consulting services via a partnership with Logoworks by HP for $299, while Yola Premiere includes consultation with a dedicated Web site designer from HP Logoworks for a $499.95 first-year fee.

Big companies pay a lot of money for a web content management solution and a professionally designed website—many in the $100,000 to $300,000 range—so the Yahoo! and Yola premier services are a bargain.

Bottom Line: Yola offers exceptional ease of use and distinctive service at competitive prices. With Yahoo! Small Business Websites, you are prone to find unexceptional tools, service, and pricing. The premier service from both providers is a bargain worth investigating for SMBs.

Note: This comparison originally appeared at Comparz.com, a site that features expert- and user-written reviews, rankings and comparisons of solutions for growing businesses. Please visit www.Comparz.com for more information.