In a fun and funny blog post dated December 12 (though it’s awfully hard to tell if that’s true), web hosting provider IX Web Hosting announced plans to release a new version of its control panel, incorporating a range of new features and updates.

The blog post includes a supposedly leaked collection of documents that includes some fairly small images of what appear to be the new control panel, and a strange redacted letter to the company’s CEO Fathi Said, from, well, somebody apparently involved in the control panel’s development.

The blog post also includes an “unsanctioned” interview with “Web Hosting Expose Weekly” (presumably a new competitor of ours) by a seemingly-fictional public relations manager named Mack Jenson.

The whole post is almost silly enough to make it difficult to pick out the point of it all, but the actual news seems to be that IX Web Hosting is planning to announce an update to its control panel, one that (if the details of a fake letter and interview can be believed) will incorporate an entirely new interface, and customization options, along with a few other tools that will make it much easier for customers to perform simple tasks like renewing domain names and updating billing profiles.

The post doesn’t include any specifics about the planned release of the new control panel, aside from suggesting that it is “entering the last stages of testing,” and that it “will soon announce the release date.”

Back in November, IX Web Hosting named hosting industry veteran Ben Gabler, formerly of UK2 group, its director of hosting, suggesting at the time that he would oversee “several updates” to the company’s shared hosting services and platform this year, of which the control panel upgrade would seem to be one.

Aside from the news itself, the blog post is an interesting exercise in customer outreach. Communicating with customers about product releases and upgrades can be tough, and the customers receiving those communications aren’t always as excited about the projects as the hosting provider. Having some fun with a blog post like this can be good for the relationship, and help to remind your customers that there are actual people (possibly even fun, cool people) on the other side of the control panel in question.

Bringing a sense of humor to communicating with customers isn’t unheard of in the hosting business. It’s been done to pretty good effect over the years by companies like DreamHost and Lunarpages. But in a market where services can start to look pretty similar, a little personality can be another good way for a service provider to distinguish itself from the crowd.

In the case of IX Web Hosting, a company that hasn’t necessarily been known for hilarious communications in the past, the response to the blog seems to suggest that the company’s customers appreciate the approach, with excitement about the new control panel and excitement about receiving a funny email appearing in about equal parts.

Talk back: What do you think of the IX Web Hosting blog post as a marketing effort? Do you put energy into trying to make your communications with your customers memorable? Let us know in the comments.

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