Reselling Hosting - Worth It?

I have a question for those you who have (or have tried) to resell hosting as a steady stream of revenue. I am been toying with the idea for a few weeks and now am seriously considering it.

A couple of questions for those who have at least tried:

• How much additional effort is required? Hours per week - troubleshooting,etc?
• How does one look differenet than the competition other than pricing? I suppose service is key here.
• At the end of the day, was or is it worth it versus building websites?

I am sure that I have missed some important aspects of it but I am looking for opinions here to help shape my evidentual decision.

Thanks in advance.

 

If you have to ask, you have no business in the hosting business.

You want the responsibilty of keeping others businesses for a little extra income?

The last thing the internet needs is another hobbiest offering so called hosting.

People need to be aware of such places and avoid them IMO.

 

Thanks for the response noppid. Everyone starts from somewhere when starting a new venture, right? It is a capitalism that sparks all things great and crappy. Hopefully I can land somewhere in between . Also, when I do try for a new segement, I am serious about supporting my customers. I do not consider my current revenue just a hobby.

But I get what you are trying to say - it is a tough business out there with very little differentiation.

 

Hi,

I did reseller hosting for a while. But it's not a "hands off" stream of money. You have to administor users and accounts, handle money and provide support. And it's support that often makes or breaks a user hanging around.

There are hosting companies that you can "resell" with affiliate schemes, ones that will provide you a monthly payment on user subscriptions if it is a stream of income you're after. Peanut compares to the money you can make reselling or actually hosting, but once the customer is handed over then they're completly out of your hands. Hassle free.


Cheers

Chris

 

I agree with that 100%. (Pet peeve number 3 exposed.)

If you approch it with that attitude and not even my commnets upset you, you will probably do well if you take the time to learn it.

Good luck.

 

Web hosting is an extremely competitive market - you really need to be able to justify how you are going to make an impact in the hosting markets, when a lot of companies are happy to make a loss on new customers.

Recommendation - start with hosting friends, then make yourself known to local businesses via recommendations from your friends and a little offline marketing.

 

Thanks I, Brian. I was actually thinking of going after the local market along with web design & SEO services. I could probably charge higher rather than going after the mass online hosting market.

 

Hi, hosting is very much a saturated market in my opinion.

Being a web developer i use my reseller account for any of my clients that want hosting, i often end up having to control the site afterwards anyway, but its good for me cause it keeps the site off of my development server and also gives me a little reccouring income.

Keeping local is probably your best bet, your not going to get anywhere in the online market unless you wish to spend a lot of money in advertising, even then it might not be worth it.

So, if your going to start a hosting business, you're best options are to use it as a support to existing services, to tap your local market, or if you already have a very large (and loyal) user base somewhere else.

Good Luck!
Dread
www.dreadlabs.com

 

well theres a lot of way of making huge money aside from tedious reselling hosting.

 

If you read the postings from people who are looking for hosting they all expect 24/7/365 service with rapid response times. There is an old joke about the difference between a dairy farmer and a convict; the convict doesn't have to milk the cows. It looks to me like running a web hosting business would be worse than a convict in solitary confinement; you wouldn't even get one hour for exercise.

There is also lots of opportunity for fingerpointing. If their email doesn't work its because your system is messed up, not that they don't know how to configure outlook.

 

I have a reseller account and it's the best thing I ever invested in, not because I get a steady stream on Income but because if i need to set a site up i can do in in a matter of minutes, It also works out cheaper than buying hosting elsewhere, and if a client needs a site I can sort one out for them immediatly which always seem to impress them for some reason.

Mark

 

i dont think getting 20gb space and 100gb bandwidth then reselling it makes much sense... as far as i know its tedious... when a prob occurs with the box itself, you cant do anything about it... and you have to wait on the host and being that middle man can cause you to loose customers.

i was a previous reseller, and never really had a problem getting customers. but support is a *cough* if you take too long to respond and cant really solve problems... you're as good as imcompetent and your clients would leave.

if you want to seriously do this... you should research getting rackspace in a datacentre then reselling/renting the boxes... its easier to manage and thats where the $$$ is.

if you want to get higher than that, start your own DC

 

couple of questions for those who have at least tried:
How much additional effort is required? Hours per week - troubleshooting,etc? DOE - Depends on your experience, also if you have access to WHM - Web Hosting Manager and if you have a billing software such as Modern Bill, etc.
How does one look differenet than the competition other than pricing? I suppose service is key here. "You should be able to respond to all hosting issue and problems that may arise and be able to respond in a 24x7 mode.
At the end of the day, was or is it worth it versus building websites? It could be, depending on how you package your service and who is your target market. If you are building websites they would prefer you also host it for them.

--------------

Thanks,

Joe Ghio
Channel Manager/ RONSYSTEMS Alliance Network
RONSYSTEMS Small Business Solutions

(214) 452-1799
(419) 574-5185 fax
ronsystems.com

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To speak with a customer representative, please contact our office during standard business hours (Central Standard Time, 9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m.).

Helping small business succeed online. Make your business a success.

 

it all depends on how serious you want to get. It will take awhile to start making some real bucks but i will be worth it. Also consider the competativeness of the hosting bussiness and consider what will your company standout from the other millions out there.