Aluminum Reseller Hosting Package

[Mehmet]

Few questions; hoping someone will be kind enough to assist me as I am completely new to all of this.

Business plan - 99p per month for 1GB of web space, 10GB of bandwidth. 24 websites hosted per server (Maximum on the Aluminum Reseller Hosting Package @ 1GB per customer).

Could this work at all; obviously on a small scale the profit margine is minimal, but could this work if I can bring in a considerable amount of customers?

Would hosting 24 websites on a single server be a problem (consider CPU/Memory usage etc). If the websites hosted are primarily wordpress blogs without too much traffic, I'm assuming the server resources would be minimal and therefore shouldn't be a problem?

Is it possible to create my small business THROUGH a blog, rather than having to make a website (which I'm not experienced in).

Thank you for your help; if someone is willing to offer me guidance through MSN/e-mail I would appreciate that too

[striddy]

Originally Posted by Mehmet

Could this work at all; obviously on a small scale the profit margine is minimal, but could this work if I can bring in a considerable amount of customers?

99p. Are you planning on going broke before you begin?

Originally Posted by Mehmet

Would hosting 24 websites on a single server be a problem

No

[Mehmet]

Originally Posted by striddy

99p. Are you planning on going broke before you begin?

What do you mean by that? Would be nice if you elaborated a little, I have actually done all the calculations and I worked out I would be making a profit.

99p p/month x 24 = £23.76
Cost of server p/month = £16

[striddy]

Originally Posted by Mehmet

I have actually done all the calculations and I worked out I would be making a profit.

99p p/month x 24 = £23.76
Cost of server p/month = £16

• Is this to be a hobby for you or a real business?
• As HG charges in US dollars, if the exchange rate changes, so does your "profit".
• What about your other business costs?

[Mehmet]

Is this to be a hobby for you or a real business?

I'd like to make it into a real business; obviously that will require alot of customers because of the small profit margin - but I do have other plans on how I'm going to increase revenue.

As HG charges in US dollars, if the exchange rate changes, so does your "profit".

As long as I'm making a profit.

What about your other business costs?

What other business costs would that be? The only cost I can think of is if you were to hire people for customer service etc - or have I missed something?

At the end of the day if it doesn't work out I wouldn't have lost anything (other than time); I'd have gained some experience at least.

Thanks David

[ShowNAMES]

That is a good attitude for a morally run company but not for competition.
I run EarthsHOST through HG and my philosophy is if i and the people i take care of are alright then i dont really care about "profit".
However in the real world those values hardly stand up against the onslaught of flashy, cheap fast-paced, "unlimited" hosting.

But somewhere in the middle you will find the common ground be tween your heart and your head.

[striddy]

Originally Posted by Mehmet

What other business costs would that be? The only cost I can think of is if you were to hire people for customer service etc - or have I missed something?

You sure have missed something. The are many costs to run a business, even if you are working from a home office. Telephone, fax, business registration fees, accountants fees, accounting software, etc, etc, the list goes on.

Originally Posted by Mehmet

At the end of the day if it doesn't work out I wouldn't have lost anything (other than time); I'd have gained some experience at least.

Don't forget about customers you have. If you close up shop, what happens to people who have paid their fees up to a year in advance?

[gwyneth]

Originally Posted by Mehmet

I'd like to make it into a real business; obviously that will require alot of customers because of the small profit margin...

What other business costs would that be? The only cost I can think of is if you were to hire people for customer service etc - or have I missed something?

I'm more optimistic than Striddy, but such a small margin calls for being a fanatic about arithmetic and planning.

For instance, unless the only payment method you accept is offline (checks, money/postal orders), you will need to process your customer payments. This means paying a percentage to Paypal or a credit card processor.

Rather than thinking of "profits" at first, it might make more sense to aim for a cash flow that first pays for the reseller account and then becomes part of your planning for a dedi, because that's where the volume model leads. HG occasionally has small unmanaged dedis for $75 monthly, which IMO would be a logical expansion step (and in response to the belief that the unmanaged dedis require a lot of knowledge to run...not that much more than running a managed dedi, particularly for this kind of reselling, which requires a fair amount of knowledge.)

[Mehmet]

Thank you striddy, I appreciate your help.

gwyneth, do you happen to use MSN by any chance and think you could spare me some of your time? I could show you the planning I have done and explain how I intend to make this work.