Brand new to "re-selling" and web-hosting in general

brudjazz · #1 04-29-2005, 02:49 AM

I have been wondering for awhile how I could get started re-selling. It sounds like something that I could do from my home, which is a good thing. I'm a "socially-handicapped procrastinator". The thing is that I do not want to get into anything that:

(a) requires a large upfront investment, or

(b) is illegal, cheating, wrong, etc.

Any advice? I know absolutely NOTHING about re-selling, and I've become discouraged with trying to get any useful information from webhostingtalk.com, since it seems to be mostly reviews of webhosting companies there, and everyone responding with "your mileage may vary", YMMV", "depends on what you want, there is no way for us to advise you" or "I really loved that webhost, but they suck, they ALL SUCK, here's a good webhost for ya!".

amartins · #2 04-29-2005, 12:08 PM

Hi!

Well things could not be simpler than the way HG has it set up. I remember a few years ago when reseller products were fewer and far between and imposed a whole bunch of requirements for a what was in effect a very "barebones" product.

On HG your cost of operation won't be much more expensive than your normal hosting package with the bonus that you can resell at the same time.

As a reality check in around 18 months of reselling here I only have 1 "direct" hosting customer (competition is pretty fierce) but on the other hand I appreciate being able to host my customers on "my own" server. Up till now we would design sites, install scripts etc and just set a customer up at a webhosting company not making money off of the hosting part. Now, as resellers, we have set up all-in-one packages with the site design (or script install and customization) along with a year of hosting included in that way we started getting revenue from hosting.

So I guess what I am saying is they you have to look into who will be your target customer and if you have enough current customers to support the monthly investment. I find that offering a bunch of other services is good at bringing customers to you. You on the other hand may want to look into the local business community even if you have to go and steal them away from other companies but only you can know and find that out in such a way as to find a place for yourself in the market.

HTH

Antonio

Dwight · #3 04-29-2005, 12:29 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by amartins

As a reality check in around 18 months of reselling here I only have 1 "direct" hosting customer (competition is pretty fierce) but on the other hand I appreciate being able to host my customers on "my own" server. Up till now we would design sites, install scripts etc and just set a customer up at a webhosting company not making money off of the hosting part. Now, as resellers, we have set up all-in-one packages with the site design (or script install and customization) along with a year of hosting included in that way we started getting revenue from hosting.

This is exactly how we do our reselling. We design custom web sites and then host them for the clients.. not only does the client appreciate the lack of hassles, but as long as we keep them happy, we get a check every year for hosting which is close to all profit for minimal effort... We do have a few client's that are strictly hosting, and do their own sites, but not very many...

We don't even try to compete with low cost hosting... I've found that bargain hunters are no bargain for me... they want more service for less money and when you give it to them, they act like it's still not enough... We give good service and good value for their money, but when they start trying to bargain and get the price down, I just tell them to shop around... if they are looking for cheap, they can find it lots of other places... If they are looking for value, then we can help them.

Anyway, I guess that's enough rambling from me...

Dwight

David · #4 04-29-2005, 01:04 PM

Dwight, glad to see that you are not compromising your business model for people that you really wouldn't want as customers in the long run anyway. I see this happen way too often in the consulting world, and when it happens the vendor ends up realizing that they kicked themselves in the rear twice. Once when they lost money on the concession(s) made, and second when they see that the customer is more hassle than they are worth.

brudjazz,

Yes, you can run a small operation from home, but really depends on what you're trying to accomplish like Antonio said. Hosting/Design is not my main focus, but I have the company I work for setup here with a reseller account to manange several sites, and I have my own reseller account here as well. I have thought about doing what you're talking about, but hosting is a saturated market to say the least. Given you're talking about a one person operation, you would really need to be able to stand out on service and support to make anything. You also need to be able to effectively interact with clients. I'm not sure exactly what you mean by "socially-handicapped procrastinator" but my guess is that might be an issue for you if you don't like the interaction. I'm not sure if you do web design as well, but it really helps to offer complementary services together which adds value from a customer's perspective. Good luck in whatever you decide to do.

David

brudjazz · #5 04-29-2005, 08:56 PM

Yikes! I did not realize how saturated the hosting market is, until you all brought that up. I am not a good web designer, so that knocks me out, too. The only thing that I can really do half-way decent is writing and editing server/client scripts.

Dwight · #6 04-29-2005, 09:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by brudjazz

Yikes! I did not realize how saturated the hosting market is, until you all brought that up. I am not a good web designer, so that knocks me out, too. The only thing that I can really do half-way decent is writing and editing server/client scripts.

I have an idea for a script I have no idea how to write... if you are interested, give me a private message... I can't pay much, but we could do some barter, or work out something... the idea I have might be saleable, so you could market it afterwards... let me know if you want to hear my idea...

Dwight

amartins · #7 04-30-2005, 07:07 AM

Hi again!

Quote:

Originally Posted by brudjazz

Yikes! I did not realize how saturated the hosting market is, until you all brought that up.

Yeah but don't have to let that limit you. The fact your customers don't come to you because they are in a forrest of other offers does not mean you can't go out and find them.

It's exactly what we are doing now, going out and showing potential customers they can get more "bang for their buck". I'm surprised to find that many companies are hosted with big name telecos and ISPs paying 10x or more what they'd pay us for what in fact is a lesser service than we can offer (except for phone support which we avoid).

Obviously this all depends on where you live and what niche market you may find my point of view is based on what I feel the market is like here in Europe.

Once you have someone as a hosting customer and they need a small update they don't know how to do.. who knows they may get in touch. As for not knowing much about design there are alot of solutions be they template sites or interactive form driven design packages such as HG offers. Many customers don't know or want to spend time filling them with their info.

Good luck!

Antonio.