Reseller Questions

[crud3w4re]

1. I'm interested in a reseller's account. In PayPal, they give you two options when you choose a Business Account, "Individual" and "Sole-Proprietorship." I don't understand this, because in the law, anyone operating a business that hasn't registered it is considered a Sole-Proprietor, so the "Individual" clause didn't make much sense to me. I'm going to be operating a webhosting business.

2. Do I have to pay for the first year to enom? If I do pay it, does the customer receive an option to purchase a domain automatically, or do I have to implement that? I might go with this if it's free for the first year, otherwise, why bother? Webhosts are not known for being great registrars, as registrars aren't known to be great webhosts. Someone can get it cheaper at a reputable registrar, and then just direct the NS to point to my future private nameserver. No problem.

3. Where do I download those webhosting templates?

4. Am I allowed to host any website that I want, even if it's against HostGator TOS?

5. How do I change my stats? I'm not using the "baby croc" package anymore.

6. If I go through all of the reseller packages, then would I switch to a dedicated server, or would I need to depart from HostGator? I don't see that happening anytime soon, but I didn't think it'd hurt to ask.

Okay. That's about it for now, I just was wondering about this stuff. I was gonna refer to "I" and "I'm" as "We" and "We're" as it seems "more professional", but I always saw that as misleading, being that I'm the only guy heh

[slapshotw]

I'll just do the ones I know the answers to...

Originally Posted by crud3w4re

2. Do I have to pay for the first year to enom...

I'm not really sure what you mean by this. You have to pay for any domain you get for each year, either through eNom or any other registrar. Why would you get the first year free? If I were you, I'd take advantage of the free eNom reseller account that comes with the HG reseller packages, which lowers your eNom price to $8.75/year-- a pretty good price. This is what I do.

4. Am I allowed to host any website that I want, even if it's against HostGator TOS?

No, all the sites you host must stay within the TOS.

5. How do I change my stats? I'm not using the "baby croc" package anymore.

You mean what it says on your profile here on the forums? I wouldn't worry about it-- nobody can see that but you so it doesn't really matter. If it really bothers you, try PMing a mod-- but again, many people say their info is wrong, and nothing happens.

6. If I go through all of the reseller packages, then would I switch to a dedicated server, or would I need to depart from HostGator?

You can move up to a dedicated with HG.

[crud3w4re]

Originally Posted by slapshotw

I'll just do the ones I know the answers to...



I'm not really sure what you mean by this. You have to pay for any domain you get for each year, either through eNom or any other registrar. Why would you get the first year free? If I were you, I'd take advantage of the free eNom reseller account that comes with the HG reseller packages, which lowers your eNom price to $8.75/year-- a pretty good price. This is what I do.

Thanks for replying. If I have to put up my own money for customer domains, why would I bother doing this? There's no profit in it for me, or is there? Most people don't look to register domains with webhosts.

No, all the sites you host must stay within the TOS.

Alright. I'll need to monitor the sites casually then.

You mean what it says on your profile here on the forums? I wouldn't worry about it-- nobody can see that but you so it doesn't really matter. If it really bothers you, try PMing a mod-- but again, many people say their info is wrong, and nothing happens.

Ohh. Nah, doesn't bother, just inquiring. I'll let it be.

You can move up to a dedicated with HG.

Nice. I hope I get that far. What do you do if you're too large for even dedicated hosting?

[slapshotw]

Originally Posted by crud3w4re

If I have to put up my own money for customer domains, why would I bother doing this? There's no profit in it for me, or is there? Most people don't look to register domains with webhosts.

You offer domain reselling services and charge people for any domains they buy with you, or, tell them that they can get the domain somewhere else and point the DNS to you. Although it may not be the smartest thing in the world, I find most people actually do end up buying a domain with their host. You can easily setup domain reselling through the eNom reseller account HG gives you.

I hope I get that far. What do you do if you're too large for even dedicated hosting?

Get a bigger dedicated server-- as in, get bigger/more harddrives, get one with a faster processor/more RAM, etc.. Or you can get additional ones.

[crud3w4re]

Alright. I will. So there would never be a reason to leave HG? Would a sucessful company ever need to hire people, eventually?

[chaloupe]

Would a sucessful company ever need to hire people, eventually?

It depends on how big you want to be.

For me, I built the entire thing myself. I have been able to be alone for two years but now it seems that I have support request to be coming in each day from businesses accounts that I have and they will not let you go if something, even the smallest thing is not running the way they want. Shared account on the other hand, are relatively calm on support request.

When I go on a trip from or taking the train for even a few hours, I get two guys doing support for my client via email and phone. I pay them for the time they spent with the client. They are IT in one of those businesses so they are nice friends of mine that I now depend on them for my small biz support.

Why two guys? In case one doesn't know the answer! He can forward the request to the other guy, if no one know the answer, they send the ticket via my Blackberry and I do the hard way by responding to the client on my phone.

I do trust them since I have known them for about 3 years but only one of them have root privilege. (It help in case I also die lol) Usually used to unlock IP's from the server firewall in case client lock themself out because they have used the wrong password.(they only get 5 tries)

But to make a story short, My blackberry is bombard with email each day to make sure everything run smoothly but thanks to my two helpers who can give me a hand when support request is going crazy.

It's not because our servers have major break down but client call you just to check a simple php code, create new email account, check permission on files, check for new spam that is not block from MailScanner or new employee locking(block by our firewall on the server) the FTP access because they have not use the right login(I got a company that every employees have their own ftp username/password so they cannot access to the main files of the website)

Anyway, I could go on and on forever on how things go on my side each day...But if you need help, let me know!

Best Regards,

[crud3w4re]

I see. I plan to run my business as a business, make money by:

A. Providing great packages

B. Adjusting my packages to better compete with competitors.

and

C. Listening to my customers, even the people I know on the various webhosting forums that I'm apart of. I will reinvest all my money into this, some to strategic paid marketings, the rest to making my site more attractive, implementing new features, etc.,

Hiring?

I suppose I'd hire a business consultant/lawyer if the time comes to expand, I'm not anticipating that. It's a cut-throat industry, patience is key. I found that the majority of the web hosting tutorials that I've read give you a completely pessimistic outlook to the business. They attempt to discourage you with business plans, and pointing out that the industry is saturated, that's why I don't really put much emphasis into any of those so-called "tutorials."

I wouldn't be surprised if they're sponsored by the webhosts themselves ha. Anyway, I know how to market sites very well, I stayed out overnight with my old Arcade site, I brought that site near the 100k mark on Alexa. I made it into a PR3 with free marketing alone, I never paid for any ads for it, so yeah, I think I see alot of potential for me in this business.

***

1. Where do I download those templates?

2. Does my enom account come built in? How do I implement it?

3. hmmm.. yeah, that's about it.