Did you know that you can make good money from a reliable web hosting service provider just to rent a Windows reseller hosting space and resell it to third-party client? Yes, it really is that easy to earn money doing nothing. The concept is very simple, you rent web space, and sell to someone else profits. As technical support, your client may require, and the original web-hosting service provider, to provide that. What could be more hassle than something like this?

However, a number of gaps that you need to pay attention when you rent web space on the first place. It includes:

First Opportunity to expand later, of course, your client can start with a small site, but you can not be sure whether he (or she) would like to expand in the future. It is best to ask the web hosting service provider in advance whether they will be able to provide additional storage space as per the requirement to fly. "If you have a choice of Windows Reseller Hosting, then it will be difficult to pull off. Just make sure that the hosting service provider has the opportunity to choose from.

The second Adequate security: If you rent web space Windows reseller hosting provider, then you should be aware that Windows servers are often nefarious intruders such as viruses, worms, and above all, the target of hackers. In order to prevent them from wrecking havoc in website hosting service provider should have a high quality anti-virus software and firewalls installed on each server. When asked about it before you shell out money for rent web space.

The third 24 / 7 Tech Support: Your customers may run into any problems with them new kinds of websites, especially if they are not tech savvy. Make sure that windows reseller hosting provider offers good tech support services for the entire day. You can not predict when the customer's site can go blink. Also, make sure that you collect contact information, technical assistance and give it your client.

Web hosting in the world, there is very little OS that could equivalency with great power and reliability of Windows. There are essentially based on the Microsoft Windows server platform hosting packages, windows reseller hosting. Only, such as Linux, Windows, offers excellent performance and high-quality and user-friendly. If offers excellent tools and options that make the windows very easy to use.

Windows platform is more flexible and support various server-side script as ASP.NET, PHP, Perl, which helps to create dynamic web pages and applications. It is also compatible with databases such as MySQL, MS SQL, MS Access, ODBC, PhpMyAdmin, and streaming support for Flash, Shockwave, Windows Media, Real Audio / Video.

With Windows reseller account to help you quickly grow the business benefits of tools. Most Windows hosting accounts come with user-friendly tools, such as the Plesk control panel. These tools can help you effectively manage your clients.

These are some of the reasons why most people liked the Windows-based hosting. Windows can offer you an excellent opportunity to achieve success with your cheap web hosting reseller account.

Always hire the Windows reseller hosting space from a reputable web hosting service providers, such as Indsoft. You'll have to deal with a lot less hassles that way. They have been in business for years and is well known for providing top notch service fees decent.

Best Windows Reseller Hosting Recommendation

ASPHostPortal.com  is the leading provider of Windows Reseller hosting. ASPHostPortal proudly working to help grow the backbone of the Internet,the millions of individuals, families, micro-businesses, small business, and fledgling online businesses. ASPHostPortal has ability to support the latest Microsoft and ASP.NET technology, such as: WebMatrix, WebDeploy, Visual Studio 2015, .NET 5/ASP.NET 4.5.2, ASP.NET MVC 6.0/5.2, Silverlight 6 and Visual Studio Lightswitch, ASPHostPortal guarantees the highest quality product, top security, and unshakeable reliability, carefully chose high-quality servers, networking, and infrastructure equipment to ensure the utmost reliability.

Starting A Reseller Web Hosting Business? 3 Tips To Help You Get Started.

Have you decided to start your own web hosting business? Well, the good news is that it can be a very profitable business and very inexpensive to start. At first, you are going to need all of the help that you can get, so we are going to provide you with 3 tips that should help you get your business off the ground.

• Branding is Key

web hosting reseller businessYou are going to be competing against a whole lot of other hosting businesses, so you are going to need a reason people will go to you other than to them. If you work hard to increase your brand recognition, you will be able convince people to join your company because you have a trusted brand. When it comes down to it, all hosting companies will get their customer’s websites on the internet, so why do some do better than others? It is because they make their company look superior and more trustworthy.
When you are first starting out, you should be trying to increase your overall visibility and reaching as many people as possible. Even if they don’t become customers now, you can still set a good impression. The more good impressions you make, the easier it will be to convince them later to convert over to your company. After a while of branding, and gaining some attention, your brand will become more and more known, making it much easier for you to attract new customers and get more visibility.

• Ensure the Reseller Hosting Provider is Reliable

This one should be pretty obvious, but unfortunately, a lot of reseller web hosting businesses fail because the provider they went with wasn’t reliable. Each provider might have different terms and conditions, so you need to ensure that you will be able to run your business properly without running into any issues. The last thing you want to do is to finally get your business off the ground, making a decent income, and then all of a sudden have the servers shut down for some random reason. While this scenario is rare, it can happen, so you should be aware of exactly what the provider expects from you.
Another issue you might run into is that the servers that your provider is using are old, not maintained properly, or are faulty. This issue is more common than you might think, and although there is never a guarantee that the servers will always be up, the company should be able to handle the situation as soon as possible. Some providers might not be able to fix or replace servers for 24 hours or sometimes a few days, this will look extremely badly on you if your customers have to deal with multiple days of downtime. You will never have direct access to the servers since you do not own them, so make sure the provider will be able to handle it. ASPHostPortal are some of the most reliable hosting providers that you can choose from.

• Gaining a Large Amount of Customers

Like I mentioned a little earlier, at first you are not going to have very many customer… if any. So you must have a marketing and branding campaign strategy ready to go as soon as possible. The sooner you are able to come up with ways to get your brand out there and attract customers, the faster you will see sales. Since this is a business start-up, you might not have the resources to launch a full-scale marketing campaign, but don’t worry because there are plenty of ways to do online marketing for minimal costs.
You should first start by setting up a blog. Blogs are very cheap, easy to set up, and very effective at attracting an audience. You just need to make sure you are posting relevant content that is high quality. Next, get involved with social media. Again, social media doesn’t have to cost you anything, but has the potential to bring you an unlimited amount of customers. There are so many strategies of getting customers for hosting, but the important part is that you start your journey as soon as possible. It might take some time, but you will eventually get enough customers to make this business worth your while.

Tips For Starting A Web Hosting Reseller Business

Opening a web hosting reseller business is one of the wisest ways to build or expand your internet based business. However, do not take this step just by deciding overnight and getting into the web hosting reseller market, the very next morning. Whenever you start a new web hosting reseller business or any type of business, you must be aware of the inside and the outside of it. The various points that you should work on, before you start a web hosting reseller business is as follows:

• Market research and planning: The first important point to be considered in a business is that you must do a proper market research. Planning is also one of the primary factors for the success towards your new web hosting reseller business. There is little scope for people who start their business without setting specific goals and objectives. People who just jump into a business with lack of research and pre-planning and research are the two main keys towards building a long term, successful and profitable web hosting reseller business.

• Competition research: If you want to get ahead in your web hosting reseller business, then in that case, you need to know who your competitors are and their other choice of service. Get to know which competitors are more successful and which are the ones who have achieved least success in their business. This information will act as a feedback and it will guide you to decide what to do and what to avoid with regard to your own web hosting reseller business. The web hosting reseller business contains a great deal of competition. Hence, it is very essential for you to realize the scope and quality of the competition that is involved in a web hosting reseller business.
• Have a market plan: You can develop a successful business plan for your new web hosting reseller business by collecting the required information from your initial research. Also, you need to be aware of the fact that just by having a sound business plan does not mean that you will definitely achieve success in your web hosting reseller business. Writing a business plan will only act as a guide and it will help you tackle the challenges and obstacles that come on your way towards starting your web hosting reseller business.

• Researching the market through other resources: Market research is considered as the top most priority towards succeeding in any industry. One of the practical ways of getting feedback about the web hosting reseller business is through variety of forums. These forums contain participants who consist of professional web hosting provider’s sellers and other internet professional. As you participate in forums, you get the opportunity to interact directly with owners and employees of other business who usually face similar challenges while building your own web hosting reseller business. Information got through these forums is priceless.Market research is time consuming but in the long run, it will save your time and money too. The information that you collect for your market research will assist you in managing the present market trend and your competitors. If you are able to understand the state of the market place and your competitors, you will then begin to enjoy a long term success.
  

This success in your business will come about through the information that you have collected about the state of the market towards web hosting reseller business.

Becoming a web hosting reseller can be a profitable way to earn residual income. Owning a hosting business allows you to set up, manage, and operate the back-end of websites, emails and domain management for your company and others as well. There are many options for doing this which we will examine in this article. We will also look at pros and cons of the industry to see if becoming a reseller is the right choice for you.
Let’s look at the options for becoming a reseller:

• Reseller Hosting:  This form of hosting is often the least expensive and easiest way to begin a hosting business. By using one control panel, you can manage multiple clients who will also have access to a control panel to make changes and updates to their service.  Many clients may not have knowledge or a background in this area and will be completely dependent on you for setup and changes to their service.  This allows you, the reseller, to charge a bit more for this hands-on service. Shared hosting is usually located on a server which you will share with other hosting companies and individuals.

• VPS Hosting: Virtual Private Server Hosting is a virtual “slice” of a much larger main server node. The main server node is often a very powerful dedicated server which is divided up into a number of different virtual environments. While it is possible to become a reseller on a VPS plan, these accounts are typically meant for development purposes only because resources are somewhat limited when compared to other forms of hosting. Regardless of this fact, many have come to view VPS hosting as a great transition from reseller hosting to a dedicated server. This is good to have while your company grows and expands.

• Dedicated Servers: A dedicated server allows you to use all of the resources of a single server machine. The equipment is owned and operated by the company that owns the datacenter where the server is located but use of the machine is exclusively yours. By getting a managed dedicated server, all of the maintenance and troubleshooting of the machine are the responsibility of the datacenter.

• Colocation Servers:  If you own your own server and are familiar with the ins and outs of server management, you may choose to store and run your machine from a datacenter.  This allows you to store your machine in a secure place with more bandwidth, fire protection, backup generators and security than a normal office building. You can also set up your own hardware and software for your business.

Here are the steps to beginning your own reseller business:

1) If you are unfamiliar with the world of web hosting, email management and domain services, we suggest you take the time to research and understand the full scope of what you will be undertaking. Many web designers and coders find that transitioning to also being a reseller allows full control of a client’s web presence and management.
2) Reselling is much like any other business in that it requires hard work, effort and some start-up capital. Like any business, you will need:

•     A powerful, reliable computer for running your business. A laptop will allow you to work from multiple locations.
•     High speed internet. Get the best you can afford.
•     A phone line dedicated to the business and possibly a fax line. An internet capable phone to receive emails and calls on the go is ideal.
•     A tax license, occupational license and incorporation papers.
•     A bank account with your company name or DBA (Doing Business As) with a debit card.
•     A merchant account and gateway software for taking credit cards.
•     I also suggest a private work area in your home or office with a comfortable chair.

3) Choose a hosting plan from the aforementioned options based on your budget and the amount of customers you feel you can grow to in the next three years.
4) Get a good web host.  This is probably the most important step in this process or I wouldn’t have underlined it. Choosing a web hosting company to resell for is crucial; take into consideration the following:

• Does the company have a good reputation? Be sure to check out their track record by researching online and visiting reputable forums such as www.webhostingtalk.com .
• Do they own their own datacenter? While this is not mandatory, a company that has its own datacenter is better able to communicate between departments such as accounting, support, security and maintenance. Their ability to monitor and work within their own company to perform all functions of service saves you time and frustration.
• Do they have 24/7/365 support? Look at all of the options that your host offers such as email ticketing, live chat and phone support.
• Does your host support the platform you choose to work with? (Windows/Linux).
• Does your host have the software options you need such as a good control panel (like cPanel/Plesk), accounting management software (like WHMCS) and web development tools?
• Does your host offer a manageable monthly plan and easy payment options?

5) Learn and understand your software to manage tickets, accounting and your control panel. Set up a sample site to get to know your way around.
6) Set customer pricing.  This can be tricky. You are competing with companies who offer $1.00 pricing online and others who can charge hundreds of dollars.  Research pricing and then break down your resources. Divide up server cost, operational costs and other factors. Websites needing secure certificates for e-commerce will be charged a higher rate as will companies demanding more space and bandwidth.
7) Build an e-commerce website with a helpdesk.  Adding an ecommerce option to your company’s website will allow you to take credit card payments online, saving you the hassle of cashing checks.  Encourage users to set up automated billing so that you have to worry less about tracking each payment.  Also set up a help desk option where customers can contact you if trouble arises.
8) Create business documents. Templates found online can be helpful in creating proposals, agreements and terms of service. Be sure you carefully craft these important documents and have your lawyer review them for accuracy. Also create an informative email to send to customers after they have signed up giving them their access codes, URLs, and email information. We have found it is helpful to highlight and bold the first line that reads, “IMPORTANT. This email contains important information and passwords you will need now and in the future. You must keep this email.”
9) “Early to bed, early to rise, work like hell and advertise.” – Laurence J. Peter.  Be sure to advertise your site accordingly. If you are new then you may want to learn ways to market yourself for little or no cost. You can also do banner advertisements or network ads. Advertising can get expensive so reach out to those you know first.
So, with all of the beginning steps out of the way, there are a few things you should be prepared for in the reseller business:

Pros

• Reseller hosting offers you a way to earn residual income.  Many customers, after initial setup, will need very little work every month to maintain their account, but the same check keeps coming in, month after month. These add up quickly and can turn into a tidy profit if you can get customers on board right away.
• With most reseller options there is no equipment to buy. Therefore you can save yourself the expense of purchasing a server and lease space on a server in the datacenter, usually on a monthly plan.
• A reseller business is very compatible with other services such as website design, website development, gaming forums, domain name registration and blogging.

Cons

• You must be knowledgeable at handling the ins and outs of web hosting, this can take some time for those not familiar with the industry.
• Problems happen at the oddest times in this industry. A customer usually forgets his password right as you are sitting down to dinner or boarding a plane.
• Web hosting is a 24/7/365 business and you will receive emails and phone calls during the holidays, on vacation and on Sundays. Due to the time sensitive nature of the business, you will need to respond as soon as possible.
• Many customers will need to be hand-held through every facet of your relationship.

The reseller business can offer you some insight into many types of businesses in a variety of industries which can help you manage and grow your own respective business.  Sound like too much work? Consider becoming an affiliate where the web host pays you for leads you send to them. Each time you send a lead, you receive money.  Good luck with your new endeavor!

Reseller Web Hosting has significantly gained its popularity among the many different types of web hosting which are available in the market today. Reseller hosting is a great way to earn additional income in if one has the interest and keen knowledge in running their own reseller hosting business whether for part time or full time.

Despite the great prospect of seeing attractive returns from this reseller business within a short duration of time, normally in less than 9 months time. No one should rush head over heels into this business without having careful consideration and assessments on some of the potential problems and risks with this type of web hosting business in the long run.

Lack of control

In the Reseller hosting business, the reseller only has some limited control over what they can do and what they cannot do. It is the hosting company which the reseller is "partnering" with who holds a large extent of the power on the rules and process of the web hosting itself.

Uncontrollable downtime

The Reseller is not responsible of the web-hosting server and there is really nothing that they can do to decide or to influence or improve the downtime of their web-hosting server. In many cases, the hosting company which you are getting the web spaces from does not have the same consciousness and urgency for the downtime as much as you have for your clients.

This will bring a lot of headaches for you, and eventually your reseller business will end up with bad names and reputation because for your clients, you are their web hosting provider which offer your reseller plan and services. The hosting company is transparent to them in this situation. There is nothing that you can help when this happen. Thus, in order to avoid getting yourself into this dilemma, check out carefully on their background and find out more in terms of their downtime frequency and the quality of their customer service. Seek for professional advice and testimonials. Research as much as possible before getting yourself locked into a partnership with the hosting company.

Unsure on the types and version of the software and hardware used by the hosting company

It is transparent to the reseller on the types and technology of the software or hardware which are used by the hosting company. Should the hosting company is still hanging on with their aging EOL server, which consistently causing unnecessary down-time and incompatibility to support some of the latest software in the market. It is the reseller who will get all the blames and accusation when this happened.

Doubtful reliability and service quality of the hosting company

Quality should always be the key attracting factor for any reseller above all the rest of the criteria. Opting for a reseller plan from a hosting company that doesn't have quality products and services will only jeopardize the reseller business in no time. With the increasing competitiveness in this tough industry, your competitors are always looking out for opportunities to over-take you whenever they can. In worst case scenario, the reseller might need to fold up their business at the end of the day.

Ensuring that the pricing structure is reasonable and in accordance

The pricing structure of the hosting company needs to be reasonably quoted in accordance to the general market price trend. Any variances out by more than 10% as compared to the market price will be considered as non-compliance, assuming the service quality and web hosting options are averagely the same.

Best Windows Reseller Hosting Recommendation

ASPHostPortal.com  is the leading provider of Windows Reseller hosting. ASPHostPortal proudly working to help grow the backbone of the Internet,the millions of individuals, families, micro-businesses, small business, and fledgling online businesses. ASPHostPortal has ability to support the latest Microsoft and ASP.NET technology, such as: WebMatrix, WebDeploy, Visual Studio 2015, .NET 5/ASP.NET 4.5.2, ASP.NET MVC 6.0/5.2, Silverlight 6 and Visual Studio Lightswitch, ASPHostPortal guarantees the highest quality product, top security, and unshakeable reliability, carefully chose high-quality servers, networking, and infrastructure equipment to ensure the utmost reliability.

A common grouse which most web hosts have is collection of payments and fees. Delayed payments from customers can mean that web hosts have to rework their monthly budget and cash flow and adjust their outward payments accordingly. This itself can be time-consuming and expensive. The advantage that web hosts have over other businesses is that they have full control over the clients account and can suspend the services or terminate the account at will. This article highlights a couple of reasons why you should pay your renewal fees or hosting charges to your web host, on a timely basis.

Prevent Account Suspension

Most web hosts automatically setup their services to Suspend or even terminate an account, if the renewal or subscription fees are not paid on time. This can be managed by an Automated Billing System which integrates with the Hosting Server and controls the Accounts. The billing system can send out automatic reminders for the payment and can also provide an online payment collection service. This means that clients can pay their renewal fees online at any time of the day, from anywhere in the world. If the deadline is missed, the account may be suspended after giving a Suspension Notice to the client. Account Suspension can lead to services becoming unavailable and visitors seeing a Suspension Message on all the pages.

Prevent Last Minute Delays

Last minute payments can be subject to several delays and failures which will ultimately lead to non-payment and the account getting suspended. Last Minute payments are often affected by bank delays, postal delays, payment processing issues, expired credit cards, connectivity issues and so on. Don't wait till the last minute to make the payment, lest one of these factors prevents you from doing so and your payment becomes overdue and your account getting cancelled.

Prevent Your Website Ranking from falling

With a suspended account, you can't do much. Search Engines will realise that your account is suspended and that no fresh content is being served up from it. This will lead to your ranking falling in various search engines. It may also lead you to fall so drastically that you are unable to recover from it. A prominent financial analyst Saneil Shah pointed out that "the cost of remembering and paying your hosting fees on time is minuscule compared to the loss your website will face if your website is suspended". He went on to say that "losing your website ranking could lead to a permanent loss, which may be irrecoverable".

Avoid Late Fees

Some hosting providers charge a Late Payment Fee to penalize clients for paying late as well as to deter procrastinators. While this may not be very helpful in getting payments on time, it surely helps the web host by compensating for the delay in payment. Late fees can be a fixed amount or even a percentage of the outstanding payment. This could increase the payment to a significantly high amount. When the payment due is high, there may also be interest on the outstanding amount along with the other charges. The simplest way to avoiding all these excess payments is to pay your dues on time.

Build Trust and Goodwill

When your payment for web hosting or related services is made on time or before time, it eases the burden of your web host in collecting the payment. Web hosts keep a mental note of your payment patterns and how many times they have to chase you up to recover the dues. Having a client who pays on time is a pleasure for any business and may lead to your host being helpful and even going beyond the line of duty to help you out when you most need it.

Best Windows Reseller Hosting Recommendation

ASPHostPortal.com  is the leading provider of Windows Reseller hosting. ASPHostPortal proudly working to help grow the backbone of the Internet,the millions of individuals, families, micro-businesses, small business, and fledgling online businesses. ASPHostPortal has ability to support the latest Microsoft and ASP.NET technology, such as: WebMatrix, WebDeploy, Visual Studio 2015, .NET 5/ASP.NET 4.5.2, ASP.NET MVC 6.0/5.2, Silverlight 6 and Visual Studio Lightswitch, ASPHostPortal guarantees the highest quality product, top security, and unshakeable reliability, carefully chose high-quality servers, networking, and infrastructure equipment to ensure the utmost reliability.

Mentioned the 3-letter words, VPS, it carves a smile to certain people. Why? Because it resembles a dedicated server. This is particularly a cheerful news for those folks who wish to own a dedicated server but cannot afford to do so. Basically, as most of you would have known by now, VPS stands for Virtual Private Server. The physical server is separated into a few partition and these partitions are the VPS-es. It gives you the feeling of having a stand-alone server when you purchase the hosting spaces. You are isolated from your neighbours and barely know each other although under the same roof.

What about reseller hosting? I'd define reseller hosting as an account in shared server environment. Simple as that, almost the same as shared hosting. But the difference between reseller hosting and shared hosting is that with reseller hosting, you can create multiple accounts of shared hosting. So, to choose VPS or reseller hosting? This is a big question for almost everyone because it's kind of confusing as there are pros and cons to every decision that you make. Let's just analyse some of the features of VPS and reseller hosting, hopefully will make your hosting decision not much of a headache.

VPS - A solution for dedicated server

VPS offers you the features of dedicated server but it's more to a dedicated server being shared by a few other tenants. I know what you are thinking now. But bear in mind that I mentioned "a few" other tenants. Which means, it is not shared by as many other websites as a shared hosting in a physical server. A reliable hosting provider will have the maximum amount of tenants in a physical server to a certain degree so that the resources of the server can fully support the minimum resources allocated for every client. The most precious feature of VPS would be the root access. Every client will be provided a root access, hence, you can install anything that you like from softwares to Operating System so long it has proper licenses.This means you have the ability to install software which your provider doesn't even have or provide to its other existing shared hosting or reseller hosting clients. Those who long for a peace of mind, will be happy to have owned a VPS because with VPS you are isolated from other clients' VPS-es and regardless of how heavy their traffic is, it won't affect your website. In addition, everyone is provided with a certain amount of CPU usage , RAM usage and bandwidth usage. Although their traffic has drained the amount of bandwidth, it will be the bandwidth allocated to them and has got nothing to do with you although they are your neighbours in the same server.

The above features of VPS seem tempting but do remember that you have to do all the installation yourself. You need to know a bit of server maintenance knowledge and also software-related stuffs. Although you can always refer your problem to your hosting provider, I believe you will be charged with an amount of fees.

Reseller Hosting - Ease your life!

Does reseller hosting offer you a better solution? Well, it depends on people. If you are a person who wants freedom of this and that, you might not be able to survive under reseller hosting. Reseller hosting is good in the sense that it's more organized as everything is setup for you by your hosting provider. You are given the WHM (Web Host Manager) and with WHM you can customize the hosting plans (webspace, bandwidth and etc.) for your resold accounts. A resold account is just like any other shared hosting account, with a cPanel as its control panel under Linux platform. You can sell your resold accounts at your own price and some hosting providers offer the private label reseller plan(meaning you can have your own brand name, thus having your own nameservers). In other words, your resold clients will only know you as their hosting provider and won't figure out you are reselling unless you tell them when they ask you. With reseller hosting, you are bound to what the hosting provider offers you, especially the softwares and applications. Hence, like I've mentioned in the first sentence, reseller hosting might not suit you if you want freedom. However, it's useful if clients do not mind what the hosting providers offer them particularly in terms of applications. Imagine you don't have to get yourself in with all the fuss of installing and configuring this and that. All you do is via the control panel provided to you, then you can start reselling already. In my opinion, reseller hosting is never a bad option and would still be a competitive option towards VPS. It is indeed reliable and useful when you think of the user-friendliness it provides to those who are not so familiar with hosting related stuff.

In general, it is widely speculated that in near future, VPS might take over the role of Reseller Hosting, but truth is yet to be known. Let those hosting fans decide for themselves which one holds to be a better option.

Best Windows Reseller Hosting Recommendation

ASPHostPortal.com  is the leading provider of Windows Reseller hosting. ASPHostPortal proudly working to help grow the backbone of the Internet,the millions of individuals, families, micro-businesses, small business, and fledgling online businesses. ASPHostPortal has ability to support the latest Microsoft and ASP.NET technology, such as: WebMatrix, WebDeploy, Visual Studio 2015, .NET 5/ASP.NET 4.5.2, ASP.NET MVC 6.0/5.2, Silverlight 6 and Visual Studio Lightswitch, ASPHostPortal guarantees the highest quality product, top security, and unshakeable reliability, carefully chose high-quality servers, networking, and infrastructure equipment to ensure the utmost reliability.

How to Choose the Best Reseller Hosting Service

Planning to launch a business selling DNS services? The most crucial decision that you will make which will have a bearing on your profitability and longevity will be choosing the right reseller hosting service. With so tens of thousands of reseller hosting services available on the web, zoning in on a particular provider that will suit your needs can sometimes be a little daunting. A good reseller program should give you access to the best features, great manageability as well as affordable costs.
Here are the top tips on how you can select the best reseller program for your DNS services:

An Easy to Use Reseller cPanel

As a web hosting reseller, you will be implementing, managing and monitoring numerous user accounts. These users expect top reliability because their websites play a very important role in their businesses. As a reseller, it is advisable to choose a reseller hosting solution that is convenient and easy to use in order to manage your client accounts efficiently. You do not want to waste so much time in simply allocating and managing resources to various users. Whatever reseller web host that you choose should have an intuitive and state-of-the-art cpanel that allows you to manage your reseller business with relative ease.

Value Added Features

What value-added features or frills does the reseller program offer apart from its basic hosting package? Web hosting clients love value-add when it comes to the hosting solution so the more the merrier. Ensure that the hosting plan that you choose supports multiple applications as well as features. It should also support multiple programming languages. The last thing you would want is turning away converted customers simply because the hosting solution you chose does not have certain features.

Is it a white label hosting solution?

Is the reseller service brandable? A lot of online entrepreneurs want to build their own brands and sell their products in their brand name instead of using the name of the parent reseller hosting provider. It is therefore important to choose a white-label reseller that allows you to brand your hosting portal.

Customized Plans

Customers are generally looking for specific requirements. Do not herd your customers into fixed hosting plans with little space for flexibility. Choose reseller hosting plans which allow for customizations so that you can offer your customers tailor-made solutions. This will help to sell more and generate more profits from your reseller business.

Offer Additional DNS Services

Do not just sell reseller hosting. Choose a reseller hosting solution which offers buyers a one-stop shop for all their DNS needs including reseller domain names, SSL certificates and much more. This allows you to sell more and upsell products in order to increase your revenues exponentially.

The Hosting Company Should be Reliable

Reliability of the parent web host is actually the most important factor as the success of your reseller business will rely on it. Check if the hosting company has a good track record and robust hosting infrastructure that will ensure the reliability of your hosting service.

Becoming a web hosting reseller can be a profitable way to earn residual income. Owning a hosting business allows you to set up, manage, and operate the back-end of websites, emails and domain management for your company and others as well. There are many options for doing this which we will examine in this article. We will also look at pros and cons of the industry to see if becoming a reseller is the right choice for you.

Let’s look at the options for becoming a reseller:

• Reseller Hosting:  This form of hosting is often the least expensive and easiest way to begin a hosting business. By using one control panel, you can manage multiple clients who will also have access to a control panel to make changes and updates to their service.  Many clients may not have knowledge or a background in this area and will be completely dependent on you for setup and changes to their service.  This allows you, the reseller, to charge a bit more for this hands-on service. Shared hosting is usually located on a server which you will share with other hosting companies and individuals.

• VPS Hosting: Virtual Private Server Hosting is a virtual “slice” of a much larger main server node. The main server node is often a very powerful dedicated server which is divided up into a number of different virtual environments. While it is possible to become a reseller on a VPS plan, these accounts are typically meant for development purposes only because resources are somewhat limited when compared to other forms of hosting. Regardless of this fact, many have come to view VPS hosting as a great transition from reseller hosting to a dedicated server. This is good to have while your company grows and expands.

• Dedicated Servers: A dedicated server allows you to use all of the resources of a single server machine. The equipment is owned and operated by the company that owns the datacenter where the server is located but use of the machine is exclusively yours. By getting a managed dedicated server, all of the maintenance and troubleshooting of the machine are the responsibility of the datacenter.

• Colocation Servers:  If you own your own server and are familiar with the ins and outs of server management, you may choose to store and run your machine from a datacenter.  This allows you to store your machine in a secure place with more bandwidth, fire protection, backup generators and security than a normal office building. You can also set up your own hardware and software for your business.

Here are the steps to beginning your own reseller business:

• If you are unfamiliar with the world of web hosting, email management and domain services, we suggest you take the time to research and understand the full scope of what you will be undertaking. Many web designers and coders find that transitioning to also being a reseller allows full control of a client’s web presence and management.
• Reselling is much like any other business in that it requires hard work, effort and some start-up capital. Like any business, you will need:

• A powerful, reliable computer for running your business. A laptop will allow you to work from multiple locations.
• High speed internet. Get the best you can afford.
• A phone line dedicated to the business and possibly a fax line. An internet capable phone to receive emails and calls on the go is ideal.
• A tax license, occupational license and incorporation papers.
• A bank account with your company name or DBA (Doing Business As) with a debit card.
• A merchant account and gateway software for taking credit cards.
• I also suggest a private work area in your home or office with a comfortable chair.

• Choose a hosting plan from the aforementioned options based on your budget and the amount of customers you feel you can grow to in the next three years.
• Get a good web host.  This is probably the most important step in this process or I wouldn’t have underlined it. Choosing a web hosting company to resell for is crucial; take into consideration the following:
  • Does the company have a good reputation? Be sure to check out their track record by researching online and visiting reputable forums such as www.webhostingtalk.com .
  • Do they own their own datacenter? While this is not mandatory, a company that has its own datacenter is better able to communicate between departments such as accounting, support, security and maintenance. Their ability to monitor and work within their own company to perform all functions of service saves you time and frustration.
  • Do they have 24/7/365 support? Look at all of the options that your host offers such as email ticketing, live chat and phone support.
  • Does your host support the platform you choose to work with? (Windows/Linux).
  • Does your host have the software options you need such as a good control panel (like cPanel/Plesk), accounting management software (like WHMCS) and web development tools?
  • Does your host offer a manageable monthly plan and easy payment options?

• Learn and understand your software to manage tickets, accounting and your control panel. Set up a sample site to get to know your way around.
• Set customer pricing.  This can be tricky. You are competing with companies who offer $1.00 pricing online and others who can charge hundreds of dollars.  Research pricing and then break down your resources. Divide up server cost, operational costs and other factors. Websites needing secure certificates for e-commerce will be charged a higher rate as will companies demanding more space and bandwidth.
• Build an e-commerce website with a helpdesk.  Adding an ecommerce option to your company’s website will allow you to take credit card payments online, saving you the hassle of cashing checks.  Encourage users to set up automated billing so that you have to worry less about tracking each payment.  Also set up a help desk option where customers can contact you if trouble arises.
• Create business documents. Templates found online can be helpful in creating proposals, agreements and terms of service. Be sure you carefully craft these important documents and have your lawyer review them for accuracy. Also create an informative email to send to customers after they have signed up giving them their access codes, URLs, and email information. We have found it is helpful to highlight and bold the first line that reads, “IMPORTANT. This email contains important information and passwords you will need now and in the future. You must keep this email.”
• “Early to bed, early to rise, work like hell and advertise.” – Laurence J. Peter.  Be sure to advertise your site accordingly. If you are new then you may want to learn ways to market yourself for little or no cost. You can also do banner advertisements or network ads. Advertising can get expensive so reach out to those you know first.

So, with all of the beginning steps out of the way, there are a few things you should be prepared for in the reseller business:

• Pros
  • Reseller hosting offers you a way to earn residual income.  Many customers, after initial setup, will need very little work every month to maintain their account, but the same check keeps coming in, month after month. These add up quickly and can turn into a tidy profit if you can get customers on board right away.
  • With most reseller options there is no equipment to buy. Therefore you can save yourself the expense of purchasing a server and lease space on a server in the datacenter, usually on a monthly plan.
  • A reseller business is very compatible with other services such as website design, website development, gaming forums, domain name registration and blogging.
  • Many resellers have been known to work from home in their pajamas.
  • You may never meet your clients.

• Cons
  • You must be knowledgeable at handling the ins and outs of web hosting, this can take some time for those not familiar with the industry.
  • Problems happen at the oddest times in this industry. A customer usually forgets his password right as you are sitting down to dinner or boarding a plane.
  • Web hosting is a 24/7/365 business and you will receive emails and phone calls during the holidays, on vacation and on Sundays. Due to the time sensitive nature of the business, you will need to respond as soon as possible.
  • Many customers will need to be hand-held through every facet of your relationship.
  • You may never meet your clients. (this can also be a pro)

The reseller business can offer you some insight into many types of businesses in a variety of industries which can help you manage and grow your own respective business.  Sound like too much work? Consider becoming an affiliate where the web host pays you for leads you send to them. Each time you send a lead, you receive money.  Good luck with your new endeavor!

Time = Money

The first thing you’ll learn about running your own web hosting company is that time = money and while this might be an old cliché it certainly rings true in this fast-moving and ever-changing environment. Keep track of your expenses and know exactly what your £’s are getting you. Measure this closely against your revenue and if you are seeing a negative return then it’s time to revaluate or try a different tactic.
Manage your time effectively and monitor the time spent on each client. If you spend too much time helping a client out with a major issue and ignoring the smaller issues, then they can come back to haunt you. Choose a top Reseller Package with a reliable hosting company to ensure as much help as possible when it comes to managing your servers and thus in turn helping to support your clients.

Big Up Your Backend

One of the most important factors in becoming a successful reseller is having a powerful backend. Your backend needs to be able to offer you instant scalability and potential for mark-up and profit while offering your clients an easy signup process. The offering on Standard Reseller Hosting Packages means that you do not have to invest heavily in servers while at the same time your hosting company is responsible for monitoring the servers and ensuring minimum to zero downtime.
When looking at reseller packages we would recommend going for the high-end packages as these have numerous benefits including free SSL certificates which you can sell on to your clients, the ability to create your own ticketing system, cPanel licensing is taken care of as your clients are licensed through the hosting company, E-commerce packages are included and you’ll get guaranteed SLA’s.

Conversions mean Capital

This next tip is vital to the success of your business and will help you to increase conversions and therefore sales. Optimise your landing/sales pages so that you can convert potential customers interest into cash for your business. Here’s how:

• The price must be competitive and clearly visible next to the product – remember to confirm contract type and length here too
• Display the benefits and features of hosting with you – remember a benefit is a direct advantage of a particular feature
• Special Offers and Promotions are great ways to increase conversion – be sure to add these to a product which isn’t achieving the desired results
• Is your Hosting service reliable? If you claim it is, then backup it up with stats or figures to prove it
• Remember to add a ‘Call to action’ or ‘Buy’ button after every product! This is key and without it your conversions will equal a big fat ZERO
  

Market Your Business and Watch it Grow

Powerful backend. Check. Reliable reseller hosting company. Check. Optimised pages and clear sales path. Check.
But wait, where’s the traffic?
Here are a few marketing tips to help generate traffic to your website:

• Make sure your web pages are search engine friendly and optimised for web hosting to ensure a steady stream of traffic from potential customers
• Start a industry related blog – this is a simple and cost effective way to generate traffic
• Join web hosting forums to gain extra exposure – be sure to comment, offer advice and submit relevant posts
• There are plenty of free press release sites where you can write PR statements and circulate them around the web
• Social media sites, Facebook, Twitter & LinkedIn, are a great channel for building relationships, interacting with your customers and offering promo’s and discounts
• Try link building exercises with other sites by offering them hosting sponsorship

If you would like more information on what the best Reseller Package will be for you then please click here.