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Thousands of websites and internet businesses spring up every single day, and those sites need to be hosted somewhere. Why not with you? If you're serious about reselling hosting, or if you'd just like to find out more, this article will show you everything you need to know to build a successful and lucrative online business.
What I need to know about Reseller Web Hosting
1. Know What You're Selling
Many hosting companies offer reseller packages. Your monthly subscription purchases a big slice of server space and bandwidth, which you can then divide up and sell on to customers seeking their own hosting deals. The parent host company hides in the background, providing technical support but otherwise remaining invisible.
2. Understand Your Needs
Packages come in all varieties, from cheap beginners' deals to premium rates for serious resellers. Most will allow you to rebrand the hosting space as your own product, but some don't. Some will set up billing mechanisms for you, and others won't.So before you launch your reseller empire, you need to find the package that is right for you. That means shopping around. Think about your budget, support requirements, space and domain allowances, whether the package allows customizable scripts, what sort of control panel the package comes with, and so on.
3. Understand Your Customers' Needs
Once you've located a likely looking reseller package online, ask yourself - will this benefit my potential customers? In order to answer that question, you need to know who those customers are. Are you aiming for big corporations, or small businesses? Are you looking to provide a service for individuals, charities, societies, or retailers?
Put yourself in your customers' shoes. If you're looking to provide hosting for small businesses, for example, think what you'd want if you were a small business looking to host a website. Ease of use, ability to host an online catalog and a reliable sales mechanism, perhaps?
4. Set The Price Point
The art of reseller hosting, of course, is to sell server space on for more than you pay for it. What would your potential customers be prepared to pay? Look around at comparable packages to get a feel for the market rate.
5. Tell The World
Once you've done all that, you'll need a website of your own. Advertise this in places where your potential customers are likely to look, and optimize it to attract the appropriate search engine enquiries. It helps to concentrate on a specific niche - "web hosting for non-profits", for example.
Reseller hosting isn't a get-rich-quick scheme, but once you master the basics, it can be a steady and lucrative earner.