Choosing Software

You need Control panel software, Billing software and Helpdesk software.

Control Panel software helps automate several Administration tasks. A large number of WebHosts use control panel software and customers expect to have a Client side control panel by default. Control panels available are Plesk, cPanel.net, Hsphere.com, Ensim.com and more. https://bobcares.com/page-117.html has a Cost and Features Comparison available to help you choose. Anyway, expect to spend $500-600 a year per server on your control panel. Of course, if you are a reseller, this cost is borne by your Hosting provider.

Some control panels, do not come with a good Billing software . If so you need to buy or lease Billing software. ModernBill and Ubersmith are some well known Billing softwares which can be integrated with popular control panels.

You may need Helpdesk software if your control panel doesn’t have them. Cerberus, Kayako, Ubersmith and Perldesk are some good Helpdesk software. Helpdesk software help you track and solve issues that your customers send.

Technical support and maintenance

Once you start your Web Hosting biz, you will get customers calling with complaints like “my email is not working”, “the website has gone down” or Requests for help like “How do I get my PHP script up and running”, “How do I use Frontpage and ftp to upload my website”. The kind of questions you can expect to get can range from the absurd to the most complex.

Make no mistake about this. If you don’t know Internet server troubleshooting and Linux/Windows in detail, DO NOT go about playing on the server. It can cause unacceptable Service downtime and worse.. Loss of Precious Customer data. Many Web host owners learn tech skills on their servers and customers(This is a scary thought). Such people actually play with the trust that their customers place on them.

If you are not a trained and Experienced Sysadmin, you can either hire local Sysadmins to help you, or you can outsource at a relatively cheaper cost to Outsourced Tech support companies like Bobcares.com. These companies have trained Engineers (Bachelors in Computer Science) who will take 10 mins to do something an untrained person may take over an hour.

24/7 Technical support with average response times of 1 hour or less is the expected Industry standard. In the dog eat dog world of Web Hosting, the only way you can differentiate yourself is through your customer support. If you choose to Outsource your support, take a good long look at the Testimonials and Plans of the provider. Cost shouldn’t be the only criteria when you choose to outsource. To save a few dollars, you may push your unsuspecting customers into Tech support nightmare. To check for Quality, look for company certifications like the ISO 9001:2000 standard which ensure that you get what you are told.

Go to https://bobcares.com/page-99.html for more on Customer Support for Web Hosting newbies.

Credit card charges

If your clientele is global, expect to get paid via Credit cards online. Web Hosting providers generally use 3rdparty Payment Gateways like WorldPay.com, Authorize.net, Paypal.com and 2Checkout.com to accept credit cards. These Gateways provide an interface for your customers to securely enter the credit card information. In many cases, as a merchant, you won’t even see the credit card numbers, which makes it safer.

If you are a US business, your credit card fees should be around 2-3% of your transaction volumes plus a per sale value(like $0.50 cents a transaction). Some have monthly fees as well. International business will typically face a higher transaction value of around 5%-6%. However as your volumes go up, the rates come down.

Marketing your website

Once you put up your site, you need to effectively market it, if you need to be seen anywhere above the millions of hosts who are already out there.

Submit your site to dmoz.org, Yahoo and hundreds of Hosting directories like www.websitehostdirectory.com , hostreview.com, thewhir.com (there are many more).

If your site is the same every time google comes to your site, It’s going to crawl it a lot less frequently – because it realizes you don’t update it as often – and there is no need to come a lot. So Make sure your site has a lot of relevant information, a lot of links and information has to be added and changed at least once a week. Adding a news section shows that your site is regularly updated.

Another way to promote your website is to use Pay Per click programs like Google ad words and Overture. Hosting is an expensive keyword and expect to pay $2 or more per click.

One interesting method that Web Hosts can inexpensively use is giving away Free Web Hosting to Popular websites in return of them displaying your link on their main page. This is a great way to generate Back links from popular pages, and is an easy way to push you up the Google ranks. Popular websites rarely pay for their Hosting charges, because Web Hosts line up to sponsor hosting for them.

If your client base is local, you could give away free hosting to locally popular institutions like Churches or schools.

Minding the Competition

There are thousands of Web Hosts out there and too many of them play the Cheapest host card. If this is your business plan, then stay away from Web Hosting. You’ll get your fingers burnt real quick. One Web Host famously said that he went from being the cheapest web host to the most expensive web host in One year without even changing his plan prices. Thats how bad things are.

The best way would be to identify Niche areas of hosting and be the masters of that niche. For example, Web Hosts provide Application hosting, like Oracle hosting.

Others provide Service hosting like Email or Data hosting.

Some others provide Hosting to certain Special needs customers. For example, Speciality hosting for Churches, Hosting for educational institutions.

The best thing about Niche Hosting is that you can establish your brand faster, and spend lesser on marketing. Many web hosts have different websites for various Niches areas. for example nicheareaoracle.com or nicheareaemail.com or whatever. Always find a way where you are special and different and be the best in that niche.

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About the author:

Sangeetha Naik heads Bobcares.com. She is the co-founder of Poornam Info Vision Ltd., Software and IT services company specializing in Linux based solutions for Webhosts and ISPs. Poornam Info Vision is an ISO 9001:2000 certified company with a team of over 140 engineers.

Sangeetha is a Computer Engineer based in India and has over 7 years of experience in the hosting industry. Her articles have been published both online as well as in print in magazines.