I post this message because many subscribers have posted messages/replies to complications in locating a suitable billing system for their needs as it pertains to the Web Hosting Industry.

Many of these subscribers have reviewed various billing systems or "settled" with their own in-house database solutions without much rendering much satisfaction to their needs.

There, simply, appears to be a serious need amongst Web Host Companies to have a custom, yet scaleable, solution to handle CRM and Billing tasks.

The President of the company I work with is prospecting the development of a system, by our internal developers, to eliminate the need of using multiple systems to handle daily/monthly administrative tasks such as Customer Service, Techinical Support, Billing and beyond.

Such system would be all inclusive, scaleable and customizable while being specifically geared to fit the needs of the web hosting industry. Furthermore, the developed system would be geared to handle the needs of the smallest Web Hosting Companies to the largest and the resellers in between.

We are just one Web Hosting Company on the Internet and this need is quite clear through own processes and through the posts here.

I am looking for functions and features, processes, etc on how the ideal software should be developed, accessible, etc.

If further discussion of this topic should warrant its own message board, I recommend the Moderators to create such board for the sole collaboration of ideas, concepts, processes WE desire in a Billing/CRM System for Web Hosting Companies.

Kindest regards to all ,

Jeff

Jeff,

You have definitely taken on an ambitious undertaking. A single system that scales from a small one-man reseller operation to a large organization with a variety of different types of customers, and covers all the bases is going to be a big project.

We were lucky in that we have such a good developer on staff, who built us a system that filled our needs perfectly, was designed to be scalable as our company grew, in a way that no shrink-wrapped software then available could be, and saved us the cost and the risk of bringing in outside developers.

Our web-based CRM system isn't appropriate for all hosting providers (as it is also handles our connectivity services as well as not including some features that we left out because we didn't need them), otherwise we'd offer it for sale as a product-it's certainly well tested after almost two years, and we've continued to upgrade it.

It's certainly improved things for us, and ensured that overages are monitored and billed for (not all of our customers were happy about that little improvement- especially those who were habitually using considerably more than their share of bandwidth, connect time and/or server space), and speeded up a lot of administrative tasks, as well as allowing us to track all customer service/tech support contacts.

Ours is written in PHP, for MySQL, and runs on a Linux platform (although the client is web-based and runs on any machine with access to our Internet through our VPN). What sort of platform are you planning to use?

good luck in your endeavor, I hope we can all be of help in building an application that could benefit a lot of web hosts.

Originally posted by Phoenix

Ours is written in PHP, for MySQL, and runs on a Linux platform (although the client is web-based and runs on any machine with access to our Internet through our VPN). What sort of platform are you planning to use?

good luck in your endeavor, I hope we can all be of help in building an application that could benefit a lot of web hosts.

While understanding such development project as being a major undertaking, it is my believes something can be done about the grief messages about such product. This was the reasoning for my post of a new thread was to get feedback from other hosting companies, large and small to start definitively specifing what would be important to them if such product were developed and made available.

A platform to use has not been determined as the development of such product is a basically a conceptual idea at the moment as we know our needs; but we would like such product to encompass the features and functionality of a larger group of hosting companies who could/would use such product. Whatever platform is chosen, it will be one offering the most scaleability and ease of customization available.

If you have a system in-house that works well for your needs, perhaps it would be good to share the components, functions and features of such system. It may help us further design the framework needed for our developers to make this dream a reality for most.

Like most websites or other systems, they are always a work in progress; however, the basis of the system must determine how scaleable it is for immediate and future needs to those which use it.

Thanks,

Jeff

I'm sorry guys...couldn't keep out of this one. I must leave one quick "shout-out".

We use OptiGold ISP. It has everything built in that you mentioned (and then some) and can help manage your entire operations.

-Online Signup that goes directly into the database;
-auto email invoicing;
-auto CC billing;
-auto server setup;
-tech support modules that can be accessed through a web interface;
-sales modules that can be accessed through the web interface;
-assett management;
-company calendars;
-employee management (payroll, time clocks etc)
-Vendor Management
etc
etc.

Even if it's not the solution for you....It may be a useful "model". http://www.optigold.com

(I've seen the previous post from the WHM editor...and I'll stick to my guns here....or until my company goes flat on it's face from not invoicing peeps.)

Originally posted by inet7
Even if it's not the solution for you....It may be a useful "model". http://www.optigold.com


Thanks! I will take a look at OptiGold for it's features and functionality as well as ideas for establishing a more inclusive product which I have a conceptual idea on.

Jeff

Originally posted by gcjeepster



If you have a system in-house that works well for your needs, perhaps it would be good to share the components, functions and features of such system. It may help us further design the framework needed for our developers to make this dream a reality for most.

Like most websites or other systems, they are always a work in progress; however, the basis of the system must determine how scaleable it is for immediate and future needs to those which use it.

Thanks,

Jeff

Jeff,

The system's developer is a big proponent of open-source, so it's likely that we can arrange to provide you with the source to give you a jumpstart instead of just starting with a blank page.

Originally posted by Phoenix


The system's developer is a big proponent of open-source, so it's likely that we can arrange to provide you with the source to give you a jumpstart instead of just starting with a blank page.

That would be superb. You have a demo of the product you utilize in house? I would like to evaluate it, it's use and annotate rooms for improvement.

<< Sorry... this is the wrong place for this..

Administration >>

Is this product publically accessible? Test/Trial Version available?

If so, please advise as it may assist in reliefing the woes of the subscribers who are looking for the "system" geared toward Web Hosting Companies.

I'm not in sales myself, but our solutions consultants do give demos via PC Anywhere. Like any comprehensive billing and customer care system, it is fairly complex and needs to be installed by a memeber of our professional services group. If you are interested, please email me (jeffrey.stockton@inovaware.com) and I can put you in touch with a solutions consultant and tell them to take extra special care of you. I need to say that the product is aimed at lower-medium to large hosts, or smaller hosts that are looking to rapidly expand. The solution also works very well with hosts that have a diversified service mix, offering ASP or managed services.

From what I have gathered of Optigold, it does indeed appear to be a wonderful product. I would just love to use it but I can't...

Optigold requires Filemaker Server Engine or some-such that is not supported on UNIX.

We need a good UNIX solution that the little guy can AFFORD to use on his/her small business. For instance, my business model maintains my service at a "small business" level and I simply cannot afford to spend the hundreds or thousands of dollars commanded for a software package. A couple grand would go a long way in manual record-keeping... sorry, but it's just not justifiable for my application.

I would welcome a basic affordable (<$75) UNIX-compatible package that is stable and completes essential operations, over a complex and fancy expensive package that has many features I would never use.

:) Just another $.02

:D Bailey

Originally posted by baileysemt123
From what I have gathered of Optigold, it does indeed appear to be a wonderful product. I would just love to use it but I can't...

Optigold requires Filemaker Server Engine or some-such that is not supported on UNIX.

We need a good UNIX solution that the little guy can AFFORD to use on his/her small business. For instance, my business model maintains my service at a "small business" level and I simply cannot afford to spend the hundreds or thousands of dollars commanded for a software package. A couple grand would go a long way in manual record-keeping... sorry, but it's just not justifiable for my application.



that is a big part of what drove us to develop our own solution. Most of these products are targeted at larger organizations, and smaller shops really don't have that kind of capital to invest in a billing system.

Scalability from the smallest business to the enterprise level is great, but when the fees are more than the annual revenue of the company, then it leaves the little guys out of the loop.

Someone needs to recognize that although the profit margins are higher for software at the high end; at the small business end, there are a lot more businesses, most of them who are looking for products that fit their needs and their budgets, but are doing things the hard way because no one wants to bother with them.

We are very lucky to be so tech-heavy at our company. If we need something, we've always got someone to build it for us (and techies love a challenge like that) -but the choices are limited for companies our size who don't happen to have a high-end SQL developer underfoot who can create the perfect billing system for us out of thin air (and a lot of doritos and jolt).

I'm going to talk further with our developer, this may be something we can do either as open source or freeware for the little guys like us. it was never intended as a product to generate revenue, just to save us time and aggravation, and improve our customer service, all of which it has done. Personally, I'd rather give it away than try to package it, market it, and sell it. Hmmm...

Phoenix,

I understand exactly where you stand having a scaleable solution as used for Larger Companies, but priced for the smaller companies. In the further conceptual idea of having our developers develop such scaleable solution for any size company, the pricing model of the product would take the smaller companies at heart .

My company has a pricing model in mind to serve the needs of any size company which can't be disclosed at this time, but be rest assured that such product, once developed, would be available to the small company population at an afforable price.

Kindest regards,

Jeff

Hello, I was actually on a search for a product that you are looking to develop and came up empty handed like everyone else. There seems to be only bits and pieces to this solution with no one putting it all together. I thought it might be a good idea if I included some of my thoughts.

First and foremost, my two biggest concerns for this project our the people developing it and the financial backing. Too many times I have seen lack of funds and bad layout destroy a product. I hope that you invest the time and money to do it right and keep on developing and improving the product.

I have never develop anything like this before and I like the suggestion of doing it in php and MySql, but no one has mentioned .jsp. I know it is a just starting to get recognition but it is capable of running on UNIX and Windows based machines, which might make it good for this product.

Lastly, I think that this site has lots of discussions on different software solutions. I think you could probably find out almost all you need to know from this site on what would be the best way to develop this product. I hope I could help. Good luck Jeff.

Through the replies to my original posting of working to develop a solution for the small and bug guys, I would like to hear ideas on fields, features and functionality.

Feel free to post them here or email them to me directly.

The application that I had in mind had nothing to do with the Web Hosting Industry but it could easily be mended to be for use within the industry.

I look forward to hearing all ideas around the application attributes mentioned above.

Kindest regards,

Jeff