Hi all,

Am thinking of 'reselling'. So there must be several questions that every wannabe reseller asked. What are those?

Here's some of mine
1) Can you really earn (ie not just break even or earn
a few cents but do all the work).
2) What (not who) is the best reseller package out
there? (ie once-off, 50/50,bonus).
3) Why would someone buy from a reseller instead
of the actual host

Thank you

Also,

-who does the billing and support?
-Is the client yours or the parent company's?
-Can you offer different prices or packages?
-Can you offer plans as your own or do you have to say you're a seller of company-X?

Just a few that come to mind.

1. Yes you really can earn money, but what you should be thinking about is not can i earn money as a reseller, but how many accounts do i need to build up before I can get a dedicated server, nobody wants to be a reseller for life, its lucrative but not that lucrative. Most people build up their client base through a reseller program and then when they have enough incoming revenue they get their own server.

2. I would say once off, the company should set a price on what you get resold accounts at so you can make a pricing structure for your clients, and be able to determine a future sales/profit forcast. I dislike very much these places like valueweb who tell you if you have 10 clients get 10% off with 50 clients get 20%. Thats not how your run a reseller program.

3. Well if a reseller program is setup correctly, the end user should know that there is another party involved, they should think the reseller is the top dog. Some people who do know who the reseller resells for will sometimes still go with the reseller because occasionally the reseller will offer better support and or slightly better prices than the top dog...

- Most places require that the reseller do billing and support although there are a few companys that will handle those issues for you.

-Again some places will allow you to offer your own plans but most will require you to stick to their premade plans. ALot of times hosts will work with you if they dont have a plan that you want to offer. And if they dont want to work with you then you need to resell for a new company.

-Nope usually you can offer them as your own, if that wasnt the case it wouldnt be a true reseller program.

It took me 6 months to figure out the purpose of reselling. This is what I believe it to be:

When choosing a host to resell from, look at 2 things:

1. Level of support

2. Quality of dedicated servers

The first is obvious, but many will forget to even look into the second. You need to make sure that the transition between reselling and renting dedicated servers is smooth, or you will lose allot of customers in the process.

You should always be thinking ahead. As stated above, you will not want to be a reseller for life. Find a a good host that offers a reseller package you feel comfortable with that also offers quality dedicated servers.

Stay away from *unlimited* reseller accounts. Look for a host that will give you a discount (many offer 50% discounts). Once the total amount you pay per month for these accounts comes close or equals the price of a dedicated server, you are ready to make the move.

Even if you *ONLY* break even with reselling, you are doing a good job. You will be learning allot about customer service and the industry in general in the process.

For example:

My host offers me the opportunity to resell any of their current packages for 5.00 a month. So for 20 accounts.. I pay 100.00 a month.

For a good dedicated server, the cost is around 400.00 a month. Once I have 80 hosting accounts, it would make sense for me to move to a dedicated server since I would be paying 400.00/month either way.

My price per month is now 400.00, and I have plenty of room to continue to add accounts to this dedicated server. This is where I begin bringing in a bigger cash flow, and start planning for the next dedicated server. =]

These are just my plans.. and may not work for you. My only point is that you should always be looking ahead.

I'm new to reselling but doesn't a dedicated server have limited bandwidth transfer a month? If i host 80 website on it and each takes like 5 gigs it would cost a lot tp pay for the extra bandwidth use right?

very short form explaination : its a gamble.

you can sell 10 accts, all being allowed say 2 GB bandwidth. Your server allows for 10GB inc. bandwidth. You have to hope that all 10 acts dont max out. To prevent this, you include in your pricing enough to cover it -IF- it happens. My experience is that most of your accts won't top 2GB/mo. We have 14 accts on 1 server that combined so far this month haven't hit 2GB. (each accts allowed 10GB) 1 of those sites gets a fair amount of traffic. the rest, eh, are average. So, everyone oversells figuring it evens out at the end. There are other folks here who can give a much better, detailed, clearer expl. than me, but thats the simple (i hope) version. Good luck!

Other things to consider is also what happens if you decide to leave the business. Who owns the client, will they take over the clients. Do they provide supporting tools to help you get started, such as support manuals and what level of support are they willing to provide you. Remember, you're depending allot on this host to give you good support since you don't have full access to their servers. Like it's been said before you're looking to generate clientele and get your own server. This should be your goal.

I will personally stick with a reseller system where your monthly cost is low with a 50% discount. The reason is it might take you some time to start getting customers especially if you don't have much lined up. You may also find yourself leaving your currently host to others so make sure you can stick with your pricing structure.

And lastly, like it's been said, make sure they are willing to work with you in the event that you need a package that they don't have predefined. A good hosting company should be willing to work with their reseller succeed.

Good luck

MadCool, rarely will you ever get a site that uses 5 Gig a month. The average is about 300-350 Megs per month. So is one of those 80 sites does use 5 Gig, the rest won't. This is how many companies can offer such large bandwidth for so little price. Others even offer the "extra" bandwidth below their cost and still make money on them :D

One area where we got burned early in our web hosting business was whether you are reselling for a reseller or are you working directly with the "owner" of the server.

In our case, we thought we were reselling for the company that owned (leased) the server. As it turned out, he was just reselling another company's web hosting services. Sh-- hit the fan the first time we had a server related problem and our vendor could not support us because he did not have root access to the server.

Now, I encourage all of our resellers to ask us and other companies the direct questions: "Who owns your server?" and "If you lease your server, what company do you lease from?" Be sure to get the answers in writing. It can save you a lot of $$$ and headaches in the future.

One of the other responders also pointed out the "growth path". To better clarify this, if you resell services from a hosting company and you are ready to move into your own server or the company you resell for goes under, what is the impact on your customers? If the hosting company you work with is leasing from a good supplier (ie: we use Alabanza), you can easily move into your own server quickly with minimal impact to your customes. Just be sure to read all of the reseller terms so you're not put in a position where you lose all your customers if you decide to switch to another hosting company or get your own server.

Lastly, since this business is so competitive, be sure to ask your hosting companies "Why should I resell your services?" They should be able to give you reasons that makes them stand out above the rest.

Hope this helps.

Quick questions with regard to Chuck's point.

1) How do you know a host is not a reseller reseller? When you ask a question, a less than dishonest reseller will always say that they are the host. Ping them?

2) With your own nameserver easily bought, how do we find out?

3) Would anyone just say "I'm a reseller" and get it out of the way? From what I figure, as a reseller, sometimes you get 50% off the hosting cost, wouldn't that be great if your customer KNOW that you are a reseller and KNOW that any service problem, you can forward their email to the actual host. Maybe just set up an email forwarding JUSt for individual customer and forward support@whateverhost to the actual support@host?

4) From what I figure out so far, host make money even at 50% discount to reseller, why not just give a RESIDUAL amount to affiliate/reseller so that there are more marketing power and it becomes a win/win/win situation?

With regard to number 4, I would love to be a affiliate/reseller if any host would handle the technical support while I just do the sales.

Thanks for your answer guys. I almost became a reseller for ***** if it wasn't for this place! Here's another question, which company should i go with to get a dedicated server to resell with? RackShack.net has a nice amount of bandwidth to go with but i heard it wasn't good for reselling.

conspiracy, that's all I can say.

Shoot, they're banging on the door, got to go destroy my hard drive now, see y'all ;)

Hello Ideasmiths,

Well, guess that we are from the same country.

Emm... The most important thing for reselling is giving the after sales support. It will be better that you handle your own support. (Do Not Let Others Handle). By doing this you will be giving your customer a personal Touch. All customers will love this..........

Hi Darius ,

Well, if you take a look at our hosts in Singapore, eg webvision, they are charging and arm and a leg for a petty small amount of features.

But what I don't get is that I am good in marketing and NOT really want to go into the nitty gritty of running a hosting support. I would rather leave that to the expert.

Given the 13 hours difference between Singapore and US, when there is a problem locally, it would be difficult for the host in the other country to respond and vice versa.

Why wouldn't host think of the extra money they would be earning if some other agent can bring a lot of busienss to them, in exchange for support.

We have a WHOLE country and other asia countries to open the market to. Why not make a deal where we'll put the server locally (ie reduce bandwidth transfer cost) but still draw on the expertise of the technical support of the hosts? ie when there is trouble, the techie in the states will handle it.

That's a win-win situation.

Hello Ideasmiths,

In Singapore there are alot of web hosting companies around. I think most of them run by young people. Namely, this are the few web hosting which are targeting singapore >>> www.cybersite.com.sg >>> www.sgdomains.com >>> sg.gs and etc..... they have quite competive plans.

Ideasmiths, We can always get a co-located server which is in other country. We can save alot of time maintaining. Having your own server in Singapore is wasting money. You got to hook up With Singapore One Fibre Optics which will cost you a BOMB. Well, best is to get something which is maintain by others..... and we will do the marketing and etc..

Talking about support...... I am trying to say that giving support to your customers after sales...... Like calling you up asking some of thier doubts..... the people behind this "support scene" are the most important person.......

Tell me what are your planning to do....... i would be more then happy to work together with you...... seeya :)