Is this web hosting business lucritive? Is anybody here in the way wealth class because of web hosting? How long before I can afford my ferrari?

No.... This webhosting biz is not lucrative! There is a say that it takes Money to MAKE MONEY. Therefore if your selling 6.99 per account.... You will never be with the wealth class! You would need 700 CLIENTS just to pay off a VDI server lol. Unless you have money to start a NOC... Thats a different thing. :cool:

Funny you say that because i own a 1999 F-150 X-Cab and a Cessna Aircraft...

thanks to web hosting...

It will make you money if can be serious about the business.

Well I was intending to be profitable if your millionares :)

It will make you money if can be serious about the business

hmmm...agree farming is more profitable than web hosting. Thats why we started offering web farm hosting (may the "farm" word itself make some miracle) ;)

Just joking... I second that web hosting is not lucrative.

I guess after much research i'm gonna dissagree with you... :D I know three people personally (one is my roomates uncle) and they are macking in near the $250,000 a year range, not that may not be alot but i could turn that into a million dollars with stocks... I think it's all in the business plan and how bad you want money :-) Here's to hoping I'm right... Goodnight.

Is it trunover or profit ?

That is profit. :D

All I can say :eek:

:eek: :eek: :eek:
Originally posted by m6.net
All I can say :eek:

Webhosting, like any business, can be profitable if you do your research and have a solid business plan.

If you just buy a server and put up a website, without giving much thought to expenses/sales/support/FUTURE GROWTH - you are doomed to failure.

If you plan every step of the way, you will probably succeed.

I'm going on my fourth year in the web-biz and I'm making more money than I EVER did working for others...and every month brings in more customers and more profit.

BUT, I planned, scraped and scrimped the first year...worked at least 14 - 18 hours a day 7 days a week for a LONG TIME.

Hard work and planning is the key to success. (sounds cheezy, but it's true)

--Tina

Originally posted by AffordableHost
If you just buy a server and put up a website, without giving much thought to expenses/sales/support/FUTURE GROWTH - you are doomed to failure.


Definitely true. I've been hosting for a year, and believe me, hosting isn't the one that's raking in the profits (in my case, that is).

It's the services that I offer along with hosting (web development, training programs for companies, software dev etc.).

I didn't buy my own server because I know I couldn't make it as a webhost. I lease some of the servers I use. For clients with rare needs that aren't supported by the servers I lease, I go to another webhost and resell their space.

But one thing important to us is that we tie up with very good server-providers with fast customer support and reliable equipment because if there's one thing we don't want to fail our customers in, it's after-sales service--and you still need hard work to provide that.

:)

well.. think abt it.. an average server cost today, is about 400$ setup + 200$ monthy..


you have around 20 accounts, each paying 10$ on an average... you cover monthly costs.. provide a good service.. word spreads... your user base could increase from 20 to 50 before you know it..

you should be ready for those really low times... but covering costs should not be a difficult task...

I don't know about $200/month for a good, solid server intended for web hosting...

Most places I've looked at are considerably more expensive than that. Also, you need to consider the cost of control panels, as well the cost of bandwidth. You might be able to find a server that would do fine for a few sites for $200, but if you're going to be starting a web hosting business and putting a lot of sites on it, you'll probably want something a little more powerful :)

Get your own machine from somebody like Dell on business lease, and then do co-location it iwill be cheeper.

Originally posted by ckizer
I guess after much research i'm gonna dissagree with you... :D I know three people personally (one is my roomates uncle) and they are macking in near the $250,000 a year range, not that may not be alot but i could turn that into a million dollars with stocks... I think it's all in the business plan and how bad you want money :-) Here's to hoping I'm right... Goodnight.

You did not menssions anything about stocks you only asked for webhosting.And most likley you are not even 18 yet or most likley you never even handled a server and you expect $250,000 ask the person how much time it took him to earn that money and ask him what he learned and what he knew before he started.

It's the services that I offer along with hosting (web development, training programs for companies, software dev etc.).

These are not web hosting.

I know any business can make money if you work hard, plan ahead, care for customer, budget your cost bla bla bla (all good things). All I want to say is that web hosting business has low profit and high risk (internet fraud, chargeback, adoption of new technologies all the time etc.) and need lots of time and pateince to success. Overall you can't call a web hosting business lucrative.

I can call it lucrative. :)

...at least it is for me!

--Tina

After too much hosting many webhosters commit suicide.

Just an observation in general, a lot (but by no means all) of so called webhosters web pages I browsed around when looking for somewhere to buy a dedicated server, did not in fact publish any address (ie a physical location)

I know that such is the nature of the web hosting industry that almost all companies make use of another NOC so there is no need for their own big premises.

The main thing that concerns me is that a lot of hosters are just a team (if you can call them that) of 1 or a handful of people sitting behind their desks working from home. Even worse are the ones that dont even publish a contact phone number and do everything by email support.

I just don't feel confident that it may be a possibility that if I applied with one of these hosters I would not be dealing with a professional (age aside) with proper business ethics and long term business plan. I dont mean to generalise here, I'm sure many of these hosters are very technically capable, but I just like to know that I am getting what I payed for and not just someone hiding behind their computer screen and webpage.

// end rant here

Originally posted by m6.net

I know any business can make money if you work hard, plan ahead, care for customer, budget your cost bla bla bla (all good things). All I want to say is that web hosting business has low profit and high risk (internet fraud, chargeback, adoption of new technologies all the time etc.) and need lots of time and pateince to success. Overall you can't call a web hosting business lucrative.


I would have to agree with you there. We're not a hosting company actually. We use hosting as one of the add-ons to our services. We have a different business model from a hosting company.

Like I said, I didn't think we could make it if we offer hosting as our "main dish" because we have so many competitors out there. In my country alone, we are many.

And most hosts in my country are using their own NOC and phone lines (which I think suck so bad, my country has the worst phone lines speed imagineable). So we use NOCs in the U.S. or the U.K. so we can have a more competitive edge (like speed, reliability) over companies in my country.


Tina,
You are quite lucky, your business model worked for you, as our business model worked for us. :)

Originally posted by Farmer
After too much hosting many webhosters commit suicide.

Wonderful :D That's the kind of future we're looking at.

Originally posted by fruitsalad
The main thing that concerns me is that a lot of hosters are just a team (if you can call them that) of 1 or a handful of people sitting behind their desks working from home.

Why not? Even big host started as a small one (not every big host, I know).

Originally posted by fruitsalad
Even worse are the ones that dont even publish a contact phone number and do everything by email support.

Why not? Even big hosts do only email support. Sure, some things can be sorted out quicker by phone, but if the host answers your emails quick and correctly there should be no problem, at least for me.

just someone hiding behind their computer screen and webpage.

Sigh, you are right, some dumb people really act like this. 5 minutes ago I read the posting about cavendo.com....

Walter> Agreed. Most hosts have to start somewhere. Hitting it off the ground is the hardest stage. There are millions of web hosting companies starting up and so often the weakest will fail at this stage.

I don't think that you could possibly judge all web hosts by the fact they do or don't have a phone or address published publicly on their company site.

I've found some of the smaller web hosts that do only support by mail and probably just work from home offer far better services than some of the big boys..

You are possibly right in respect to the ratio of how many bad smaller companies vs. how many bad larger companies and thus choosing a large host will more than likely be a "good" host than a "bad" one.

I think general respect for a company is more of a key to deciding the good vs. bad..

Yes, we could offer phone support - but we don't. We offer top-notch email and helpdesk support and we beat the pants off the 'Big Guys' when it comes to pricing, support and reliability. This is NOT meant as an advertisement for us....please read on:

If we offered phone support - we'd need to hire more people and raise our prices. We tried offering phone support ages ago...we ended up getting a certain portion of customers who would phone at the drop of a hat (I really think some of them were just lonely!). We found that almost all questions can be answered via email, etc....no phone support needed.

We do list an emergency number on our site - and have a strict warning about making absolute sure its an emergency before they call. It seems to satisfy those just needing to know that there is a number in case something goes horribly wrong - and the rest of the customers are fine with email support.

As long as the customer gets speedy answers - my experience has shown that it doesn't really matter if it's via phone or email.

Besides...which would you rather deal with - a big hosting company who has $7 an hour tech support people answering the phones and looking up the answers in a flip-book....or fast email support from the owner or small team of support staff from a small company who KNOWS the value of each customer.


--Tina

I know which one I'd choose! :idea:

I have a question...

We gave out our mobile phones recently. I guess this is because we're really mobile (since we do on-site projects, meaning our presence is required at the project site), and when there's an email inquiry my sis who is stationed at the PC can send us SMS and we email the customer using our phones (if she doesn't know the answer).

Is this considered phone support? Or is this still email support?

Hey now, you know the anwser to that... I appeal to honesty.

Originally posted by ckizer
Hey now, you know the anwser to that... I appeal to honesty.

No, I don't. We've been dissed for not providing phone support. They don't consider SMS a phone support, but I'm using a phone so I don't really know how to respond to customer accusations about this.

What is it with phone support anyway? I'm actually afraid to offer real-time talk on the phone because my English isn't that great when I talk.

Originally posted by skysenshi


No, I don't. We've been dissed for not providing phone support. They don't consider SMS a phone support, but I'm using a phone so I don't really know how to respond to customer accusations about this.

What is it with phone support anyway? I'm actually afraid to offer real-time talk on the phone because my English isn't that great when I talk.

That's not phone support. If you can convince a customer that it is phone support.....you can probably also sell that customer a dedicated server package with unlimited everything.

--Tina

Originally posted by AffordableHost


That's not phone support. If you can convince a customer that it is phone support.....you can probably also sell that customer a dedicated server package with unlimited everything.

--Tina

Really? Thanks--uh, about the clear up.

Speaking of calling, a client called up my fiancé's mobile line and he had to mentally call up all English words he could muster. I guess this is one reason why other hosts do not provide conversational phone support?

We may be able to write in English, but speaking it is a different matter. A dictionary can be easily reached while typing, but using it during conversation would be weird and probably annoying for most English-speaking clients.