I once had a hosting business that I ran off a reseller account. I did not want to get a dedicated server due to the cost, and I did not have very many customers.

Well I am now thinking about getting back into the hosting business. I am on a reliable reseller account, hosted at theplanet. The problem I have is that I dont have any startup money.

I pay my hosting bill every month, and can design my own webpage and scripts. I have a domain to use for it.

Now that I got my plan and a little history out of the way, here is my midsize plan I wish to offer:

50mb space
1gb bandwidth
5 emails
unlimited sub domains
1 mySql database
cpanel 6
linux
I plan on charging $5/mo or $50/yr.

With that type of plan, what would be the cheapest marketing methods? And any idea's on a ninche market. I figured small business's. I have access to good quality traffic, so I plan on using this as one method to promote, but wish to find out other maybe cheap or free methods.

I was also wondering, on the site I figured I would have tutorials.

Any comments and suggetions would be very welcome.

This would be a one-man operation at first, but what I am aiming for is my own servers/staff one day.

-Thanks

Bid on hosting requests to build up client base. That plan might sell because it's cheaper.

I really don't think that would work, $5 is far too much for 1GB of data transfer.

Suggestions for building the site;keep it strictly hosting, easy to use, plenty of information available.
Ooh.. and no unlimited web space bandwidth packages. ;)

Start with a small reseller plan and upgrade when you need to, this way you can always stay in profit.

Best of luck!
Daniel

I don't think $5/mo is necessarily too high for 50 megs and 1GB of transfer. I have resellers that sell similar plans for even more than that, and they do quite well.

I recommend you go after your local market.. it's most accessible, and you can advertise cheap using flyers and by actually visiting businesses. You may have to be creative to avoid their 'no solicitors' sign.

Why spend your money when you can use other peoples money?

Just become a Sales Rep and sell servers on a commssion basis.

There are good companies who offer such programs.

They cost you nothing. There are some that pay as much as 25% residual commissions and they have good product/services/support.

You make the sales. They collect the money, provide the support and you just sit back and get paid over and over each month for each sale.

I just don't uderstand why people want to spend their good hard earned money and long hours providing support when you don't have to. Just keep in mind, that for any busness venture you tak eon, yo will have to be patient and persistant. And, your best market is your local market. face to face sales always prevails!

Originally posted by hk5754
Why spend your money when you can use other peoples money?

Just become a Sales Rep and sell servers on a commssion basis.

There are good companies who offer such programs.

They cost you nothing. There are some that pay as much as 25% residual commissions and they have good product/services/support.

You make the sales. They collect the money, provide the support and you just sit back and get paid over and over each month for each sale.

I just don't uderstand why people want to spend their good hard earned money and long hours providing support when you don't have to. Just keep in mind, that for any busness venture you tak eon, yo will have to be patient and persistant. And, your best market is your local market. face to face sales always prevails!

I think for a lot of people it is more about control and pride. Selling for someone else doesn't exactly make you feel good.. and not to mention how much it hurts you if you sell someone on a service and the provider ends up going up in smoke one day.

I get recommendations all the time for various things.. just last month someone referred me to a graphic artist. After about two weeks of torture, I gave up on the artist, and was left feeling angry at the person that referred them to me. This one incident is probably enough to keep me from asking them for an artist again.

I like that.. "Face to face sales always prevails". Must remember that one.

Thanks for your tips guys. I figured start off with filling up my reseller account without overselling, then I will upgrade the account to the next one up. I will continue to do this until I make enough profits to cover a server at theplanet. I also am going to talk about selling reseller accounts with my host. I would defently recommend them to anyone looking for a cheap reliable webhost.

Try listing your site in hosting directories. There is a pretty good list in a thread here. Can't remember right now where it was though, try doing a search.

I totally agree with what hk5754 said.

Any suggestion of which companies offering those kind of package, viz offering commission tto he reseller and technical support to direct to their clients.