After 3 years of struggling, trying to compete with undercutting competitors my business has had to chuck in the towel.

I couldn't walk away without first thanking everyone on this forum for providing me with so much information and advice.

I wish you all the best of luck for the future.


Lee Marshall,

PS, the following domains are up for offers:
relationsearch.co.uk
www4u.co.uk
jigsawpieces.com

Lee I feel really bad about it...
I wish I could help you out.
My advice would be not to give up... You'd eventually suceed..
However, do not undercut. Keep standard prices.... i.e. the prices you feel your services are worth for.... Give the best in customer care and solutions and I'm sure you'd be through.. A lot of people focus on prices and not the level of service. If you are good at service highlight that fact... Don't talk to a customer only about prices...

Have a great day :)

Regards
Amar

Thank you for your concern, the advice you give is sound. But I've also got to consider my family life as well, I barely got to see my son or wife at the weekends because I was busy chasing up clients and potential prospects. My full time job in the City keeps me away from home until 7pm every night as well.

Now though, I can sit back and spend time with the family, while still offering design services on a personal basis from my private web site.

I'll still keep popping back here to keep up with the trends, but for now I'm taking a well deserved break.

Merry Christmas ....

Merry X'mas to you too....
I'm not supposed to be marketing here.
However, consider outsourcing your support. This would let you take breaks as and when you want. I personally have some clients for whom we look after everything. They just look after all money related aspects...

Again, I'm not marketing my goup. You can consider others too in the market . Just consider outsourcing..... In almost every aspect of life that is becoming very popular...
I hope the moderators understand this ... :)

I just felt sad when I saw a business closing down.... :(

I wish you the very best of luck in your future.


Have a great day :)

Regards
amar

In my opinion, in the hosting industry and after reading so many posts here in the last few months (questions like, what do I need to start a hosting business), people running a part-time hosting business or afterhours, highschool kids, etc., is a huge problem. This is a problem for clients and it is a problem for people running the business too and has resulted in a bad name in general for the hosting industry. I mean, when everyones cousin is a web designer, and everyones brother is running a hosting business it becomes a problem in general for the industry. This is why you get so many people complaining about support etc., Everyone is chasing after building the client base, undercutting prices, etc., and when you do that clients do not get what they thought they would and what they were promised. Since a majority of hosting companies are doing this (and they have to if they want to compete) it has become a mess.

I am sorry that you had to close, but your business plan of undercutting prices and running a hosting business with a full-time job and a family, was never the way it was supposed to be. There is nothing wrong with this model, if you have a handful of clients and you are forthcoming. However, you can not expect to build a business on it - that's just the way it is with any business. I am sure a lot of people are gonna jump on me for saying this but guys, get your priorities straight, do not start a hosting business or any business for that matter without some sound planning and just beacuse you can resell accounts. Especially, high school kids - enjoy school life while your parents are still paying the bills, you will never have it that easy later in your life. Besides, I don't know where you have the time for school, girls, parties, homework and a real business - think about it.

Originally posted by leeacm
But I've also got to consider my family life as well, I barely got to see my son or wife at the weekends because I was busy chasing up clients and potential prospects. My full time job in the City keeps me away from home until 7pm every night as well.

Now though, I can sit back and spend time with the family

Wise choise. Although I am sorry to hear you business has not gone so well, but after all - the only thing that really matters is the family.

I know what you are talking about, got a 2 year old daughter myself and everything else comes second.

Originally posted by Gurudev
Especially, high school kids - enjoy school life while your parents are still paying the bills, you will never have it that easy later in your life. Besides, I don't know where you have the time for school, girls, parties, homework and a real business - think about it.
On the contrary. I am a nerd, and don't really go to parties. Homework is only about an hour a day. I plan to start a hosting buisness soon. I'll probably just resell from rackshack, than work my way up. I need a source of income, my mum (mum, lol) doesn't really like spending on me and she thinks video games are a waste of time.

Originally posted by TGL4387DD

On the contrary. I am a nerd, and don't really go to parties. Homework is only about an hour a day. I plan to start a hosting buisness soon. I'll probably just resell from rackshack, than work my way up. I need a source of income, my mum (mum, lol) doesn't really like spending on me and she thinks video games are a waste of time.

yes, but even you will grow out of it :) .. we all do ..

Originally posted by CRego3D


yes, but even you will grow out of it :) .. we all do ..


And...when you're in your 30's, you won't have time to camp out for the night for the new XBOX. :D

I personally think I will never grow out of gaming. I plan to be a web prgrammer when I grow up, and plan to familiarize myself with all of the programming languages. C++ will be one, and I may get hired as a video game designer! :) By the way, sorry your company died man. I hope the same thing doesn't happen to me.:eek:

Lee, how many customers did/do you have ?

Not enough to keep my business sustained, but the few that I did have are now safely passed onto xela.ltd.uk

Thanks,
Lee.

That's sad to hear... :( Got Any experience or mistakes that you made during the 3 years that you would like to let us fellow web hoster know about?

ROFL!! Yes, I have a few.

Most important thing first, Know your product inside out. Know everything about web design, hosting, e-commerce and shopping cart solutions etc. Just because someone can fix your car, doesn't mean they have what it takes to be a qualified mechanic.

Put a good solid business plan together, get at least 2 or 3 unique selling points that put your hosting business ahead of the competition. Make a mission statement, detailing your aims and objectives, again include some key selling points that make your mission statement better/different from the competition.

Start small, test the water first. Take a cheap hosting plan somewhere else, don't invest in a dedicated server solution just yet. Sell your services on a one to one basis for a year at least, i.e to friends, colleagues, local businesses etc. Don't go for the big fish, it'll come back and bite you in the arse!!

Every six months review your business plan and mission statement. Make changes to these based on your experiences and don't kid yourself. Be brutaly honest in your review, even if it's bad news. The biggest of companies (even IBM) went through startup problems, but by addressing the weak points in their plan, things got fixed and the companies got going again.

If after a year you find yourself up every night, working all weekend and just barely pulling through; call it a day, take time out and rethink your strategy. If you don't things will only get worse, a break will do you the world of good and maybe help you see things more clearly. Again, be honest with yourself, maybe it wasn't for you. Just because someone is good at fixing cars, doesn't mean that they have what it takes to run their own garage.

Every good businessman/woman, will tell you that just because your first attempt didn't work out, doesn't mean you are a failure. Some people make good money out of being freelancers, which is what I'm doing now and already I've landed a client. But it's easier, because I don't have to play businessman, I simply charge up front, pay it into my account, log it in my book and pay the taxman at the end of the year. If I don't want to do a job, I simply don't do it, no overheads you see, just a simple 60ukp a year for hosting my private site, simple!! Oh yeah; and the clients come to me, mostly through refferals or after looking at my site.

Listen to these people on this group as well, this is the best group for honest straightforward advice and opinions.



Merry Christmas,
Lee Marshall.

PS, excuse the spelling mistakes!!

Good advice, sorry to hear about your business loss.

The one thing I would disagree with is "know your business inside and out". I would change that to "know your weaknesses and hire an expert to handle that aspect of your business".

--Tina

Tina,
I would just like to add some more here.
I feel more important than knowing the business or weakness is
"knowing the customer. "
In most of the industries - automobiles, hotels, airlines .......... and even hosting.
The customer is the most important factor in any business. As in object oriented programming it is the objects that matter. In a customer oriented busiess it is the customer who matters.
So the rule says ......
"Know your customer". The rest just happens. Also never go by the technology or numbers... Those are irrelevent. What is big now would not be so in 5 years from now. What matters is your approach and the level of customer satisfaction that you achieve. Consider customers like wine... the older they get the better they are..... :)

Have a great day :)

Regards
Amar

If you don't know your customers then you don't know your business. This is something that will reflect in your business plan.

Getting someone to do the work for you is a good idea, but then how do you know they are doing a good job? How do you know what they are talking about? More importantly how are you going to afford someone at that level when just starting out on a venture. These people don't come cheap... Do they?

My point was that you've got to know what you're selling. You have to be able to answer questions without looking to your number 2's (rude joke time)... If I were to approach a director of a company who was forever reffering questions to someone else in his company, I'd start to think he was a complete blonker and his company wouldn't get my business!!

Everyone has a copy of perfect business practice on the shelf, but there comes a time when you've got to look yourself in the eye and ask questions that the books don't.

:)