Hi,

It's striking how hard many folks here work at building and running their hosting businesses. Many report working 10 to 16 hours a day, 5 to 7 days a week. Wow. My hat's off to you.

May I ask, how is your 10 to 16 hour day taken up? Is it stuff that only YOU can do, or could some of the more time consuming stuff be given to someone else to do? Would that even be possible? Affordable?

Will the 10 to 16 hour work days only continue until you reach a certian critical mass or size -- and then you will put in a more typical 40 to 50 hours a week, 5 days a week -- or is 10 to 16 hours a day, 7 days a week just what having a hosting business requires -- and will continue to be required for anyone building theirs?

If so, why is this so? What might help and enable you to work a more typical number of hours per week?



Thanks a lot for sharing,

Louis

Other people can do some of the jobs/work that is needed. There's always marketing etc. and some people don't know what to do. I think there is a point where you won't have to work so much, maybe when you have say 50,000 domains hosted and pay other people to do almost everything, and you just work on the business end. It all depends, I could be wrong. When you open a data center you either need to be the person to get a call at 2am from techs saying they need help or pay someone else to do that job. Do you see my point?...I know I didn't make it very well. Sorry.. Hope this helps though!

Hi MattS,

I really wonder at what point folks could, if they wanted to, cut back on the hours; and if the nature of building and running a hosting company is such that if one does hire someone to lighten the load...then there's no profit left. At what point is this likely to no longer be the case I wonder? Is it a case of what's required during the initial, or building up stage of building one's hosting company -- or is 10 to 16 hours a day required no matter what the stage of a hosting businesses life cycle one is at?

Moreover, I wonder how folks are dividing up those 10 to 16 hours among what task; what's the biggest demanders of time?

I think that point would be around 1,000 clients, if not less. If you are paying someone else to do your job, you won't make as much money.. You will still be able to make good money at around 1,000 clients while paying other people to lighten your load. Then again, it depends on what type of clients those 1,000 are ;)

Another thing is when you start paying someone else to help you, they never seem to be able to do things as fast/well for at least a few months... Its worth it in the end if u get good people though.

-Brendan

Brendan is right. You are always the best at what you do :D everyone else just slows you down for a while.