Hello,
I bought a reseller account and I am currently designing my website. I need information on how to run my business. Not advertising wise, but the very basics. Such as posting a website on the internet. I need to know how to help customers when they ask questions and some common questions that they ask. Please only post on this thread if you are helping me, not critisizing.

wow.. why did you start a hosting business.. just curious

Find a hosting software ?

Ok, I bought a hosting business because I have always wanted to create my own website business and by having a web hosting reseller account I can do that.

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Can you suggest any web hosting software?

check out ClientExeC, ModernBill, and WHMAutopilot

Write a business plan, that should be your main focus right now. Come up with prices, a plan for upgrading and spreading as well as which market to target, etc.

Edit: He means ClientExeC :)

Edit2: He edited his post, based on my Edit about the edit. Have a good day, nothing to see here ...

Yes, I edited my post :)

My suggestion would be to cancel your reseller account until you figure everything out - No use in wasting money while you're not ready to launch the business yet. Read WHT, and you'll get quite an education on the industry :D.

Originally posted by RyanMorgan
Hello,
I bought a reseller account and I am currently designing my website. I need information on how to run my business. Not advertising wise, but the very basics. Such as posting a website on the internet. I need to know how to help customers when they ask questions and some common questions that they ask. Please only post on this thread if you are helping me, not critisizing.

Sure, you want us to run your business for you? How can you even offer web hosting when you can't even help yourself with uploading a page to the internet.

Find another field or get some more knowledge before trying to get this off the ground.

Hello,
I bought a reseller account and I am currently designing my website. I need information on how to run my business. Not advertising wise, but the very basics. Such as posting a website on the internet. I need to know how to help customers when they ask questions and some common questions that they ask. Please only post on this thread if you are helping me, not critisizing.
I agree with what was said by gentoo, I would recommend that you learn a bit more about how websites work and how a good host is run before you put money into starting a host. Once you have ackquired that knowledge, then you will have a better chance of developing a decent company. I think for the time being you should cancel your reseller, just so you can get some more knowledge without throwing a way money, then when you feel you have a good grasp of the basics and a lot of the advanced, then you could try again and most likely will do much better!

Just my suggestion, not criticism :)

Yes, I see what you are saying, but your not answering what I am asking. I am asking where I can get this information. Possibly some good books I could buy from a bookstore?

You won't find books on the hosting industry which are specific to reseller accounts. Any you do find will be outdated. Try and subscribe to these magazines - they are all free:

WebHost Industry Review [published by theWhir]
Pingzine
The Hosting Standard [by Tophosts, inc]

A lot of your hosting account is controlled by experimentation - you can upload your site with an FTP program. A free one is wsftp le.

Dont start any business if you have no knowledge in basic tasks. Try and get help from your reseller - hopefully you chose a good provider. Possibly look at outsourcing support to another company. It can be expensive but their team should be more knowledgable than you.

Ask more specific questions, and you get better answers. Your issue seems to big to answer efficiently. What don't you understand about your reseller account?

Some web hosts, such as hostime, have affiliate programs where you refer users to the company and you get paid while the company looks after the customer. Look into these.

Evaluate why you entered this industry, and build your business plan up from there.

Well, I don't want to be harsh, but, perhaps it would have been best to write a business plan first explaining what you will do when you get your account, how to market etc.

Without a business plan, you lower your chances of success incredibly!

Sorry if you think I'm criticising you here, just trying to give you some helpful advice :)

Ok,
I have taken some of your advice. I have contacted the hosting company which I am currently reselling at. (Hostblock.net). Also, I do have a business plan, but only advertising whise.

Read the tutorials on this forum and also get some information on small business related things. Work out a marketing strategy once you know who your target customers will be. Eventually consider the local market as your start area first. I think it is easier to deal with the local folks and to get a feeling for web hosting before going online for new clients.

Christoph

You really should know how to create a website before you get into the webhosting business. I am surprised that you have decided to do it. Without the basic website knowledge, you will not be able to support your customers and your business is doomed to fail.

So I'd recommend you learn about website creation first before you start anything.

Ryan, nobody is criticizing you...

The problem is that the questions that you are asking us are the "EXACT" same questions your customers will be asking you.

Since you're only reselling, I doubt that you'll be outsourcing the support. What happens when a customer tells you that something is wrong with their account?

You as a reseller are responsible for your own accounts. Do not expect any help from your hosting company as their *only* job is to help you, not your customers.

Before you start reselling you should learn how to manage a single shared hosting account...

Welcome to the game. You are definately in for some rude awakenings. But, as you said, don't criticize - help.

Here is my help.

Go to www.peachpit.com and in the orange bar, click on BOOKSTORE.
You will see categories of books. Focus first on web design, programming and scripting and operating systems.

These books are written like workbooks. You will need to discipline yourself to complete them from start to finish. They are not expensive and they spare you the agony of having to read the history of the internet although at some point you want to take some NoDoze and read it anyway.


This is only a starting point. It's all I can recommend besides making a friend in the industry who doesnt mind explaining alot of stuff.

I hope this is helpful for you and I wish you well.

LH

Setup a good looking website, get yourself a billing software implemented in the website, a live help script if you'r offering that, helpdesk script and a few other bits and bobs :)

Good luck!

Most of you are critizing him and telling him to go find help before he opens...

Why do you think he is here...
hes asking for help, and most of you all are just telling him to go get help. He is here for help

A lot of your hosting account is controlled by experimentation - you can upload your site with an FTP program. A free one is wsftp le

I recommend FileZilla [ http://filezilla.sourceforge.net/ ]

This is a bit of an odd way to learn, but there are a lot of companies that create flash tutorials for webhosting clients. Go to DemoDemo [ http://www.demodemo.com/hostingtutorials.html ] and learn how to navigate your way around CPanel (or whatever control panel you use, as well as whatever ftp program you use).

Then, get a book on the internet. Without basic knowledge about how the internet works, you're really behind the 8-ball. Then after that, find a good book about servers, then read the apache documentation.

Originally posted by Twinky
Most of you are critizing him and telling him to go find help before he opens...

Why do you think he is here...
hes asking for help, and most of you all are just telling him to go get help. He is here for help I don't see a whole lot of unwarranted criticism in the thread really....Shock and amazement, yes, but not outright criticism.

No one is going to be able to supply the answers he's seeking though. How can they? He's not familiar with setting up a website and yet he wants to resell webspace? Is he planning on running to WHT each time a customer asks a new question?

I know very little about modern automobiles, but what the heck....I wanna be a mechanic! Let me throw a little sign out in the front yard and start collecting customers. Oh yeah, they have to pay in advance too. And no guarantee I'll get it fixed in a timely manner 'cuz it'll have to wait until I can call my brother and ask him how to fix it. And maybe borrow some tools too.

The best advice he could possibly get has already been offered in this thread: Set up a domain and play around with putting together a website until he feels comfortable in his understanding and then have at it. Someone previously suggested getting rid of the reseller account, but I don't think I'd do that.....It doesn't look like it's costing him much at all, and he can use it to set up, suspend, modify and delete accounts until he's familiar with what he's doing.

The OP also needs to spend some time reading through WHT as well for a well rounded introduction to the world of hosting.

And then he might be ready for prime time.

Make sure you register your company if you're going to be serious about your business.

You should have planned this before you bought your reseller account !

Originally posted by RyanMorgan
Hello,
I bought a reseller account and I am currently designing my website. I need information on how to run my business. Not advertising wise, but the very basics. Such as posting a website on the internet. I need to know how to help customers when they ask questions and some common questions that they ask. Please only post on this thread if you are helping me, not critisizing.
I guess you may have some background on doing business, except that you would need to equip yourself with the technical aspects that are specific to this one.
In order to be able to offer good service or help your clients, you might find that:
1. Some personal experience with webhosting as a client would be an advantage, plus what other resellers/hosts had gone through.
2. It would be necessary to know the market; check out those sites that have been suggested.
3. Equip yourself with the know-how. It's a vast field, some of which have been suggested earlier; webmaster foundation, server OS and applications, programming languages, servers, merchant gateways, system security, and etc.
If you do not already know most of these subjects, it would easily take you some months to acquire them all. So, you may want to consider ditching the reseller account while it's still within the refund period and opt for a shared one to start gaining some personal experience as a client first while you equip yourself. If, on the other hand, you're planning to outsource your admin and support work to someone else, you might still find it useful to equip yourself with the necessary market and technical know-how to really run a good business.
Just hope that these few additional suggestions could help.

Originally posted by RyanMorgan
Please only post on this thread if you are helping me, not critisizing.

But constructive criticsm is always good, and I have plenty to give! :)


the very basics.


So you went into the business without knowing the very basics? Oops. :( Before you go into any business, you should at least know something about it. Web hosting isn't some magic get rich quick scheme, but a job that will require a lot of time and knowledge.


I need to know how to help customers when they ask questions and some common questions that they ask.


What do you know about web hosting? You will need to have knowledge if you plan on staying in business. When a customer asks a question, you answer it. There is no magic book that will answer all support questions for you, you will need to know a lot.


Please only post on this thread if you are helping me, not critisizing.


But I believe that I am helping you by criticising you. Consider it a wake-up call.

You need to have plenty of knowledge of web hosting if you plan on running a web hosting business!

You also need to have business skills.

I could go onto a rant, but I'll stop myself here. I just really think that the thread starter should do a lot more research before starting up.

Even more important than knowing anything about the hosting industry...you need to know how to run a business. That comes first. By getting a reseller account first and then asking "what do I do now?" shows that you need to take some basic business courses or read all you can about running a small business. The very first thing you will learn is that you need a focus/business plan, which you don't have.

--Tina

I remember when I was starting out wanting to create websites in the late 90's and it seemed so hard to get a straight answer. There always seems to be so much information overload but what I'd suggest you do is

1. Get youself a copy of Dreamweaver and perhaps Fireworks, Photoshop if you can afford it (just get an older version)

2.Contact some people you're on good terms with and say you need to 'test market' and could you build a website for them - in this way you'll have 'clients' with all the Q & A that comes with that, but without the pressure of it all going wrong

3. Get some Lynda Hands On Training books from Amazon (can't post URL's yet! - these Hands On Books are the best about (IMHO) and its how I learnt Dreamweaver 3 all those years ago. Then when you're a bit up to speed visit dynamicdrive 'dot' com and stuff around with some scripts there

4. I don't know about jumping right into hosting, but rather have the hosting as a way to sell you websites as a 'package' then you can budget that into the price and if you have Cpanel administor the site. If your reseller host is any good you'll have a good support network there to refer problems to.

5. You may find you prefer designing sites to hosting sites, or even just working with Photoshop and leaving the code to those whose brains run to that path. I know now that I'm best setting up multimedia things such as videos / audio and some Flash and getting in a coder to do that side of the site.

Good luck!
RKBB

hosting busines competition is fierce. Reseller plan might be a good way to start but you still need to learn alot. learning from mistakes would be very valuable, but sometimes costly