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  1. #1
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    The Hard Part About Starting Hosting Biz

    Hello guys,

    this forum has been amazing source of information about how to start/run hosting business. Great business tips, great advice on picking reseller etc. Even marketing is not that hard.

    But the biggest problem for me personally, is learning about the tech part of it and becoming well versed in it. Having zero tech background makes me feel bad and I want to get better at it!

    So, where is the best place to start and learn about the tech side? I know it's 'DUH' kind of question for those who are great at it tho. Are there any courses, books, websites that share the info (and aren't affiliate type of websites promoting 'Start your own web hosting biz from home' type of crap)?

    Cheers
    RCKG

  2. #2
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    Tech side is not a problem since you can get a managed hosting to take care of it but the hard part is getting new customers.....

    Don't expect you will earn from it in just a few months even a year.

    Specially 4 U
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  3. #3
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    Quote Originally Posted by net View Post
    Tech side is not a problem since you can get a managed hosting to take care of it but the hard part is getting new customers.....

    Don't expect you will earn from it in just a few months even a year.

    Well, I don't want to be clueless and too dependent on others for tech side. I want to know enough to be helpful myself on support issues sometimes. Also want to know what I buy and how to judge at least part of tech about servers and management.

    Getting new customers to me is easier since it's not a first business I start, I know it takes longer. Usually, nothing happens in first 18-24 months. So, I'm good there, I also already have design business so few clients will slowly show up. I'll handle that.

  4. #4
    The hardest part, by far, is figuring how to attract customers - the tech part can be learned over time, choose a managed hosting provider in the beginning if need be.

  5. #5
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    Quote Originally Posted by babypurin View Post
    The hardest part, by far, is figuring how to attract customers - the tech part can be learned over time, choose a managed hosting provider in the beginning if need be.
    Where? That's the question.

    I see a book about how to gain first 1000 customers that seems to be great read but there is no such for tech part. I'm reading some articles on About.com but already half of them look like they aren't that good.. etc

  6. #6
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    Have you looked at the tutorials sections right here on WHT?

  7. #7
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    Quote Originally Posted by Postbox View Post
    Have you looked at the tutorials sections right here on WHT?
    Yeah, but it has no direction, no structure, so it's hard to know what to read in what order etc. Just too much stuff at once. Tons of 'How to pick Host' advice, but not advice for resellers.. This thread, the title sounds perfect but there is no good help really:

    http://www.webhostingtalk.com/showthread.php?t=1397786

    I think if someone does an online course or ebook etc on this tech stuff, similarly to that ebook about getting 1000 first clients then they would be killing it. Plenty of folks like me that need directions and advice.

  8. #8
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    Best advice I can give is to learn this stuff on a personal level first. Hosting business are saturated that getting customers is the easy part but keeping them is the hard part. Skills are a must, gotta understand how your setup works at the coding level, hardware level, software level, and customer level.

    I would recommend reading a good LAMP stack book first, then getting familiar with a control panel Cpanel is the most popular. Then start playing around with your own sites before attempting to sell a package.

  9. #9
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    Mar 2013
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    Quote Originally Posted by RCKG View Post
    Hello guys,

    this forum has been amazing source of information about how to start/run hosting business. Great business tips, great advice on picking reseller etc. Even marketing is not that hard.

    But the biggest problem for me personally, is learning about the tech part of it and becoming well versed in it. Having zero tech background makes me feel bad and I want to get better at it!

    So, where is the best place to start and learn about the tech side? I know it's 'DUH' kind of question for those who are great at it tho. Are there any courses, books, websites that share the info (and aren't affiliate type of websites promoting 'Start your own web hosting biz from home' type of crap)?

    Cheers
    RCKG
    There are no books really for this business. Best way to learn is either trial and error or have someone mentor you. I would recommend working for a hosting business and learn the ends and out. Biggest issue in this industry similar to the computer security industry is it is just changing so often that by the time you have the book written it would be out of date.

    Its refreshing to see someone concerned about knowing what is going on instead of just diving in.

  10. #10
    Quote Originally Posted by Silvatech View Post
    by the time you have the book written it would be out of date.
    This is so very true. Most books I read are based on outdated version of the software, which by the time those books already published, the information has become obsolete and inaccurate.

    The best source of knowledge is the online documentation of the software itself. Most software you are going to use have documentation, which contains the most up-to-date information available to general public. (except for Microsoft's software, which books you can legally obtain only by joining Microsoft Certification Training)

    @RCKG I highly recommend you to read from there, do a trial and error on staging servers, and be prepared to spent a good amount of time for learning.
    -

  11. #11
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    Quote Originally Posted by RCKG View Post
    Where? That's the question.

    I see a book about how to gain first 1000 customers that seems to be great read but there is no such for tech part. I'm reading some articles on About.com but already half of them look like they aren't that good.. etc
    I have actually read this one (I think) and it does cover stuff such as cPanel, WHMCS, setups, configs, ect... I would really recommend reading it completely, will definitely get you going.
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  12. #12

    Talking

    Quote Originally Posted by net View Post
    Don't expect you will earn from it in just a few months even a year.

    hahaha.. You are right.

  13. #13
    Hiring quality tech support staff is a key to success. Along with this you can join professional certification course of Redhat. This will help you immensely in your endeavor.

  14. #14
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    Quote Originally Posted by RCKG View Post
    Where? That's the question.
    There is no single step-by-step guide on everything you need to know in order to run a hosting business.

    Start with managed hosting and gradually take on more technical responsibilities. You run into a problem and you research the answer. Customer needs to migrate a database -- you research how to export SQL databases and import them. If you run into trouble or can't figure it out, then you have the managed hosting to fall back on.

    This forum is a great resource. ServerFault.com is a great resource. However, none of those should be considered a one-stop shop for everything you need to know.
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  15. #15
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    Quote Originally Posted by RCKG View Post
    is learning about the tech part of it and becoming well versed in it. Having zero tech background makes me feel bad and I want to get better at it!

    So, where is the best place to start and learn about the tech side?
    Unless you have already a background in IT then you'll find it hard to understand the most basic server related stuff like understanding iptables and networking protocols will bend your brain in afew minutes and thats not even the start of things.

    If you truly want to go the self-study route and maybe looking to complete some basic qualifications along the path then an ideal starting point would be getting the material for CompTIA A+ just the book can be had off eBay for afew quid and covers alot of the basics about IT in general then for instance you can get CompTIA Linux+ and a whole host of CompTIA books and materials to make a decent starting point for yourself.

    In my case I already had an existing knowledge in the IT world within Microsoft/Windows systems and had some knowledge about Linux from using it with routers so making a transition over to Linux was some what easy considering I already had a strong background of understanding in other things.

    I reckon you should go over to Digital Ocean and spin up a $5 CentOS based VPS with them for afew months and start learning the command line using "top" "iostat" and understanding what the output means maybe even start learning how to use an editor like "nano" while this is very basic stuff it's used every day.

    This is a deep subject and requires a big commitment to fully get to grips with stuff to make you a versatile tech.
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  16. #16
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    I think it's great that you want to learn before going into it yourself, but I think the only way you will truly learn is by just starting out getting a hosting account and start learning step by step and again expect that you will make a mistake and just learn from it. If you get a hosting provider that can help you, you can also ask them to guide you on certain things.

  17. #17
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    Quote Originally Posted by Photonhelper View Post
    Best advice I can give is to learn this stuff on a personal level first. Hosting business are saturated that getting customers is the easy part but keeping them is the hard part. Skills are a must, gotta understand how your setup works at the coding level, hardware level, software level, and customer level.

    I would recommend reading a good LAMP stack book first, then getting familiar with a control panel Cpanel is the most popular. Then start playing around with your own sites before attempting to sell a package.
    Learning LAMP because it's how the servers are controlled etc?

    Thank you!

  18. #18
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    Quote Originally Posted by Admin-OpticHosting View Post
    I have actually read this one (I think) and it does cover stuff such as cPanel, WHMCS, setups, configs, ect... I would really recommend reading it completely, will definitely get you going.
    Started reading it! I'm a lot more concerned with security let's say. Etc.

    But yeah, that book is a good start.

  19. #19
    hard part is collecting new customers;
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  20. #20
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    Lots of tips here, thank you!

    Interning for some hosting company def. would be best option, but I got my own business to run and grow.

    Guess starting slow and just learning as needed is the way. I'm with a good reseller company I think so it should be good.

    P.S. If someone wants to make good money in hosting industry, this is a good problem to solve too, people like me will pay for information!

  21. #21
    Great tips here.

    However, if you want to really get familiar with linux start with the basics. Learning the File System Hierarchy Standard.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filesys...archy_Standard
    Also you can view this sheet for common commands with Linux found here: (there are others available as well, do some googling.)
    http://www.cheatography.com/davechil...-command-line/
    Also reading up on the BASH shell will be beneficial which you can find out more information here:
    http://tldp.org/HOWTO/Bash-Prog-Intro-HOWTO.html
    That would be a real good start. You don't need to spend money to learn Linux, Linux is free open source software. The source code is free for everyone to use and the information to know how to use it is also free.

    I hope that helped, good day!

  22. #22
    There's no shortcut. You learn as you go. Customer has problem, you learn what to do about it.
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  23. #23
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    Personally started out as a web developer, started on HTML/JS (called DHTML at the time), and eventually CSS as it became available. Then moved into backend scripting (Perl at the time, then PHP and several others now). I set up a development environment on my own personal Windows computer (Apache, PHP, MySQL). I learned a lot of very important lessons of cross platform variances (production sites were hosted on Linux servers, by a few companies that are no longer in business). From there I became very interested in Linux.

    Initially I installed SuSE Linux Personal Edition (8.x I think) and learned about it on the desktop side of things. Then tried out Mandrake (now defunct), and eventually to Gentoo Linux.

    Gentoo opened my eyes to the world of Linux more than any other distribution. Somewhere along the line I learned about UNIX permissions, SELinux, IPTables, and various other important things required to properly set up and secure a hosting platform.

    Unfortunately as others have brought up, there is a lot to learn and it does take time. I've been learning something new every single day for the past 15 years or so when I first dove into it... and even now we have yet to launch our hosting system (was scheduled for Sept 1st, but ran into a couple road blocks).

    Cheers.

  24. #24
    Quote Originally Posted by funkywizard View Post
    There's no shortcut. You learn as you go. Customer has problem, you learn what to do about it.
    this is good way working for me too
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