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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Mar 2010
    Location
    Arkansas
    Posts
    155

    How much did you spend to get your business going?

    I just want to compare my expenses in starting my web hosting company with that of others who have started a web hosting company in the past. Specifics don't really matter, just a general idea. Also, how long did it take you to get to the launch stage?

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Oct 2002
    Location
    Hong Kong
    Posts
    166
    We started in 2002 with a budget that could barely cover the cost of one dedicated server, I'm guessing at that time we paid $149 per month. At that time, it served the purpose of two nameservers, one webserver and one mailserver all at the same time. Of course I strongly advise against that now, but it is how we got started. With VPS these days it can even be done cheaper.

    With a strong background in server management and programming we developed everything ourselves on an old box in the atic and we went live 8 months later. This saved in costs, but took a lot of time to develop. We had our first client (that we didnt know personally) in November 2003.

    There are many costs, we grew and improved our setups little by little. There is still a lot of room for improvement of course. It all comes with resources.

    Goodluck!

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Mar 2011
    Location
    Dallas, Texas
    Posts
    355
    It really depends into what your trying to get into.. What your offering.. How good you want your service to be.. Where is your company going to be located at..


    I would say a good starting amount would be any where from $8000-XX,XXX to get your business started and off the ground running well, and servers taken care of, services that are required paid for, team, and such. But a business is something that you not only work with, but you put money into make better and bring more services, and such into. The start up to just start I would say would be a good amount would be what I stated above.

    But this varys depending on which type of market your heading towards, what kinda products/services you wanna offer, features included with them, and how successful you wanna be. Building a company takes time.. It's not just something you put a little bit of money in and think getting clients on one server is going to make you successful or rich; Building a company from the ground up, investing, building ideas, offering your own type of features and such all takes money. I think a good start fee is needed, and then each week, or ey, let's say each month you need to invest to make it a little better, or improve from last months records/keepings so that this month is better and so-on.

    A good team is a key-factor too, as if they' care, your business will run good and you will all work together to make it better.
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  4. #4
    Join Date
    Jun 2009
    Location
    UK: Oxford
    Posts
    1,259
    I started with minimum investment. 35.99 a Month for 3 months then with the money I made.Then Upgraded to dedicated server and I now own 30ish servers, 2 ns and 4 database and email servers. Hardly spent any money on advertising as most clients are recommendations =]

    Still going and on occasion, pay for extra staff for billing and accounting =]

  5. #5
    Join Date
    Jul 2005
    Posts
    3,784
    Quote Originally Posted by jwebhost View Post
    I started with minimum investment. 35.99 a Month for 3 months then with the money I made.Then Upgraded to dedicated server and I now own 30ish servers, 2 ns and 4 database and email servers. Hardly spent any money on advertising as most clients are recommendations =]

    Still going and on occasion, pay for extra staff for billing and accounting =]
    "Proudly and confidently hosting over 2,000 domains!"

    Why would you need 30 servers for 2000 domains?

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Jun 2009
    Location
    UK: Oxford
    Posts
    1,259
    Most are shared, but others are dedicated servers for indiduals and businesses.

  7. #7
    Join Date
    Mar 2010
    Location
    Arkansas
    Posts
    155
    These figures seem reasonable, and helps me feel that I am on the right track! There really is a lot that must be done to start and build a company. My company has been in development for well over 7 months...but when I take a step back and see all of the progress that I've made and the quality of the work that I have done so far, it is all worth it.

    I am always investing in my business; Even though I haven't launched yet, I have an entire room filled with promotional material alone. I feel that I have a well thought business plan, which took months to write, edit, revise, and edit again! All in all, it has been a very exciting process, and I can't wait (but I'm being very patient) until the day I launch which is set at the first of June! When I do launch, I plan on hitting the market hard! I've also accumulated a few shared clients through word of mouth, so it's nice to already have a little bit of income in the beginning.


    Quote Originally Posted by FN-Mark View Post
    I would say a good starting amount would be any where from $8000-XX,XXX to get your business started and off the ground running well, and servers taken care of, services that are required paid for, team, and such. But a business is something that you not only work with, but you put money into make better and bring more services, and such into. The start up to just start I would say would be a good amount would be what I stated above.

  8. #8
    Join Date
    May 2006
    Location
    San Francisco
    Posts
    7,325
    $15k initial investment for a VPS company. Relatively affordable I suppose.

    If you're doing mainly shared hosting, that shouldn't be too expensive to start. I guess it depends on what market you intend to compete for. If you want to hit the big boys, you need 6 figures at minimum probably to start off. If you have a more narrow market, you can likely make do with much less.

  9. #9
    Low 6 figures so far. Probably will need to do mid six figures to get the business to the size I want it to be. The size I want is large enough to justify having 24/7 company hired technician coverage instead of the "wake someone up" emergency support you can have with 2-3 techs, plus enough servers and customers to be earning enough to wash my hands of my proxy business that is paying the bills these days.
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  10. #10
    I started with a few hundred bucks and a business partner. Our policy was always zero risk. Only thing we could ever lose was our time.

  11. #11

    Talking

    Quote Originally Posted by collinsj View Post
    I just want to compare my expenses in starting my web hosting company with that of others who have started a web hosting company in the past. Specifics don't really matter, just a general idea. Also, how long did it take you to get to the launch stage?
    I started my business in Feb, 2009 with $4/m budget.

    I get a $3 Reseller Account from Rewindd.net(Rewindd Closed in 2010).
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  12. #12
    I started my business with 1 lakh, and it worked. there was nothing for me to lose, everything was preplanned but there was one thing which i could lose the shortage of time. if everything went according to the plan you have set and that also in time then how much ever amount of money you have spend will be recovered very soon.

  13. #13
    I think some are missing the point that we have been in a mad economic upheaval for some time now. Spewing out x amount of dollars like its candy and being arrogant is not a proper answer to this question. You need to explain this out in a reasonable manner anymore other wise its garbage and does nothing but make things much harder for others to do anything at all.

    I used to make 4k a week but that means nothing in terms of what you can do with it. Someone making 4k a week can spend all they want but will end up just the same as the person making a 100 a week if they know what there doing. Really when you ask about money its each to there own on there sources of it, how they use it, and what it means to them. One mans garbage is another mans treasure so to speak. If you got some good ideas your better off then a corrupt team of money hungry people.

    If you take a look at whats happening to millions of people, you will see. There are literally hundreads of thousands of individuals striving to make it on there own with things like reseller hosting, free webhosting, small buisness that do outsourcing, all kinds of things you will see on the net and some go to things like warez, torrents sites, underground things. These people are all legit just as much as the large business's that deal with higher volumes of cash are.

    The question is vague though, and can only be answered vaguely. Different business's require different salaries to get started. Just for a nice website, anymore, I would say after my 10 years of being in the web development sector of things, If I was given a client who wanted a site built with seo,themes,templates,advertising,monetization, the works it would cost maybee with no hourly wage added around 600 dollars. Most of that would go into advertisers for different advertising networks but also some directories as well. For a site just for me, I can make one for 150 dollars or so.
    Last edited by eycel; 04-12-2011 at 09:03 AM.

  14. #14
    Join Date
    Jan 2010
    Posts
    1,030
    Initial investment can vary greatly as it depends on what you are going to be offering and servicing, how you are building your infrastructure, target audience, adverting, growth requirements, etc.

    I would suggest going through an entire business plan to help figure out your costs.

    Budgets will vary wildly. We have some resellers who started with a few hundred dollar initial investment that have gone the long and slow road to financial independence (it's now their full time job), and some who have had a thorough business plan and invested heavily from the get go, and everything in between.

  15. #15
    Join Date
    Apr 2009
    Location
    Bangladesh
    Posts
    406
    It depends on what you want to offer. If you want to start small and offer only shared hosting you can start with a budget of as little as $30/month. But if you want to start big and start offering VPS or dedicated servers, you have to invest FAR more than that.
    Sajid Iftekhar - Web Design Portfolio

  16. #16
    Join Date
    Jul 2009
    Location
    UK
    Posts
    1,312
    Im not a hosting business, ( I do host my product for people.. "remotely hosted?" ) However it probably costed me a few K to start fully.

    Now ive got over 1500 clients and profit making.
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  17. #17
    Join Date
    May 2003
    Location
    San Francisco, CA
    Posts
    1,506
    What's important is not what everyone else spent, it's what you need to spend in accordance with your business plan.

    The initial investment could just as easily range from an entry reseller plan, to purchasing hardware, to building a data center, etc.

    If it helps, I first started in this industry over 9 years ago with a ~$10/month reseller account. That company became quite successful and sold for a great price.

    If you haven't been involved with web hosting before, find someone who has. Hindsight 20/20 is invaluable. Having experience of past failures and successes will give you a leg up and allow you a better chance of seeing your business plan come to a successful fruition.
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  18. #18
    i ahve so far spent £1.

  19. #19
    Join Date
    Oct 2003
    Location
    UK
    Posts
    3,590
    Quote Originally Posted by 247UKHosting View Post
    i ahve so far spent £1.
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  20. #20
    Join Date
    Apr 2004
    Location
    Ontario
    Posts
    141
    I'm in a prelaunch stage and I have already spent a few hundred.

    Remember to build a budget and try to stick to it.

  21. #21
    Join Date
    Apr 2009
    Location
    Bangladesh
    Posts
    406
    We didn't need to spend so much at the beginning. We didn't need to pay for a web design because I am a designer myself. So, that saved us a lot of $$$. Since we are basically targeting small businesses/personal sites. So, just advertised on forums and stuff.

    So, it actually depends on your marketing plans.
    Sajid Iftekhar - Web Design Portfolio

  22. #22
    Most of my businesses I have started with around $50. << My current company >> was the biggest with a $225 initial investment. "Laughable, I know". I then keep bootstrapping for a couple years and then let it explode in growth. I have also pivoted every time because where my business starts is not where it will end up.
    Last edited by writespeak; 04-18-2011 at 08:10 PM.

  23. #23
    Join Date
    Feb 2011
    Location
    Denver, CO
    Posts
    124
    I think the key here, and what most people are saying, is that you need to decide on your market first. If you want to hit commodity shared hosting, like GoDaddy, you will need a huge investment for advertising, staff, and infrastructure. Since hosting is so saturated though, it's probably best to start with a niche market, provide excellent service for cheap, and grow from there. That seems to be how most hosts start, most small businesses in fact.
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  24. #24
    Join Date
    Jul 2009
    Location
    New Zealand
    Posts
    2,331
    In this industry the lower your operating cost the better you'll survive, your operating cost should reflect on the size of your client base, why spend 4k/mo when you only have one client paying 10/mo? Note im talking about operating cost not initial investment (like buying your own hardware, office space) also it depends on your business plan on how do you want to do business.
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  25. #25
    Join Date
    Apr 2010
    Location
    Lander, WY
    Posts
    13
    Mine is a boot strapped business. I didn't spend anything out of my personal pocket to get the business rolling. I've repaired loads of computers over the last year to subsidize the business during startup and lean months (this is a great marketing tool as well). At this point things are self sustaining and I've got tons of room to grow until I'll need more server.

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