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  1. #26
    Join Date
    Jul 2018
    Posts
    677
    Quote Originally Posted by farhan713 View Post
    Being a online business has its pros and cons but I feel in 2019, an online business is better than a similar offline business interms of ROI.
    The seems to be almost no offline businesses anymore.

    So, how did you start your business?

  2. #27
    Quote Originally Posted by mightynation View Post
    Hi there. Seeing so many people try to start a web hosting business here. They are asking a lot of questions about how to get customers and arrange their marketing strategy. That made me curious - why would anyone want run a business in such an overcrowded market? My presumptions would be:

    • You just finished school and haven't seen much beyond computers?
    • You have degree in computer sciences and want to start your business?
    • You have just created your first website and think you can run the whole business behind it?
    • You are a geek and just running all this stuff for curiosity and self education?
    • You have a different kind of job, but you like to mess with operating systems, networking, some programming and you think it is an opportunity to change your life?
    • You are looking for a simplest way to get some money?


    I would appreciate, if you guys would share your story behind running/trying to run a web hosting.
    Some people start it as part time for additional income
    Some people do this as a passion fulfillment
    Some consider this as their sole income
    Some do this as it can be started off with minimum income

    And others may have their side different stories too

    Today almost everything is done via internet and there are lots of people looking to host. This number increases day by day. Therefore those in this field know very well that they could surely get an income starting a hosting business.

    However just like any business to grow in this field is not easy as thought, there is very high competition, you need a lot of hard effort and time and also you must be careful that you provide the best service as this is the only thing that would take a hosting business forward to grow and be successful.

  3. #28
    Quote Originally Posted by mightynation View Post
    The seems to be almost no offline businesses anymore.

    So, how did you start your business?
    There are offline businesses everywhere. Just have a walk around and look at shops near you. But most of them have low ROI.

    I started my business with a small website in my city.
    When you take action, it may seem nothing to you but there is our creator who values them. a lot and shows you direction. We should make mistakes(manageable) and learn from them.

  4. #29
    Join Date
    Jul 2018
    Posts
    677
    Quote Originally Posted by farhan713 View Post
    When you take action, it may seem nothing to you but there is our creator who values them. a lot and shows you direction
    Excuse me, who values it all?
    Quote Originally Posted by farhan713 View Post
    Just have a walk around and look at shops near you. But most of them have low ROI.
    How do you calculate ROI of shops near you?

  5. #30
    Quote Originally Posted by mightynation View Post
    Excuse me, who values it all?

    How do you calculate ROI of shops near you?
    The Creator of mankind and this Universe.

    ROI is calculated by the amount invested to run a profitable business and dividing it by how much the business makes annually.
    Last edited by farhan713; 06-13-2019 at 05:26 AM.

  6. #31
    Join Date
    Jul 2018
    Posts
    677
    Quote Originally Posted by farhan713 View Post
    The Creator of mankind and this Universe.
    I don't know what are the benefits of taking this b******t seriously, but I learned here that passion and even religion can drive you to and through the web hosting business. That's interesting.

    I also asked you how do you know and compare the ROI's of specific businesses, not the definition itself.

  7. #32
    Quote Originally Posted by mightynation View Post
    I don't know what are the benefits of taking this b******t seriously, but I learned here that passion and even religion can drive you to and through the web hosting business. That's interesting.

    I also asked you how do you know and compare the ROI's of specific businesses, not the definition itself.
    you need to know the net profit of the business first.
    A good place to learn this is the "Business and Clients For Sale" section of this forum.

  8. #33
    I started my hosting business as there was an easy way to gain clients. (long story). However, since then, its grown on its own and word of mouth keeps it going. So I got into it as there was a limited opportunity, and I'm still in it because, well it's all I know.

  9. #34
    Join Date
    Oct 2016
    Location
    United Kingdom
    Posts
    52
    its interesting, well for me, I started website hosting as a result of doing website design and making extra income. A great way to keep your clients in check for more work to come in.

  10. #35
    I have been in the web sphere for 10 years offering design, development, marketing and sysadmin services. I have mostly shied away from the hosting responsibility (with some exceptions) because I don't want to take urgent client calls at 2am, and I'm not willing to delegate that responsibility to an employee. I'd rather that my clients deal with a third party hosting firm that offers excellent 24/7 phone and/or chat support when there is an issue. Particularly when the profit margins are so low on hosting, and seeing cPanel increase their prices recently.

    There's no doubt that you can have a very successful hosting business, but these days it's a commodity offering. Customer service and marketing are the only differentiating factors, no? I'd love to hear why I'm wrong, and why I should actually start a web hosting business though.
    Last edited by mandala; 09-11-2019 at 11:57 AM.

  11. #36
    Join Date
    Jul 2009
    Location
    New Zealand
    Posts
    2,331
    Because i love it and has been my passion ten years and counting... no regrets!

  12. #37
    Join Date
    Nov 2014
    Location
    Australia
    Posts
    1,644
    Oakley capital with their decision to increase CPanel prices have changed the hosting industry overnight.
    Customer service hasn't mattered for a very long time. People have gone out and purchased the cheapest product they can find.
    Cheap unlimited hosting won't be a thing as of January 2020 all those hosts will either fold or be acquired by huge global multinationals.
    Some hosts will switch to lesser known control panels like Direct Admin to try and compete but consumers are funny beasts.
    You only need to read the couple of posts regarding consumers complaining about price increases.
    This number will continue to grow over the next 12 to 18 months.

    In my case started CPK Web Services 10 years ago after designing websites for a few clients and deciding I could make extra income from hosting them.
    we've been doing a lot of restructuring of the business in the last couple of years.
    With our Microsoft partnership I think we have a good base to continue building from.
    You basically need to be a decent sized company to make a profit out of shared hosting, no money in it what so ever.

    Our focus is on business grade customers who just want their website and related systems to work and who don't have the time to invest in learning things themselves.
    We dumped our Budget hosting range at the start of September because we don't want customers who are only focused on price.
    We want customers that see the value in the services we provide on top of just giving them a website and email accounts.

  13. #38
    Join Date
    Nov 2014
    Location
    Australia
    Posts
    1,644
    Quote Originally Posted by mandala View Post
    I have been in the web sphere for 10 years offering design, development, marketing and sysadmin services. I have mostly shied away from the hosting responsibility (with some exceptions) because I don't want to take urgent client calls at 2am, and I'm not willing to delegate that responsibility to an employee. I'd rather that my clients deal with a third party hosting firm that offers excellent 24/7 phone and/or chat support when there is an issue. Particularly when the profit margins are so low on hosting, and seeing cPanel increase their prices recently.

    There's no doubt that you can have a very successful hosting business, but these days it's a commodity offering. Customer service and marketing are the only differentiating factors, no? I'd love to hear why I'm wrong, and why I should actually start a web hosting business though.
    I haven't offered 24/7 support since 2013 and don't intend to any time soon.
    Our systems work and so customers don't need to be calling at 2AM.
    We do offer emergency support for outages late at night and on weekends but generally most customers contact us during business hours.
    Generally if we have an outage I'm on to it before customers phone anyway.
    Most issues we have had is when we have moved services to totally new platforms but these have generally been resolved quickly.

  14. #39
    For some of the companies I worked for, I felt I could offer customers a better experience and I like the environment, and volume of servers I work with.

  15. #40
    What about.. its just a passion?
    For myself, I know thats what it is. I didn't start the company I'm at but intend to run it in the near future and heres my take...

    I enjoy technology in most forms and I can get lost in it. With that, I enjoy helping others and since I can't yet do that on a grand scale, maybe providing the support and experience to our customers will help them make a bigger change in this world.
    So for me its mostly passion for tech. Tech and Helping people.

  16. #41
    Join Date
    Sep 2018
    Posts
    35
    I strongly believe that IT business in general is and will become an even more desirable field to work in. It is profitable and exciting as it brings new possibilities and lets you get to know new technologies. I might not be answering your question correctly, but I thought I'd share my opinion.

  17. #42
    A devout love of constantly helping people make their email work again

  18. #43
    I answer with a question first:
    Are you a great business man that can help poor people selling servers to become as rich as you are?
    Most of people here do something more than selling hosting services and I would love to know how and why you started your great business so we can learn, while I think there is not competition in your niche/field.
    Thanks bro


    Quote Originally Posted by mightynation View Post
    Hi there. Seeing so many people try to start a web hosting business here. They are asking a lot of questions about how to get customers and arrange their marketing strategy. That made me curious - why would anyone want run a business in such an overcrowded market? My presumptions would be:

    • You just finished school and haven't seen much beyond computers?
    • You have degree in computer sciences and want to start your business?
    • You have just created your first website and think you can run the whole business behind it?
    • You are a geek and just running all this stuff for curiosity and self education?
    • You have a different kind of job, but you like to mess with operating systems, networking, some programming and you think it is an opportunity to change your life?
    • You are looking for a simplest way to get some money?


    I would appreciate, if you guys would share your story behind running/trying to run a web hosting.

  19. #44
    Join Date
    Jul 2018
    Posts
    677
    Quote Originally Posted by webgem View Post
    I answer with a question first: Are you a great business man that can help poor people selling servers to become as rich as you are?
    Mysterious answer. In a whole I can admit, that helping others in any way feels like your life becomes more meaningful.
    Quote Originally Posted by webgem View Post
    I would love to know how and why you started your great business
    I didn't start any great business yet We tend to think (earlier or later, after trying other things), that we can turn our hobby into occupation quite easily. That doesn't necessarily work in the way we expected. Web hosting is one of the best places to make yourself sure of that. While on the other hand - if it still remains a thing of your liking and you learn how to bring value to others, while getting endless opportunities to learn something new every day and you appreciate it, why not to continue? Still I think web hosting is kind of a wild place, where you can be eaten fast, so you should plan well and be prepared to use all the advantages you have or could gain in order to survive (if you have no other means).
    Quote Originally Posted by webgem View Post
    while I think there is not competition in your niche/field.
    You talking about one of my businesses/occupations exactly or you mean something in general? Considering that even Intel and NVidia have to face tough competition these days, what else can be said about far less technologically advanced fields? Unless you are sitting on a gold mine or oil well, you will have to compete. Competition is great thing for customers, but when it's tied directly to your income, things may get a bit stressful. I think every small business has to find it's own niche to be successful. It has to offer something or in a way, that others can't.

  20. #45
    I originally got into the web hosting industry to offer a better service as I was fed up with poor support from some providers when running some of my own sites.

    You can never compete with the larger providers pricing wise, but you can compete when it comes to offering more personal support, and that is priceless.

    It can be tricky to get sales when customers mainly go by price. The only way you can stand out and do well is by offering the best personal support possible which the medium to large providers just can't do as well.

  21. #46
    Join Date
    Aug 2019
    Location
    Krakow, PL
    Posts
    97
    Everything started 10 years ago, when we were focused just on webdesign, simple websites for local companies.. we were not even using reseller account, we were just buying shared hosting accounts for our clients .. but it was tiring, all the time issues, poor support, downtime.. etc. so we were changing providers. During that time, we saw many good and bad examples of that business.
    Obviously when you are beginner, and you don't know anything about that, you trust bigger companies, we made that mistake, but later we noticed.. that not always bigger means better.
    After all "stories" with that, we decided to buy first VPS, and it was the best idea.. many years we were working like that.. just providing hosting for our customers, later because recommendations from our clients, people started come to us, but not for webpages, they were just tired of their hosting, and they wanted to move to us. It was the moment, when we started to provide hosting.
    Right now we are not just local company, we decided to move forward, open our services for whole world - as I said bigger doesn't mean better, we don't want to fight with big players.
    So with us, it was just evolution, from one thing to another.

  22. #47
    I ran an online business for over 15 years. Loved it and it was profitable. Once I started opening brick and mortar stores, the end came sooner and I finally had to shut it all down. Should have stuck with online only....

  23. #48
    Join Date
    Dec 2007
    Location
    IN
    Posts
    146
    OMG I am getting older!

    I have been working with 20+ Hosting companies and supporting them. Just felt curious running my own company. Journey was absolutely awesome selling UNLIMITED cPanels till few months back.

    Built 1000+ Websites which gave a grip and still on marathon!

  24. #49
    My story is different, I start with FX, when I see the need of market for 100% uptime of server, I start with shared cloud hosting around 10 years ago, no one heard about it. hosting needs patience, patience and patience. while it's profitable business if you have great marketing strategy it's not suitable for everyone, I closed my business many years ago, I never regret for that.

  25. #50

    Thumbs up

    I started my business mainly for selling website designs to local business that hadn't upgraded their websites sine the 90's lol Offering hosting services to those clients afterwards was a no-brainer, and once that's setup might as well offer it to the general public as well.

    It's mainly a side hustle at the moment, I still have my full time Software Developer job, but it would be nice to someday be financially free to be able to work on my business 100% of the time.
    Last edited by WEBTRICS; 01-23-2020 at 11:12 AM. Reason: removed signature

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