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12-30-2022, 04:09 PM #1Newbie
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How Did You Build Your Hosting Site?
Hi all. This is my first post on the forums and I’m rather new to the web hosting industry so I’m wondering, what do y’all use to build your hosting sites? I’ve been left feeling sad and unsatisfied by the lack of easy customization to the WHMCS front end, but also haven’t had much luck with the Wordpress bridge. What are the best practices for making attracting hosting sites?
I’m using the Lagom 2.0 WHMCS theme which is wonderful, but it’s still left me with wanting more due to the limitations of WHMCS in the design area. I have patiently been waiting for their theme builder to release, but feel as though I have no other choice in the meantime but to make a Wordpress site, link the pages, and hope nobody thinks it looks funny when they’re directed to a distinctly different looking website (WHMCS).
I have 10ish clients right now, all of which have just been through networking. I was thinking about running Facebook ads but honestly, I think my site just looks too bare to be attractive enough to get new customers to sign up.
I don’t exactly have the time to learn php in order to edit WHMCS myself (aside from very basic things) and can’t afford $10k for a custom development on the WHMCS front end.
I really like the look of sites like NameHero and HostArmada, very clean and modern feel (both of which were developed by the same dev team as Lagom).
So I guess I’m wondering, what does everyone else typically do? HTML or Wordpress with links? WP Bridge? Editing WHMCS theme files directly? (Feel free to link your sites too, if that’s allowed.)
Thanks!
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12-30-2022, 07:19 PM #2Web Hosting Guru
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fiverr has plenty of web developers that can make you a decent looking site.
--
CLAG
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12-30-2022, 07:22 PM #3Newbie
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12-30-2022, 07:44 PM #4Web Hosting Master
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12-30-2022, 09:20 PM #5Disabled
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Custom WHMCS template pages are built with html and css. If you already know that, then you should try it on your own. If you want some fancy effects you’ll need javascript for it. Most of the basic transition effects are done with css too. Have you looked at WHMCS docs? https://developers.whmcs.com/advanced/creating-pages/
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12-31-2022, 04:41 AM #6
We do it inhouse. When you have an inhouse developer who can develop a custom made website as well as modify WHMCS, it becomes a no brainer.
But most companies don't have an inhouse developer. If you don't, you can get a WordPress theme on web hosting from themeforest. Keep your main site and WHMCS separate. Use the product links in the order now buttons on the main site, and you are done.█||||[ MechanicWeb.com - Shared Hosting | Reseller Hosting | KVM VPS | Dedicated Server ]
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12-31-2022, 07:26 AM #7Junior Guru Wannabe
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From the perspective of sales I can only say that the site should deliver what customers want in pre-sales. WHMCS with standard templates cannot do that. The whole buying process is requiring unnecessary steps, the layout cannot fit all. For really successful selling you have to know your customers and design the checkout lane like they expect it.
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01-05-2023, 07:17 PM #8Rebooting is a hack, not a fix
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- Citrus Heights, CA
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WP Bridge was once a decent plugin, however I wouldn't use it now. It's burning a slow death and as far as I'm aware still has compatibility issues with the latest version of WHMCS. I've also tried to contact them about an issue on a clients behalf roughly a month ago, and yet to have received a response. Their support team seems to be non-existent and uninterested in further development of it.
RS Studio (the developers behind Lagom) actually offers custom services. I have no clue on the cost as I wasn't personally involved in that project but I definitely would recommend reaching out to them if you haven't yet.Last edited by Mark Muyskens; 01-05-2023 at 07:21 PM.
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01-06-2023, 10:19 AM #9New Member
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Ive looked into having RSstudio design a whmcs site and cost is around $10,000ish. The work they do is simply amazing just not obtainable for a lot of us smaller companies. Im sure the new site could result in more sales potentially but hard to justify the cost if your not making that much to begin with. Im still waiting for the website builder to come out also which would be nice to integrate with there lagom 2 theme
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01-07-2023, 01:22 AM #10Newbie
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That's kinda the boat I'm in. I've only made $1,000ish dollars so far (not too shabby for someone who just started) but I can't justify getting a loan for a website lol. I'm def curious about their sitebuilder though! At the same time, if they make it TOO intuitive, that might mean they would get less customers who want custom sites and I certainly can't fault them for that.
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01-07-2023, 05:13 AM #11Junior Guru Wannabe
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Also opting for Fiverr. Try to find someone from India or Pakistan. There are many who do a great job.
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01-07-2023, 05:27 AM #12Junior Guru Wannabe
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- May 2010
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I'm product designer with web development background, it is time consuming but I mostly design and edit templates by myself to deliver seamless experience to my customers. If you're at budget and don't want to spend too much time and money on customising WHMCS then I would suggest ThemeForest. You can get website and WHMCS template within $100 and the creator of template can customise functionality based on your requirements but they will charge extra for that.
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01-07-2023, 07:13 AM #13Web Hosting Master
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This post sums things up pretty well.
Web hosting providers' sites usually need to be updated quite often, so my suggestion for small business owner would be to pick some platform he's comfortable with and do all required changes himself, rather than taking time try to reach someone, who created certain template and figure out why he did it that way or another. Most popular themes and templates are usually the most polished, as they got lots of feedback from users, though they might not be the best looking ones.
And last, but not least - the speed. Theme or template should be utilizing the best practices to make site loading as fast as possible.
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01-09-2023, 05:11 AM #14Junior Guru Wannabe
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- Jun 2015
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When I'm designing a site, specifically a hosting site I focus on getting the website looking and behaving how I'd like it to.
Once and only once that's been completed you can get the WHMCS integrated, just search for WHMCS Integration online, you can probably get this done for around $50.UK/EU/US cPanel Cloud Hosting
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01-11-2023, 02:15 AM #15Premium Member
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I don't understand why you want to use WHMCS for the font-end of the website. Simply put, for me, WHMCS is more like a billing solution. It does the job of maintaining billing and user accounts perfectly, but it is not a complete website solution. Most of the hosting providers, including us, separate our main website from WHMCS and link them both using product links, signup links, and support ticket links.
If you have some HTML background, you could buy a web hosting business website template from a reputed marketplace like Themeforest, for instance. If you don't have any coding knowledge and prefer to do it in a no-code way, there are plenty of options available too, like Divi with WordPress, Elementor with WordPress, SitePad, etc., I personally like Elementor as it is a ton flexible and the final output looks amazing and fast, but there is a steep learning curve involved. SitePad on the other hand is easier for beginners.
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01-11-2023, 01:12 PM #16Junior Guru Wannabe
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- Jun 2002
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- Texas
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Yes, they do.
Here is what we did, build out our main site on WordPress, and once you get it to the way you want it (doing it yourself or hiring someone) RS Studio will take your theme and make the Lagom Theme look the same. I think that service is a one-time $695. Not bad. But double-check me on that.
Good luck to you.
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01-11-2023, 05:42 PM #17Newbie
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- Aug 2008
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- Australia
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Hi @CrimsonRed
i think a good question which hasn't been asked yet is "where is your business coming from"
- is it website sales directly?
- Referrals?
- Are you hand holding leads and then manually creating accounts and invoices in WHMCS once converted?
If your core business is not directly from the internet and converted on the website into a sale then the website and WHCMS integration is less important than the level of support and pre sales you give to potential clients.
There are many service providers who don't use a billing platform like WHMCS to convert leads they use contact forms to gather enquiries and then hand hold the client until the sale is done after that the on boarding process includes account creation etc.
it really comes down to the business model you are looking to evolve and how hands on you want to be.
Answer those questions 1st and identify your target audience, once you know your target audience and POD - Point Of Difference create content on a normal WordPress or other website platform with your service offering and then link to the billing platform.
Do you have a logo, style/ branding guidelines?
If not then get those sorted out 1st so that when you are ready to build the website or make small changes to WHMCS you have a colour scheme to follow etc.
for many years we used WHMCS and only made basic theme changes to match colour for our brand it made WHMCS appear to be more inline with our primary site and cohesive.
just some food for thought.
best of luck
""Cheers
G
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01-11-2023, 05:46 PM #18WHT Addict
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I would suggest WordPress and Product links to WHMCS.
Or, if it's mainly for advertising use a landing page builder/service and product links. Because once someone is a customer they really don't care what your website looks like anymore (within reason). All they care about is that their own website is working, and they can easily log into WHMCS for support.Knewedge - Managed Website Hosting, WordPress Support, and Linux & DevOps Support
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01-11-2023, 08:14 PM #19Newbie
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- Apr 2018
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Hi,
I hope you are doing good.
Updating the WHMCS theme itself is rather easy as long as you know HTML & CSS and a bit of Javascript and/or jQuery, my best advice if you are to go this route is it create a child theme and then customise to your heart is content. Start off pulling across the files you want to customise out of the gate and then spend time doing the other files.
For my business I use a custom built WordPress theme for the frontend and then all links to purchasing go through to WHMCS, I've found this works really well and a lot of other hosting providers seem to do this or they use a custom app or HTML website.
I'm in the process (when time permits of course) of migrating the main website away from WordPress and building something completely custom in Laravel which will (hopefully) enable a much greater interaction with WHMCS within the Laravel application.
<<snipped>>Last edited by Postbox; 01-11-2023 at 10:28 PM.
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01-12-2023, 02:30 AM #20Disabled
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- Jan 2023
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honestly I wouldn't waste your time trying with WHMCS bridge or any solution, you will just end up tearing your hair out and likely never get a solution you are happy with.
WHMCS BRIDGE never worked properly.
There is another solution called whmpress.com which seems to be a lot better, and has mostly good reviews.
Every host I have ever used just has a separate site (usually WordPress) and links through to the shopping cart on WHMCS.
All you need to do in WHMCS is just apply your own branding if you want with a very simple theme or custom css file.
I would however recommend getting an ADMIN theme for WHMCS, as that makes life a lot easier, as the default theme is rubbish. I have been using LARA Admin theme for years, which is great.
Honestly, customers do not care, otherwise, everyone else wouldn't do it.
I have 3 businesses using WHMCS and I built all the sites with WordPress.
I am a website designer, so built mine from scratch, but you can find plenty of ready-made hosting themes on ThemeForest.
If you go down this route, avoid using a WordPress theme built with wpbakery, it's awful and horrible to use if you want to make changes. Make sure you find one that uses a decent builder plugin like Divi, elementor, beaver builder etc, or find one that just uses Gutenburg blocks, which will be the lightest and fastest.
<<snipped>>Last edited by anon-e-mouse; 01-12-2023 at 05:16 AM.
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01-12-2023, 07:47 AM #21Aspiring Evangelist
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In many cases, just HTML for the front and ....WHMCS with some modifications is just fine (or you can actually get the header and footer and modify your WHMCS theme) ...what matters the most is the services offered.
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01-12-2023, 11:44 AM #22Web Hosting Guru
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01-12-2023, 12:08 PM #23Junior Guru
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I suggest hiring someone who actually knows how to code to do it. It's just HTML and CSS, and maybe some JavaScript if you want. None is really necessary these days. It's more useful for ads and data-mining than it is for anything else.
Plugins and themes are ongoing sources of annoyance. They may or may not be properly maintained, they may or may not be compatible with future changes to the software (or even the PHP), and they almost always are absurdly bloated for what they actually do.
Richard
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01-12-2023, 01:38 PM #24Junior Guru
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Truth.
People looking for Web hosting want a fast connection to a fast server at a certain price point. The better your site articulates what they are looking for and the easier you make it for them to find the information and pricing, the better the site.
Because speed is so much of what people are looking for, the site should be fast. It should be hand-coded (no CMS or "platform"), mainly text-based with judicious use of lightweight graphics, and free of unnecessary JavaScript (which would be basically all of it) that does nothing useful and slows down the page load speed.
Then put your plans out there with concise descriptions and prices that doesn't require people to drill more than a page deep, and a link to a contact page.
That's it.
People aren't going to your site to be entertained. They want a fast connection to a fast server, so articulate that by building a lightweight page that loads quickly; and make the server and pricing information easy to find by putting it right out front.
When I'm shopping for products or services, and the Web site seems intent on distracting me and wasting my time with lightboxes, newsletter sign-up offers, and other useless crap that gets in my way or slows down the page, you know what I do? I click out. That's what most sensible people do.
Richard
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01-12-2023, 04:43 PM #25WHT Addict
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Last hosting site I ran was just HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Then I just segmented off the Client Area (Blesta) and used similar colors to make them tie together. Then added a link to the Blesta header like "return to main site."
I've used WordPress before too, but it's a lot less bloat and hassle if you can configure your front-end site to be static.
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