May 28, 2009
Common Misconceptions About Reseller Hosting
Reseller web hosting is becoming an increasingly popular option for people looking to profit online. Many enter into this business as they have learned of the paramount success of others before them. While some have achieved success, others have failed before their reseller business even got off the ground. If this is the game you're looking to play, it is important to first make yourself familiar with the common misconceptions centered around reseller hosting.
Managing a Reseller Account is Easy
The purpose of the control panel is to make your life as a reseller much easier. Instead of performing administrative tasks through a more complex command line, most control panels allow you to manage your account through a graphical user interface or simply, GUI. cPanel's WHM (Web Host Manager) is a perfect example of a control panel that simplifies the process of maintaining a reseller account. With that said, even the user-friendly WHM requires you to have some technical knowledge. For instance, the software allows you to add more functionality to your environment by installing Perl modules. However, if you have no ideal what Perl is or how to install the modules, such a luxury is essentially useless. In fact, a GUI control panel can actually prevent you from performing certain tasks and make others more difficult than they should be. So, even though the software is designed to add simplicity to the reseller environment, it is still good to have a working knowledge of Windows or Linux to get the most out of your control panel and reseller account.
The Math is To Your Advantage
When it comes to reseller hosting, everything on the surface isn't necessarily what it seems. Let's say you find yourself a hosting plan for $100 per month. Included in the package is 80 GB of disk storage and you decide to resell this space in 25 MB bundles at $5 per month. With each gigabyte equaling 1024 MB, let's round things off and assume you can sell 40 plans for each gigabyte of storage you have. 40 x 80 equals $3,200. Multiply that by $5 and you have $16,000. Deduct your $100 monthly hosting fee and you have $15,000 in pure profits. Not bad for a simple reseller account, right? Unfortunately, this is a very unlikely scenario.
If you have the misconception that being a successful reseller is a simple matter of favorable math, you just might find yourself out of business in no time. Putting 3,200 accounts on a single server is next to impossible, unless your host is begging for you to regularly crash the machine that is. Apart from disk space, you must also consider another vital aspect of the equation - bandwidth. Just as a server comes with a certain amount of space, it also has a limited amount of bandwidth, which entails how much traffic you can support. Although most customers will not require all the bandwidth allocated to them, some might. For this reason, it is advisable to never oversell your resources just to make a few extra bucks.
Conclusion
There are many disadvantages to running your own business. It doesn't matter whether you run a restaurant, shipping company or reseller hosting business. The best approach is to first weigh all the pros and cons to make sure it is the right move for you. If so, treat your reseller account like a real business and steer clear of the misconceptions.
Categories: Reseller Web Hosting |
Tags: WHM,
Reseller Web Hosting,
reseller business,
control panel,
bandwidth
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