Reseller hosting

Reseller hosting refers to the process of selling somebody else's web hosting services and taking commissions on all sales.

It's a type of affiliate scheme in that you do not actually provide the service yourself, but you market and sell it on behalf of a third party.

However, with most packages, you are able to customize the service so that it appears that you are the company providing the service, in that you can use your graphics and your web company name.

Reseller hosting is of particular interest to people who are running webmaster businesses, but will also appeal to anybody who's producing website building and information blogs or sites.

At a very simple level, you lease a dedicated server - or space on a server - from a third party at a certain price, then you charge clients extra to 'sub-let' space on that server at a price that you control ... and you keep the profit.

If you're building websites for other people, hosting their sites on your reseller server area is a great way of earning recurring revenues after they have initially paid for your webmaster services.

Reseller hosting tips

There are many companies that you can chose from when you're getting into reselling and I suggest you shop around a bit first to find the company that's right for you.

Here are five tips to get you started:

1) Chose a company which offers a package which is right for your niche. For instance, there's no point offering a service with MySQL databases and php services if a) you know nothing about them yourself b) you're only targeting the beginners market.

2) Think about the 'extras' that you'll need ... bandwidth, disk space, level of customization, email accounts provided and so on. Don't fall for a service which offers lots of everything if there's no chance you're going to use the service.

3) Check very carefully the level of support that's on offer and how that support is given. If you're only offering reseller hosting in your own country for instance, you might only need to provide support during local office hours. However, if you're offering a worldwide service, you might prefer 24/7 phone support or 24/7 live chat.

4) Look for a recommended reseller by reading review sites and directories. Find out what other people have to say about the service and support and make sure that you're teaming up with a legitmate, trustworthy, professional outfit.

5) Check the billing options and confirm who manages and handles this side of the business. The benefit of starting a reseller hosting business is in the recurring revenues that you earn, however, make sure it's easy to monitor the paperwork and issue the bills to your clients.

My reseller hosting tips

Heart Internet is now my company of choice for my personal web hosting, so it made sense to try them for reseller packages.

What I particularly like about this service is that I get unlimited bandwidth, unlimited web space, unlimited domains and unlimited websites all for the same low fixed price.

The service is easy to install, customize and operate and it comes with all sorts of add-on packages, bulk purchase options and support.

There is also a billing system integrated - with multiple payment options (Paypal, Google Checkout and so on) - as well as an invoice management system, reminder email service and other practical and useful management services.

The big benefit for Heart Internet users is that all important word unlimited.

In the past I have used reseller packages which are extremely limited and become very quickly annoying.

This is fully integrated reseller hosting, and of course included within that word 'unlimited' is your own website hosting in the price ... so if you sell on enough packages at the right price, you could easily be paying your own hosting costs in no time.

What's the alternative?

An alternative to conventional reselling is to use SiteSell Services which pays extremely generous commissions for reselling their web services.

In addition, they handle all the customer hassles with their dedicated and comprehensive support services, so once I've made a sale, they deal with everything else and what's more, my commission on that sale is recurring every time the customer's annual renewal comes up.

They offer the following customer options:

Think carefully about whether you really want to get into reseller hosting and if you do decide to go ahead, make sure that the service you opt for gives you all of the support you need.

If you don't think it's for you, try signing up as a SiteSell Services affiliate by clicking on the graphic below.

It's completely free to join, no catches, and the support given to help you make sales is superb.

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