How is it done? - Host Discussion Blog

*jenna drew* · 07-17-2002, 03:00 PM

How do you create your own hosting company!

swilcox · 07-22-2002, 03:28 PM

I've been doing this for a while. If you haven't actually run servers, there is a good ways to get your feet wet:

Begin by reselling someone else's hosting.

Do this with a host that can offer you control of the server with some interface and preferably with a host that will provide you nameservers and hide themselves.

Once you have enough clients, the business case will start to make more sense to go with a dedicated server. This will depend some on how much experience you have gained reselling, and if you feel comfortable with less hand-holding. But there will come a time to take this step. We're not quite there yet ourselves.

But start with the reselling. I have resold for a few different companies, and been disappointed with some, but I'm just now transferring accounts to NEIT Solutions (www.neitsolutions.com), and they have all the stuff I talked about above and great customer service. By that, I mean that I'm not even that web-saavy (doing this as a side business to my graphic design). But I can actually call these guys. My last host would take days to answer emails. So I'm pretty happy. I recommend them, especially if you are just starting out.

Hope that helps.

*jenna drew* · 07-28-2002, 08:28 AM

Alright. Thanks!

MyWebTeks · 08-28-2002, 08:36 PM

There are many things that it takes to create a web hosting company.

You will need servers, a cooling apparatus, security, technicians, a knowledge of windows and unix operating systems, redundant direct connections to the internet backbone, a good knowledge of how to market your services and the search engines. How domains are routed using the dns systems and an automation system for your customers for signing up and customer support.

If you want to be competitve you will need many other things such as 24/7 live tech support using multiple media such as phones, email, trouble tickets and live support chat. Others include pre-installed cgi scripts, ecommerce abilities, shopping carts and connections with merchant service providers, and a design team that can offer top notch web development.

There are many aspects and that are involved in creating and running your own hosting company. If you don't have the expertise through formal education or on site training, I would not recommend that you try to just jump into it without knowing what you are doing.

There are other ways that you can start up your own hosting comapny that doesn't involve all the head aches of actually running or owning everything that I listed and those that I didn't because of space limitations. If you really want to learn what it takes to create and run a web hosting company, I recommend that you start off as a reseller for a web hosting company such as us. We offer a reseller plan that will allow you to have your own hosting company without having to purchase all the hardware, software, personell and physical locations to do it. You set your own prices and bill your own customers and we bill you and never contact your customers. All you have to concentrate on is building your site and attracting new customers while we handle all the technical support anonymously. As far as your customers are concerned, they think they are talking to you when they are actually speaking with one of our technicians. We remain invisible to your customers so you can build your own name as a web hosting provider. If you would like to learn more about our reseller options you can go to our site at http://www.mywebteks.com and look for the link for resellers.

If you have to ask what it takes to create a web hosting company, you are not ready to start one. Your best option is to start as a reseller. Whether for us or any of the others that offer reseller plans.

If you have more questions please don't hesitate to call us in the US toll free at 1-877-826-5448, internatinal at 1-909-357-7385 or email us at sales-team@mywebteks.com

*jenna drew* · 08-30-2002, 11:14 AM

Wow! More advice! Thanks!

Mia! · 09-05-2002, 01:11 PM

jenna and I might start one

*jenna drew* · 09-05-2002, 01:13 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Mia!
jenna and I might start one

We confirmed that yesterday

Andrew · 01-04-2003, 05:21 PM

Best to start with a business and marketing plan and therefore eliminate any problems.

Next step is to either resell for someone or setup a server.
Someone above spoke of spending copious amounts in coolant equipment and staff - this is not true in all cases, you can rent a server for a flat fee per month and the provider will provide technicians.etc, co-location works in much the same way.

Even larger hosts will not pay for coolant systems or engineers even if they have multiple racks, as it should be provided by the data centre as part of the contract. You only need worry about purchasing BGP routers, technicians, UPS's and so on if you are starting up your own data facility.

If you plan on having multiple servers, you may wish to invest in your own netblock (AS number) which is provided by various organisations. In my case, we use RIPE, but others use ARIN and so on.

One thing you will need to renember is bandwidth and pipe costs. you will need to have a large amount of data transfer avalible to you or you wont be able to host many clients. You also need the connectivity to be able to service them with fast loading sites. As with all professional entities bandwidth should be multi-routed from diffrent providers so that there is no single-point of faliure outside of your network which would inadvertantly cause downtime.

MyWebTeks · 01-07-2003, 09:38 PM

It looks as if Andrew dosn't read entire posts to the end. Jenna asked what it took to start her own hosting company. We gave her a couple options and not all the options included purchasing cooling equipment, technicians etc.

Due the limitations in space and time, we did not go into every possibility of starting a hosting company.

We have several data centers so we answered the question from our aspect. Everything we stated was true and if you plan to be a tier 1 top level host, then having your own data center is neccessary. This involves a lot of money.

As we stated though, you have other options available to you amongst which is as a reseller, whether you have a dedicated server, colocation or any other option. The options we gave were so that Jenna would n't have to spend large amounts of cash or hire her own tech team to handle everything. Since she would be a reseller, she wouldn't have to worry about putting out all the money to have all the perks of being a real host and her clients would be none the wiser as we remain anonymous.

As a reseller, you also don't need to worry about bandwidth and pipe costs except that if you or your customers go over a certain limit specified by the host. The ony time you need to worry about these kinds of things is if you plan on having your own machines on your own premisis. The large hosting companies don't rent rack space or depend on a data center to provide coolant and engineers. They already own their own data centers and have their own engineers. The same people that would handle all you technical problems for you and your clients if you happens to be a reseller.

Note for Andrew: It pays to read through an entire post.

If you would like to start your own hosting compamy now and save on the cost and hassels Click Here to read about our reseller options. You will save a lot of time, money and headaches.

Andrew · 01-08-2003, 07:45 AM

After looking at your whois your name servers point to propagation.net, propagation.net is CI Host, so the comment about you having several data centres is somewhat of a farce - more likely you either rent a dedi, do colo or are a reseller of them.

It is also intresting how this image:
http://www.mywebteks.com/images/poweredby_mwt.gif

looks similar to this image:
http://web.archive.org/web/200110090...mages/h_61.gif

note to: MyWebTeks - I do read the posts, and go touched on aspects you didnt, and went into further depth - ta.

MyWebTeks · 01-08-2003, 09:17 AM

The images of MyWebTeks and ciHost look similar because ciHost is the parent company of MyWebTeks. MyWebTeks is a discount outlet for ciHost services and run by the same company. The details are not made public and are not released to any callers or inquiries.

As such, the statements we made are completely true. We have data centers in several locations around the US and England. This also does not change the details of what we wrote in our post. There are many aspects of being a host and not enough room on this board to go into detail about what each is or how to do it. We only touched lightly on a few of them due to time and space considerations as we noted before.

We still stand on what we said, if you want to save time and money, check out our resellers plan for further details.

Jim_Six · 11-18-2003, 10:51 PM

This forum certainly has an unusual view/post ratio ... - anyway ...

There are numerous companies that offer reseller plans - the trick as every one knows is finding one that offers the right mix of cost, tools and support.

Personally I would be looking at partnering with companies with better offering in terms of tools (eg control panels etc etc) and support. This way you can develop awareness of the (new) host as a company that has something reliable and worthwhile to offer. The alternative is trying to squeeze $$ out of clients while acting as a reseller. This (imho) result in a lower quality of service and will ultimately make your foundation for a move to a ded. server shakey. People are coming and giong as they find your service is not providing what they want, or is down half the time , or support queries are not actioned.

I would appreciate comments etc on this. Also I should plug my work - they offer reseller plans, which was my origanal reason for coming into this section ... http://www.m6.net

Regards,
Jim Smith
http://www.m6.net

compusolver · 10-18-2004, 09:31 AM

8-95.com has super reseller plans and they do a fantastic job of keeping those servers humming 24/7.

However, as with most reseller plans, they do not do hand-holding, so you might not like the support.

SmBizHosting.com specializes in reseller accounts for web designers/developers who don't reallly want to have to do a lot of support work and know a lot about servers - they just want a solid place to host their clients where their code will run solidly with full database support, features like automated backups, DNS control, etc.

While we are happy with 8-95.com, I've been in the business long enough to know that a solid server today may be tomorrow's worst hosting experience. That's why we keep a second server option in the wings ready to switch clients over to should anything ever go bad at 8-95.

So, for designers, developers and small businesses who want solid, business-class hosting without hassles and with fast personalized support (we're right here online and right by the phone nearly all the time and server techs are on duty 24/7) give us a try.