Schewanick Computer Services

What is Reseller Web Hosting?

Reseller web hosting gives a company an opportunity to purchase large amounts of web space with the intention of packaging it for resale purposes. These web hosting plans, help the "reseller" to be a middle-man by allowing him/her to create and brand an image, find customers, and finally, host them on the servers owned by the hosting company.

This business allows the reseller of web hosting to strategically investigate market demands and creatively answer via competitive pricing and package content. Lastly, it is mutually beneficial to the web host, as their servers remain full and profitable.

=| Advantages: |==

Besides the entrepreneurial aspects of being able to create a brand and have another company actually provide the web hosting service, reseller hosting has some interesting advantages and features including:

* Resellers possess the opportunity to offer other services, to be used in conjunction with web hosting accounts. These include merchant accounts, SSL Certificates, search engine optimization, and domain name registration, which all may provide additional income for the reseller. * Resellers can avoid the expenses involved in maintaining their own in-house web servers, mail servers, DNS servers, backup generators and other network hardware and connections required to host Internet web sites * Resellers are able to respond to increasing numbers of businesses and individuals that are migrating to the web. A rich target demographic exists. * Resellers can purchase packages based on his/her sales forecasts for their use of hard disk space, allowance of data transfer, and a variety of other add-on options. * Web hosting resellers can pursue scalability, where purchases from the web host will directly correlate to growth of one's business. * Web hosting resellers can enjoy high profits compared to initial investments. * Resellers are offered nice multi-level graphical user interfaces that can automate the processes of managing domains and customers, which makes the profession of reseller web hosting more enjoyable.

=| DisAdvantages: |==

Clearly, the benefits and advantages of reseller web hosting outweigh the disadvantages. However, the major premise of establishing a business model surrounding another vendor's services may at times be a daunting task.

For example, proper research must be done while selecting a reseller web hosting provider, especially if your brand and total business responsibility depend on a 99.99% uptime. True investigation should be done to ensure that the reseller web hosting company will be in business and will provide the level of service that has been promised to a reseller's customer.

Furthermore, reseller features such as hard disk space and data transfer allowance will need to be monitored so that if these metrics are exceeded, one can easily upgrade plans rather than be hit with hefty "ala carte" expenses associated with overage penalties.

=| Benefits: |==

Reseller web hosting allows the major benefit of revenue stream generation for the companies who don't have the time, money, or resources to maintain their own servers and data centers. Furthermore, it is a great business opportunity for those who want to create a stand-alone business venture, or for those with other parallel businesses who can take advantage of the chance to sell hosting with their services.

What is the best application of a reseller web hosting service provider?

The major benefit of reseller hosting plans is that the reseller is allowed to purchase web space for a reduced cost. At that time, the reseller can sell the web hosting plan and/or use some of the space for his/her own projects.

The best application and intentions are revenue-based and several schemes exist for this:

1. The reseller can create his or her own brand, market it, and successfully sell and support the web hosting plans. Then the customer can contact the reseller for support. 2. The reseller can just act as an affiliate or an agent for the web hosting company. In this way, the reseller is minimizing liability of service provision, but still reaps benefits of revenue once customers purchase. Customers would contact the original web host for support and future plan modifications. 3. The reseller can be "hired" on as a proxy employee. In this model, the reseller can create accounts as an "employee" of the original web host.

=| How to decide: |== Generally, just as one would decide on any other web hosting plan, there are some main concerns that exist. Possible resellers should always investigate concerns such as:

1. Having a large enough site and the ability to market through various channels to justify the initial costs involved with the reseller packages. 2. The cost, as compared to other web space vendors with similar plans and packages. 3. Security of Data and equipment of the company that the reseller purchases with. 4. High enough bandwidth for the number of sites and the types of sites the reseller will support. 5. The level of knowledge and integrity of the web hosting provider 6. The service level agreements for technical support and hardware repairs from the web hosting provider 7. The speed of the page downloads and uptime of the company's web pages.

Furthermore, because one is putting their name on the brand, it is imperative to further investigate hardware. Some of the factors to consider are:

Brand: Brand names of hardware convey reputations for reliability and known support for hardware failures.

CPU's:The speed of the CPU's in the servers will directly correlate with the load speeds of customer websites.

Memory:The reseller web host should allow one to know that the very important commodity of memory will be readily available, as an increased number of sites running various types of code and scripts may prove to be resource and memory intensive.

Mirrored Drives:To offer backups to potential customers, it is good to further investigate backup options. To ensure data redundancy, most hosts can offer drive mirroring, which will keep a synchronized copy of all data for easy backups.

Features specific to reseller hosting can be numerous also. Generally, it is advantageous to look for a reseller plan that offers nice plans with value-driven offerings in disk space, bandwidth, and 24x7 support. One can also look for plans that offer free account setups with no contracts.

Other reseller specific perks to look for include:

Hosting ability:UNLIMITED site hosting will allow one to package their web space any way that they choose for resale purposes.

Private name servers :further reinforces branding and makes you look like a stand-alone network.

Administration software:This software allows the reseller to divide the web space into packages. On the end-user side, it also gives them administration rights to their website.

The benefits of reseller web hosting seem to far outweigh the disadvantages. With proper business planning, reseller web hosting seems to be a great addition to a company's products.
About the Author
Rodel Garcia is a freelance programmer and web developer. Owner and webmaster of http://web-hosting-service-directory.com/web-hosting-reseller-program.html