For those who go about it the right way, now is an excellent time to build a successful web hosting reseller business. However, those who consider the web hosting reseller business to be a “get rich quick” scheme that requires little or no effort to establish and run are likely to be very disappointed.
Some people think that the only energy required to profit from the a web hosting reseller business is the effort they will expend counting all of their money as it rolls in freely each month. This is a myth. Keep in mind that stories about get rich schemes that occur with little are no effort really are too good to be true. There is not such thing as an effort-free way to make money.
Building any type of successful business requires dedication, a great deal of hard work, and a long-tem commitment to investing the time and capital necessary to begin to see a sound return on your investment. There is, however, great potential for financial reward for those who go about setting up, marketing, and running their web hosting reseller business in the proper manner.
Myth: All You Do is Click a Few Buttons
Those who own web hosting reseller businesses will need to be skilled with using the control panel management functionality that their service provider has. One of the most popular control panels for web hosting is cPanel. The cPanel system’s Web Host Manager has a graphical user interface (GUI) and isn’t extraordinarily difficult to operate.
As a web hosting reseller, you are going to have to have sufficient technical skill to effectively work with the cPanel Web Host Manager. As a web hosting reseller, you are likely to be responsible for handle a variety of site administration tasks for your clients through cPanel’s Web Host Manager. You will need to have an understanding of the numerous website administration functions that can be performed through the cPanel Web Host Manager. You can’t just randomly click buttons in the control panel without knowing the potential impact your actions might have on your clients’ business critical websites.
Additionally, it is highly likely that there may be times that your web hosting reseller clients need assistance with their sites that goes beyond the realm of what the cPanel Web Host Manager can accommodate. It is important to keep in mind that control panels are only a tool to help with the most common tasks.
To be a successful web host reseller that provides adequate customer service, you need to know more web sit hosting that just how to click the appropriate buttons in cPanel Web Host Manager. You are also going to need skills in with both Linux and Windows operating systems in order to configure and secure your system, as well as to troubleshoot the issues that are sure to arise.
Myth: You Don’t Need to Know the Hardware
There is more to being able to run a successful web hosting company than buying hardware space and putting other people’s websites on the space. Even though you are a reseller for hardware that is owned by your web hosting provider, you need to be knowledgeable about they types of hardware in use and its limitations and capabilities.
When you are working with current and prospective clients, you have to keep the capabilities and limitations of the equipment on which you own space. Just because you can get the site to fit within the space you have does not mean that the space you have is sufficient for the site to operate as intended.
Web hosting is about more than just space. In addition to knowing how much space the site will physically occupy, you must also be knowledgeable about the site’s bandwidth requirements. You have to allocate sufficient bandwidth to allow for the websites expected traffic, as well as processing activities at all times.
If a customer’s site fits on your web host, but runs poorly due to a lack of sufficient bandwidth, you are going to have a very dissatisfied customer on your hands.. As a web hosting reseller, you have to be knowledgeable about bandwidth in order to provide quality web hosting services to your customers.
The Challenge of Competition
Of course, there are still many Internet speculators who look at web hosting businesses as an opportunity to make a fortune with no effort. Such companies are not likely to provide good service, but still get customers by offering rates that are cheaper than those provided by reputable hosting companies. Competitors who are disreputable, as well as those that simply lack the skill and knowledge needed to provide effective web hosting reseller services, give others in the industry a bad name.
Unfortunately, as long as gaining entry to the field of web hosting is fairly inexpensive and easy to do, there are always going to be less knowledgeable entrepreneurs entering the market. They may undercut your price, but their customers won’t be satisfied. Hold steadfast in providing outstanding and knowledgeable service to your customers, and remember that the true test of business success is long-term satisfied customers who see you as an expert in the field of web hosting. As your customer’s colleagues quickly learn that the cheapest hosting solutions aren’t always the best ones, your customers will likely to refer their dissatisfied colleagues to you, and your business will grow exponentially.
I started buying and selling domain names in 1995. Domain speculation began sometime in 1994. I did appraisals and was one of the biggest advocates for registering generic domain names rather than made-up names or those that violated trademarks.
I made a good income from my domains because I did not just sell domain names, I sold domain names that had a business plan and a website while others were just trying to sell their domain names with no traffic, no business plan and no website.
Today many are still doing it that way. Although now they park them at SEDO or Go Daddy or somewhere to try to make adsense revenue while they list them for sale. So my background in domain names is good enough that I can dispel a few myths.
First TLD stands for Top Level Domain. .COM, .NET, .ORG are all examples of TLDs. The domain name most people refer to is what goes before the dot. The TLD is what comes after the dot.These are some Common Myths about Domain Names;.TV is for television or multimedia websites. Pure myth. Any domain name in any TLD can work for television, video, or multimedia. The TLD .TV does not give you any special tools for creating multimedia-rich content. .TV does not stand for television. It is the ccTLD or country-code TLD for Tuvalu Island. An island in the pacific that had no real use for owning a TLD so they sold the rights to sell domain names on their TLD to a company that leads people to believe it stands for television. It works. People buy them and use them and associate them with television and that is ok. It’s just a myth that .TV was created to mean television.Another Domain Name Myth: If you want to build websites that people can access by their cell phone or PDA you need to get a .MOBI domain name. Just like dot tv does not give you any special capability for television or multimedia, dot mobi does not give you any special tools for mobile-capable websites. Any website on any TLD can provide content to cell phones and PDAs if it is made compatible for them. Many will lead you to believe that dot mobi somehow gives you the advantage when it comes to cell phones and PDAs. it doesn’t..ME Domain Names Myth: Coming soon to a domain registrar near you. Soon domain names will be marketing for the TLD dot ME. They will market them as great domain names for personal websites. They may be. But it was not created as such. It is the Country-code top-level domain designated for Montenegro..PN Domain Names: I own Blogs.pn. I would love to tell you it stands for Publisher network or something like that but it doesn’t. It is the Country-code top-level domain designated for Pitcairn Island. Another pacific island that did not have much use for a TLD so someone was authorized to sell dot pn domain names.
Soon ICANN will be allowing more TLDs to be created and domain names will be marketed in these new TLDs. More and more countries will also offer domain names for sale in their ccTLDs. So the market will be opening up and it may be confusing to some. The truth is what comes before the dot matters most. Getting a domain name in a TLD that makes sense to users can help you though.Shorter Domain Names are better than Long Domain Names Myth: Only in certain circumstances is a shorter domain name better than a long domain name. Many domain gurus disagree. I don’t care. They talk about people being able to remember your domain name. Truthfully more traffic comes from people clicking links in search engines, on other websites, and on social bookmarking sites than comes from people who type in the domain name.
What is more important is that the domain name help you capture a phrase you want to target in the search engines. I can give you a ton of examples where having the exact phrase you want in the domain name has helped get a top position in Google and other search engines. So if the phrase is longer, do not abbreviate it just because you heard shorter domain names are better. Get the phrase you want to target.
If you are planning to advertise your domain name OFFLINE, in advertising on TV, radio, or even magazines and newspapers, shorter domain names ARE better. Offline, people have to be able to remember your domain name.The best of both worlds: If most of your traffic comes from the web, shorter means very little. To cover both, get a domain name that matches your key phrase and put your website on that domain name. Then get a second domain name that is short and catchy and redirect or point it to the same website. Use the shorter-easy-to-remember domain name for your offline marketing and the domain that matches your key phrase for the search engines.Anything other than a dot COM is worthless Myth: This is a favorite myth spread everywhere. It is based on the same myths about shorter domain names. If people have to remember it, then yes, they do remember dot com more often. If you are doing offline marketing, use a dot com.
Online your website can be on any TLD. People are clicking links. So again, get the domain name that matches your key phrase for your website whether it is on .com, net, org, tv, pn, cc, ws, or whatever. Start with dot com, try your phrase. If it is taken, move to the next TLD and try your phrase again. If it is taken, repeat your attempts to register until you find a TLD that your phrase IS available in and register it in that TLD.These are some Myths about Trademarks and Domain Names;Domain Name VS Trademark Myth #1: If I own a trademark I need to register my trademarked name in every TLD. Pure Myth and a worthless, time-consuming strategy promoted by Intellectual Property Lawyers who need to justify what you are paying them.Domain Name VS Trademark Myth #2: When you register a trademark, you have to choose a classification for that trademark such as “entertainment television”, “clothing and apparel”, “beverages”, etc.
You do not own the phrase you trademark. You are being allowed to use that trademark in commerce within the classification you chose. Someone else can register the same exact trademark and choose a different classification.
In addition to that, the geographical area you registered your mark in only covers that area. Someone could have the same trademark in the same classification in a different geographical location.
So again, you do not own the phrase you trademarked, so no need to register every TLD in existence. It could even be construed as anti-competitive business practice to do so.Domain Name VS Trademark Myth #3: If you chose the trademark, “goofball lawyer stuff” and chose the classification “clothing and apparel”, I could still register the domain name http://goofballlawyerstuff.com or net or org or whatever.
As long as I do not sell clothing or apparel, link to anyone who sells clothing and apparel, or try to confuse people into believing my website is owned by you, I have not violated your trademark rights. Get over it.
I hope this helps you dispel a few of the most common domain name and trademark myths you may have been reading about.
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