How much?

[James]

How much does the average reseller need in start up funding? How are the costs split up between, marketing, staffing, hardware, etc?

[Jaiem]

If you're reselling someone else's plans that cuts the costs.

At first you can do your own support. A killer but a cheaper option.

I'd say there's the cost of a merchant account, accounting software, office supplies/products (stationary, FAX etc), maybe an 800#, and of course the website for selling the services.

Overall, I'd guess you can get started for as little as $1,000 (USD) seed money. Maybe a little less.

[James]

Originally posted by Jaiem
If you're reselling someone else's plans that cuts the costs.
At first you can do your own support. A killer but a cheaper option.


What do you mean by killer option? Doesnt sound too up beat ;)

[JTY]

It works out, if you don't sleep......

[Jaiem]

Like the man said, if you're all by yourself then it's you doing the 24/7 support. Puts a real crimp on your social life too when you need to be available at a terminal 24/7. :)

[James]

Wouldnt the easier opton be to just offer email support? You could at least get some sleep that way.

I realsie this only works for the budget end of the market, but its a start.

[Technics]

Everyone knows the live 24 / 7 or 24 / 7 email support is a lie or at least they should do. How many hosts email you back within minutes of you sending in an email?

My first host WebNetics (now out of business) claimed they had 24 / 7 live everything. They had 11 staff at one point and it still took 2 weeks to answer an email with a client base of 1,000.

So how would a one man operation be able to provide this support? I know when i setup as a host i wont be claiming this but will state if you do not get a reply within 48 hours monday through sa****ay you get a months free hosting or some kind of compensation for waiting so long.

As for funding all would be needed is to cover your account so your site is up all the time. Use a free credit card processor like instabill until you can afford a merchant account. Hardware well thats not really an issue as a reseller. You just find yourself a good reliable host to resell for and let them deal with hardware.

Marketing - Best way for a start up is get a domain that is catchy. One that could be typed in by mistake. Get listed with all the webhost directory's. Wouldnt spend anything on advertising until the company was bringing in a stable amount of money.

[Jaiem]

Originally posted by Technics
Everyone knows the live 24 / 7 or 24 / 7 email support is a lie or at least they should do. How many hosts email you back within minutes of you sending in an email?

We do have very rapid response time to emails (pardon the horn tooting). Obviously response at 6am on a Sunday won't be as quick as 3pm on a Tuesday. But response times of 20-30 minutes is very common.

NTL, a response to a technical inquiry (as opposed to a sales inquiry) should be no more than 1-2 hours just about any time of day/night. How the host sets that up is thier concern.

The bigger issue is keeping the customers happy. Many more hosts are using 800# so that may need to be an option just to remain competitive. OTOH, an irrate customer or one who calls every couple of minutes can be "trying" too.

And even with telephone support, that doesn't mean the person at the other end can really help them. My old ISP had 24/7 telephone support. And they did answer. But other than a simple browser or email configuration question (i.e. if you had a real technical problem with your account) it took until the next day at least before anything was done about it. The people on the night shift just didn't have the ability and/or authority to take action.

The point is - a host that offers 24/7 800# support should have techs who know what they are doing and can make changes on the spot, not just take problem tickets for the day shift. Otherwise it's just a marketing gimmic. And that's a cost unless you do it all yourself.

[Mr Chunder]

Just interested to know but how much effort is involved on average per customer. If you had a $5/month customer, how much effort is required to service that customer ? Surely, it is all done through control panels etc. or is it too much for people at that end of the market ?

:confused:

[CharlieS]

RevenueHost.com does offer a branded email tech support option for its resellers for a low fee. There are people staffed at this position 24-7.

[James]

I havent heard of Revenuehost.com, I checked out our database and nothing is listed.

How long have they been in business? Their prices appear to be at the top end of reseller pricing.

[akashik]

Originally posted by Mr Chunder
Just interested to know but how much effort is involved on average per customer. :confused:

The answer is a piece of string. :)

Some customer's need more support than others - for various reasons. We haven't found much difference across the range of plans we have. A very good tip is to make sure that if they do have a problem, you not only fix it, but *explain* how it happened, and what was done to fix it. If a customer learns from the incident it reduces the chances of it happening again, reducing future support needs.

In most cases it's just a matter of them not knowing how to do something within their account. An explanation of how to do, then a link to the relevant support documentation, and it's all good. (Just because you stock online documentation doesn't mean anyone ever reads it :D )

Control panels help a great deal of course. People understand 'Point and Click' pretty easily and at the end of the day it's about the most a lot of people require. Most of our clients are online businesses from online stores to brochure sites and don't need much more than that. The few that do need more get a detailed reply and that usually ends the problem...

One line answers to support requests will usually just generate even more e-mail from them, so it's in a host's interest to get it right first, and fast

Greg Moore

[Jaiem]

Ditto.

Many customer need little support, but a few are always contacting for support. And some want you to do things for them, like setup email or shopping carts or merchant accounts or even legal advice! At least some leads ask you in advance if you do these things. But others just sign up and assume you do it all for the $15 or whatever per month. Yea, right. That's like expecting the phone company to program your speed dial and take your messages.

There's a saying "5% of customers use 90% of the support."

[akashik]

hehe,

we have a few asking for website design advice at times (which is pretty obviously not covered by 'hosting' as such). But you do what you have to make them happy. At times you may go out of your way willingly, other feels you're being pushed out of your way with something unreasonable. As long as both parties know where the lines are drawn there's rarely much of a misunderstanding.

I agree too - there is usually a small percent that make up a large percent of the work. It doesn't make them bad customers though - personally I prefer to hear from them than have those 'silent clients' that sign up and never say a word. Having been in webdesign for quite a few words I've come to expect a lot of chatter with clients. You'll never get a site done if there isn't. Hosting is a bit of a different mindset :)

Greg Moore

[toneatlas]

When we advertise 24x7 we mean it!!
E.mail response will depend on technician work load.
I encourage our customers to call our toll free call center available
24x7. It's alot easier to get something solved over the phone
than through email.

[akashik]

And a lot easier to use 'outsourced' tech support too.... You might want to consider getting your own nameservers - your 'support' is showing, and they're not too well recommended.

Greg Moore

[toneatlas]

I have NOTHING to hide.
I get customers by providing good service to them.

but hey weren't you the one who said in that confession
that you lied to a customer saying you will give them
2 months free and something else. And you DIDNT

Actually YOUR showing

[toneatlas]

Oh I just remembered your a moderator.
So I guess you removed your post right.

[akashik]

actually no it wasn't me at all sorry...

As you appear to be quite testy and ready to throw stuff like that around...

.. You nameservers say CIHost. CIHost's reseller plan offers invisible toll free 24 hour support to it's resellers. The vast majority of people that have had to deal with their support lines have complained of no-one picking up the phone, incorrect, uncaring support and what have you.

So.. you're either the owner of those nameservers :rolleyes: using their free tech support number offer, or paying for your own toll free line when you don't need to.

Feel free to let me know how wrong I am..

Greg Moore
www.akashik.net

[toneatlas]

Actually the support is fine. I've had no problems with it.
I jus called and I held for four minutes. Maybe you can get some support from me.

Why is it when I come to these forums I always get a jerk
like you opening up their mouths??
Trying to make me look bad?

Do you think I care that your mad because cihost has more business than you?

Keep your comments for someone who cares ok?!

cihost!!

[akashik]

So what you mean to say is:

"We used outsourced tech support and monitor it closely. To date we've found it to be to our standards, with minimal waiting times. While some may be critcal of the service this has not been our experience"

See how much better it looks with a civil tongue in your head?

To address the CIHost customer level issue... mad? no A little envious maybe that they have such a large client base. I think we'd all love to have that sort of client level, or at the very least maintain the advertising budget they can. I'm quite sure Howard Stern wouldn't the amount I could pay him for airtime. (I still think that was a great ad idea too - the chat about the deal has always been even bigger than what Mr Stern has ever said about them himself). Very smart move of their part.

As for my comments, fair enough. That's the last I'll say on the matter.

Greg Moore

[toneatlas]

Say what you what I can still offer:

Shared Unix and NT hosting

Dedicated Unix and NT Hosting fully customized packages

choose from dual pIII566 through quad xeon 900mhz

up to 2gig ram any amount of cache

1 through 5 hard drives at 36gigs.

My dedicated servers come with a direct managed rep.
so instead of 4 minutes of waiting for support it might be 2.

So if you need a hookup greg drop me a line.
for that package you charge $60 I charge $20
with a better uptime guarantee i think.

Instant Setup no bull. Instant IP#:sleep: