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Reseller Web Hosting – Pros and Cons

Reseller web hosting is not for everyone but it is becoming more and more popular in the hosting and web design industry. Many web developers, marketers and web designers purchase reseller web hosting since it is a great way of offering their clients a complete package and making extra money. Reseller web hosting comes with both pros and cons - here are five points representing both sides.

The Pros

• The first, and probably most obvious, advantage with reseller web hosting is that it can be very profitable. The hosting itself is not expensive and when offering it with something extra, like web designing services, you will be able to sell it at a much higher price.
• If you want, you could stick your name or logo to everything you create, also called white labeling. Remember though that doing this can damage your credibility if done poorly. Running a branded hosting with flare and passion will successfully increase the strength of your brand.
• High costs, such as server maintenance, will still be the headache of the web host. All of the really technical issues will remain the job of the web host and they will not charge you anything extra for this. Customer support however, can either be the responsibility of you or the hosting provider – all depending on the type of reseller hosting you are offering.
• You will have more flexibility than say a shared hosting plan because one hosting account can manage all of your clients.
• Themes and user-interface of the control panel with which your clients will work can be changed and tweaked by you. This will not only be appreciated by your clients, it will also make your professional work more enjoyable.

The Cons

• If you ever were to change web host then you will notice that it is not as easy to do as with other forms of hosting. This will not only be inconvenient for you – your clients will be affected by this.
• You will have to place trust in the hosting provider. If they are having problems with their servers then all of your clients will have problem with their websites.
• When you run out of your portion of disk space or bandwidth then it will not be possible to increase it immediately; which could lose you a client or two.
• As with all businesses that become popular, the reseller industry is competitive. Do not count on making thousands at the beginning.. First you have to deliver an excellent product and understand the business, then market the product well.
• Investigate everything from the uptime to the quality of the customer service; your reputation depends entirely on host’s reliability. Also remember that there will be a lot of sunken costs at the beginning. The hosting itself may not be pricey, but you have to set aside money for marketing and advertising.

All in all, this kind of business is not for everyone. If you are in business that completes this type of hosting, expanding your business along the hosting lines is perfect.

People who tell you they make thousands every month and do nothing, are pretty much lying. Keep that in mind. Yet in a tough economy, the internet is sitting in its own world. Startups and new ideas are successful everyday; good tidings for us then. If you have technical know-how and enjoy web hosting, then reseller hosting would be a great business opportunity. Good luck and if you start a reseller business, be sure to post it here at ScrappyUpstarts!

Guest Author - David Walsh, of WebHostingSearch.com

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Pay Per Click, simply explained.

A common small-biz rule of thumb is to set aside 10 percent of total expenses for advertising.

Are Scrappy Upstarts really doing this? How do you promote your product, get your company and its great services in the public eye without spending a ton of money?

Pay per click is a familiar and viable option, that you might not totally understand if you’re just starting out.

Pay per click lets you advertise your product or service online and only pay for what brings consumers to your business site. If you put a pay per click ad on the Web and no one clicks on that hyperlink to come to your site and buy your products, you don’t pay for that ad. If they do click, you do pay.

Google AdWords is probably the best known and largest volume pay per click advertising program. It’s also extremely easy to start and it gives you total control of your advertising campaign’s budget.

For its Starter Edition just decide what you are going to say in your AdWords ad (it’s all text), go to the Google site and sign up, write what you want to say in your ad and note the ceiling you will spend each month. Your ad will appear next to the search results of relevant keywords (that you note) when someone searches on Google. You only pay for those who see the ad and click on to your site. And you stop paying when you’ve reached your stated budget for the month.

These ads appear along the side of search related results they can also appear on sites that have agreed to show google ad words, often related to the ad’s content.

While pay per click cannot guarantee results – no advertising can do that – what it can do is guarantee that you won’t spend more than you can afford.

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Bootstrapping Your Business

Great article for Scrappy Upstarts about bootstrapping at YoungEntrepreneur.com

20 Ways To Bootstrap Your Business:

1. Start A Service

2. Figure Out What Makes The Most Money

3. Get Volunteer Help

4. Hire Part Time

5. Automate

6. Form Partnerships

7. Use Pay Per Click

8. Use Search Engine Optimization

9. Leverage The Media

10. Think Big, Start Small

11. Do Something Every Day For Your Business

12. Don’t Quit Your Day Job Until You Can Afford To

13. Turn Everyone Into A Referral Partner

14. Watch Your Payments

15. Start At Home

16. Share Your Office

17. Barter

18. Lease Don’t Buy

19. Hire Friends / Family

20. Create A Rainy Day Fund

YoungEntrepreneur.com

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Free SEO Tools

While full access to SEOmoz.org requires a monthly fee they offer quite a few free resources to help you understand the fundamentals of search optimization. Whether you work with a professional or go it alone - you may find something useful for your scrappy upstart.

SEOmoz free tools include:

• Linkscape - an inlink search engine
• Trifecta - which measures metrics to estimate the relative popularity and importance of Page, Blog or Domain (Page Strength).
• Term Target - which helps determine how targeted a particular page is for a specified keyword.
• SEOmoz Firefox Toolbar - Lets you add an SEOmoz tool to your toolbar.
• Term Extractor Tool -  analyzes the content of a given page and extracts the terms that appear to be targeted at search engines.
• Crawl Test - Helps diagnose search engine crawling issues on your website
• GeoTargeting Detection - Discover how well your website is targeted to country specific search engines.
• SEO Toolbox - A collection of FREE Tools that will give you quick answers and aid in daily SEO activities.
• Popular Searches- Aggregates and archives popular searches from various sources.

Their free guides skew to beginners and include:

• The Internet Marketing Handbook
• The Web Devloper’s SEO cheat sheet
• The Beginner’s Checklist for Small Business SEO (Local Search)
• The Beginner’s Checklist for Learning SEO
• The SEO Industry Survey Results

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Small Business Tax Tips

Good post over at InfusionSoft:

Featuring links to some useful “Last Minute Tax Tips” For Small Businesses.

For those of you running your small business from your home, Score.com recommends to:

• Use your home office exclusively for business. The IRS won’t let you take a deduction for your kitchen, just because you use the kitchen table as your desk. You must have a separate room or partitioned area that’s devoted to business use.
• List your home address as your principal place of business, even if part of your business, like a warehouse, is outside your home. Make sure you have a desk, filing cabinet and separate phone line for your business.
• Store your merchandise or supplies on your property — in a detached shed, spare closet or your garage — instead of renting a warehouse. You’ll save on rental costs and get a tax break for the space you use.

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Using SEO in Your Blog

Your small business blog needs to constantly be refined for maximum pull through. There are certain topics your blog can cover, and even certain keywords you can use to attract more people to your blog. The trick is in knowing which keywords to use and how to make the most of them. This process is commonly known on the internet as SEO, or Search Engine Marketing. It might sound complicated, but all you do is research keywords relevant to your industry, add them to your blog titles and topics, and the traffic will generate itself.

How do I know what words to use?

That’s the easy part. First, you have to think like a consumer. What would they search for? If you have a real estate business in the Atlanta area, for example, you would focus on what a person would look up if they wanted to find homes in Atlanta. If you can’t think of them on your own, there are keyword search sites where you can find the most popular phrases and keywords based on your subject. Using words like ‘Atlanta real estate’ or ‘Atlanta homes for sale’, for example, would be much more relevant to consumers than choosing phrases like ‘real estate for sale in Atlanta’ or ‘homes Atlanta for sale’, and so on.

Ok, I’ve got my keywords. Now what?

Now, you create a blog, or add to the one you have. Give it an SEO-friendly title, and make sure each post title is relevant, as well. Then, in your content, take the keywords you’ve found and use them 5-10 times, depending on the length of the blog. Just remember, with SEO, less is really more, so don’t overstuff it. That will actually have an adverse effect on your website, because it’s bad practice and frowned upon by search engines.

Having a blog is going to be a big part of your success in today’s online market. Making sure that blog is seen by optimizing it with SEO practices will only help to drive traffic to your website. Even in a slow economy, people are still buying, so you need to make sure you’re doing everything you can to get them to buy from you. One of those crucial elements is using SEO in your blog. For more information, the SEOBook offers detailed insight.

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Peter Schiff has a time machine.

I am convinced after watching this.

I love that he was yelled at for predicting EXACTLY what we are seeing.

Thanks to Brian Jones for originally posting this.

More importantly, see Peter talking about 2009 last month, he was still getting yelled at!

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Holiday Shopping Sales Fell 3%

According to comScore - holiday e-commerce was down 3% year-over-year - spending totaled $25.54 billion, from $26.33 billion during a similar period last year.

First time since 2001 when they started tracking this.

Some winners: HP site visitors jumped 28%; Amazon’s traffic increased 7%.

Ebay was the most visited site but was 4% down from last year.

No surprise Circuitcity.com visits were down 21%, and Dell dropped 17%

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“The Great Disruption”

The Great Disruption. Is this how we will be referring to our current economic times?

Scott Anthony poses that question at Harvard Business Publishing.

He goes on to discuss how to Thrive in the Great Disruption stating it requires a particular breed of innovator.

Specifically, innovators should look to master three disciplines:

1. Placing a premium on progress.
2. Mastering paradox.
3. Learning to love the low end

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I only care about doing.

I don’t care about Steve Jobs or Michael Dell.

There I said it. I don’t even care about the guy who just secured $9 million in venture funding. I don’t care about Tim O’Reily waxing philosphical about online serendipity. I don’t care that TechCrunch says Google and Adobe are great places to work.

I care about the guys (and women) in the long tail of it all. Not making a million bucks, but making it. Cashing a $2,000 adsense check? Good for you! How? Getting by on 8 new customers a month? Great! How? Figured out how to make a living without going into an office? Fantastic! How? Moved your brick-and-mortar successfully online? Awesome! How?

Look there is a tremendous amount to learn from the analogs of Steve and Mike and the rest - no question - I’ll watch, I’ll read - but for the love of God, stop letting internet media stay at the 30,000 foot level - You want to succeed? DIG DEEPER!

Philosophical diatribes won’t help you succeed in the trenches. Vague predictions about “new media” or “social marketing” aren’t going to put food on the table.

Tactics, execution, dedication - How are you doing it? Be specific! Speak up!

[Author's note: No one is going to respond to me. I know it. Either no one is listening (possible, this site is only a month old), no one cares - that too, then you might as well go back to solitaire, or no one has any idea how to really do it...Then tell me that.]

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No Budget Advertising

Oh no! You’ve invested all your cash getting your business started but you failed to set aside a budget for advertising. You could have a cure for the common cold and still die broke if people don’t know you have it. Fortunately there are still ways to get your business off the ground. The key is you have to start today, and you have to continue everyday.  

Oh, I can hear you now. What could I possibly do with a budget as low as $10? Well I’ll tell you just to give you a few ideas. Of course like I said above you will have many more options once your account grows but for now let’s assume its your first month in business and that is literally all you have $10, period. So you work with what you have. Sit down with paper and pen and start thinking. Make a list of any ideas you can come up with to spend those bucks to get you even one or two new customers this month. As I write this I am doing that right now to come up with a few ideas for you. How about… Getting as many flyers as you can copied advertising a sale of some kind. Then you could distribute them on weekends at car shows or even on car windows at flea markets and places like that.

How about having a bunch of simple business cards printed up. Instead of just your name or phone number, they can offer a new buyer discount. If you have the equipment you can even print them yourself. Then just leave those cards everywhere you go. On counters when you stop for coffee. In phone booths, all over in nightclubs, in men’s rooms and any place else you happen to be in your marketing area. Get the idea? Getting any other ideas now?

As your budget grows so will your options for advertising. You will also find that now salespeople will be calling on you because they saw your ad or promotion somewhere. You’ll be getting offers to advertise and most of these will be fairly expensive. Here’s an easy way to remember what to do: forget em! When you’re just starting out investing a large sum of money in a single place is just not the smart way to do things. Right now you should be placing smaller bits of advertising in as many places as possible. The objective here is to find out what mediums work best for you. As results come in you then invest more in the most productive ones. By working in this fashion you are always building from a position of strength and knowledge. That is always more desirable than experimenting.

Do it and watch your business grow every day. Anyone else have any “no budget” ideas?

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What Obama needs to do to create momentum

From a recent post at discussionleader.com: Memo to President-Elect Obama: 7 Moves to Create Momentum

Michael Watkins writes an open memo to President-elect Obama.

He begins by citing the “contrast effect” , which basically says we distort our perceptions of something’s performance based on immediate previous exposure, in other words, Obama may have an easier time changing things since things are so desperately in need of change.

Michael also cites 7 principles Obama, as a strong leader, should put into action after assuming the Presidency:

1. Organize to accelerate learning.
2. Establish your A-item priorities.
3. Define a compelling vision.
4. Get your new team in place fast.
5. Secure early wins, in the right ways.
6. Build a ruling coalition anchored in the “middle third.”
7. Leverage a balanced advice-and-counsel network.

To Obama: Your transition has to be the best the nation has ever seen.

Michael Watkins, is the same guy who wrote: “First 90 Days: Critical Success Strategies for New Leaders at All Levels”.

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Will the economic downturn drive an increase in online sales?

I started writing this thinking, “yeah, sure - uplifting news to follow. Not so much - looking at the November 2008 Monthly Retail Sales Comparison, I expected to see a clear uptick. I then headed over to emarketer.com and I was greeted with “2008 was not a good year for e-commerce.”

Granted we are looking at a 10% increase over 2007, but overall we are looking at a growth rate decline of about 20%.

I mean, all the earmarks are there for an upturn. At no time in history have consumers had more access to more choices in terms of product and price.

With e-commerce sites becoming easier and easier to search, browse and checkout one would expect to see that upturn in online sales.

The unfortunate news is, it has not happened. In 2007 we saw a 20% increase over 2006. This year we are seeing just a 10% increase over 2007. And we know the stakes are high for many of these retailers who are teetering on bankruptcy.

Happy New Year?

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SEM in a down economy webinar

The people over at ‘Target Marketing‘ magazine are hosting a webinar entitled 18 Ways to boost your SEM Performance in a down economy. Its January 13 at 2pm EST.

They plan to cover:

• How to increase your ROI even as CPC costs continue to clim
• How to beat your competitors‚ keyword rankings with lower PPC bids
• How to increase your campaign’s conversion rate
• How to save money on testing by utilizing past data

You’ll be able to submit questions directly to their speakers for a live Q&A session during the hour.

Click here to register.

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5 tips for effective blog optimization

Lee Odden over at TopRankBlog has a great new article outlining 5 tips for successful business blog optimization.

After writing the Virtual Ad Agency blog for just a little over a month - I have to agree with this point wholeheartedly:

Without proper planning, oversight and passion for the topic, blogs implemented purely for SEO objectives are doomed to fail. Additionally, social media referrals and recommendations are becoming a notable competitor to search traffic which can place SEO as a secondary promotional effort in some situations.

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