We are starting a new hosting "group".
After several years of doing internet hosting and development. One thing has occurred to me.
That the reseller business really demands a lot of support hours.
If you take a look at the number of support hours you spend on email and the phone providing support, then "apply" a typical hourly rate.
You really don't make much money-- realistically. Meaning that you put in a tonne of hours you don't get paid for.
Being that the amount of support you provide, in addition to all your marketing efforts, really adds up.

So I came up with an idea. If we all banded together and moved all the accounts under one company.
Then a dedicated support staff could handle all the support for you.
In return you would move all your clients on to the new servers.
You would no longer have to provide support, process transactions, do the accounting, do the client sign-ups, DNS, and domain set-ups.

You would simply maintain the marketing that you currently do online.
We could work out a deal where you receive 30% of the hosting fee every month.
We did some numbers and realized that most resellers (once they calculate in their own hourly rate) really do NOT make 30% of the hosting.
Being that your time is worth money and most hosts don't account for that when they offer reseller deals.
So they benefit from the hours of work you do in exchange for a small percentage.

What I was thinking is that if you receive 30% for every client you move over to the new servers--you will receive 30% every month as well as 30% for each new customer you gain.

That way you get 30% of the hosting fee then pays you for your marketing services only! The support will be taken care of on our end?

Let me know your thoughts,
I think its the only way we can all start making some true value on our time.

Robert Gaudette
bobgaudette@rogers.com