Article
About the Author
Nathan McKinlay
Nathan has extensive experience in both the traditional networking and
Web hosting industries, and worked extensively with Microsoft products before moving to Unix. He's worked on some of Australia's largest Web identities, and is still asked to consult on networking, internetworking, Web development and deployment. He also runs ResellerSpace.
Reseller Hosting Demystified
Web hosting can essentially be placed into three categories.
- Shared or virtual
- Reseller
- Dedicated
The most common is shared, where you have an account with a hosting company to whom you pay a monthly or yearly fee, in exchange for a pre-determined amount of space, bandwidth and a few extra's like PHP or ASP support (or both), and CGI etc. Often, each shared hosting account allows you to host one domain at a time, with a single control panel -- and that's pretty much it. Most of the time, that's all people require, and so the need for these types of hosting environments will always exist.
Often, when a host is first starting out, they won't have enough capital to afford their own server, and sometimes they don't have the time to commit to server maintenance as well as trying to market and grow their new Web venture. Websites need to be hosted on a server somewhere, but if the company offering the hosting services is in this situation, how can they offer competitive hosting packages without the increased expense of buying or renting their own server?
This is where reseller-style hosting comes into the picture.
What Is It?
Reseller hosting is where a Web host buys a bulk plan from the reseller hosting company, and then subdivides that plan into smaller pieces to on-sell or "resell" to individual users.
The reseller host provides large scale hosting packages where, for a fixed cost, substantial packages of space and bandwidth are made available, together with the ability to host bulk domain names. The individual Web host can then concentrate on providing packages and plans to attract customers, without having to own, manage and maintain their own server.
Who Operates the Server?
The sever is run by the reselling company, and all server issues are taken care of on behalf of the reseller's customer: the Web host. The Web host is generally free to claim the server as "theirs", although they rarely have full access to it. However, this doesn't mean they can't ask for things to be done to the server. For example, if a particular host needs a module installed to help run a script they have, they can request that it be installed -- most reseller hosts are more than happy to install these items for their clients.
So Why not Go Straight to the Reseller Host?
Most site owners' Web hosting needs are met through relatively small amounts of space and bandwidth. A reseller-style account involves a large amount of space and bandwidth, generally too much for a single site to ever use.
Additionally, prices are generally more expensive at the reseller host than at the shared host; after all, the on-seller subdivides these larger chunks into smaller lots suitable to the average site owner's needs.
What is Unbranded Reselling About?
When a reseller host says they offer unbranded reseller plans (sometimes referred to as 'private label' plans), it simply means they provide their Web hosting services to their customers in such a way that it appears they do not exist.
How this works is that the reseller host uses an ambiguous domain as the primary name for their servers -- they choose not to brand that domain with their own logo or name. This allows the smaller hosting on-seller to tell their clients that the server and associated domain name belong to them. This gives the impression that the on-seller is somewhat larger than it actually is, and that it owns and controls its own servers.
Who Uses Reseller Web Hosts?
Many Web hosting companies are in fact reselling the server space and bandwidth of another company. Using a reseller is an extremely effective way to break into the Web hosting industry, as it generally entails a reasonable monthly cost without the worries of server management, maintenance, and dealing with data centres. It's essentially a stepping stone for new and small Web hosts, initially allowing them to provide hosting services and then, when they've outgrown their reseller hosting, they can easily move on to their own semi-dedicated or dedicated server.
Reseller hosts are useful for the following type of people: