A web hosting provider is someone who runs a web hosting company and takes risks in an attempt to make a profit.
While web hosting is a profitable business, keep making new clients in this dynamic industry to survive for longer and achieve a milestone is not an easy task.
The hosting industry is big and you can get a few clients in initial days but the journey of success is full of challenges, distraction, and lessons to be learned along the way. Here are 10 common mistakes I have observed over years the web hosting providers commit.
1. Giving Up Too Early
Many of us work hard to start a web hosting company with an expectation of outcome, and when we don’t meet our expectations after consistent efforts over certain period of time we just give up. Sometimes, our greatest success is just around the corner and we just need to patiently keep doing what we were doing.
Find out the real reason for giving up too early. Is it a lack of progress or fear of failure? Or you no longer feel as motivated as you did in the beginning. In that case you should focus on progress and remind yourself of your “why” and purpose of starting the company.
Trust yourself and introspect before arriving at your final decision. Be patient and give yourself another chance based on your observations and introspective findings.
2. Landing Page Without Clear Call To Action
A landing page without clear call-to-action(CTA) is like a road leading to nowhere. It leaves the visitors wandering what to do next, resulting in loss of business opportunities.
The landing page of your website must be prominent and visible. It should lead the visitor’s eye up to Get started, Sign up, or Buy now button.
Without a clear CTA, your landing page may fail to convert visitors into customers and reduce your progress rate
Keep away the distracting content and links away from your landing page. Use clear and action oriented language like “Buy Hosting” or “Get Started” at certain monthly/yearly price.
See How My Videos Can Get More Clients
for Your Web Hosting Company.
YouTube Marketing: 100s of ‘How-to’ videos on your channel.
Branding: Each video display your brand logo/website link.
Niche Targeting: Our videos are related to web hosting that users are looking for on YouTube for help.
Strengthens Support: Our videos are integrated with your Knowledgebase website that can be used by your clients and support team in email to customers.
3. Unbalanced Niching
Web hosting world is full of countless websites requiring different hosting packages with different storage capacity, bandwidth, RAM, server location, etc. Isn’t it?
Very broad targeting, such as tackling the entire web hosting sector, is an impractical endeavor for smaller hosting providers.
It is challenging to stand out with limited resources against industry giants. You will face lot’s of competition in every aspect of web hosting business.
On the contrary, niching down too much may mean providing shared hosting with only 1 or 2 GB RAM packages.
Sure, there are numerous variations of shared web hosting, but imagine dedication an entire company’s website to shared hosting. And what about the customers who want to scale up with growth in their own business.
You will not be able to retain old customers who plan to switch to VPS hosting or further dedicated hosting. And this barrier will also hinder new customer who think of scaling up with time.
This type of approach is unlikely to be effective as a long term strategy. You need to strike a balance in niching and then focus on requirements of customers of that niche.
For example, If you want to cater new businesses planing to come online, then you should design packages and content dedicated to them. The package can include a free website builder, option of scaling up and down, etc.
4. Lack Of Focus In Marketing
Trying to appeal to too broad an audience by using multiple channels of marketing without prioritizing goals and objectives can lead to lack of focus in marketing.
You need to pick two to three channels of marketing at a time and remain consistent about messaging on these channels. Make a scheduled of posting your content on these channels at a regular interval.
Analyze the outcomes and assign your efforts to each marketing channel according to the outcomes. Channels with higher output should be given higher priority.
Creating content with a clear purpose of reaching web hosting clients on a particular channel can drive results for your hosting business.
You do not need to create the content yourself if you get distracted from the main task during the creation process.. It would be better to hire content creators from within the industry to produce quality content targeting potential buyers of your web hosting related products.
5. Running the Show Solo
Some of the web hosting providers are lone wolf taking care all the aspects of the business. Over time, they develop ‘no one else can do it better than me’ attitude.
Sometimes they become technical support and sometimes content creators. They fail to understand that they will have to acquire the role of managing people responsible for execution over time.
Most businesses are started by a single person but those who are successful in delegating are more likely to become brands.
Professionals like content creators spend years honing their skills through knowledge and experience. So they are able to create content that audiences search for on the Internet.
6. Not Embracing the Changes of the Web Hosting Industry
Failing to adopt new trends in the web world can make your company obsolete. Ignoring changes in the industry can result in the loss of old customers and reduced new sales, resulting in total revenue loss.
Ask yourself, what are the big changes hosting industry have gone through in last one to three years and how you have responded to those changes.
Make a list of the changes that you have observed through out the year and think how to respond them. I can help you start with some of the big changes.
Some of the Big changes Web hosting Industry saw over last 5 years.
- Skyrocketing prices of all applications used by your hosting company like control panels, billing software, server costs.
- Changes in Google’s policies and fall of views on web hosting forums.
- Rise of YouTube as the second largest search engine after being acquired by Google.
- Entry of giants like Google and WordPress in web hosting industry.
These are some of the major changes that have affected almost everyone in the web hosting industry, from users to service providers.
Rising prices has affected hosting providers with limited money and rise of YouTube increased the demand of Videos related to web hosting.
Our DemoTiger team keep working on creating partially completed web hosting related video series and use web hosting company’s brand logo/intro and website link and produce the branded videos for them.
These videos are hosted on your YouTube channel of web hosting company’s that bring views for YouTube channel of web hosting companies
7. Want Fast and Easy Results
One more common mistake some web hosting providers make while promoting their product is expecting their efforts to pay off quickly.
Everyone loves fast and easy results, but they may have to abandon their marketing strategy if the results don’t meet their expectations.
Instead look in to the quality of efforts if it requires improvement. Make the desired changes and wait for the result to meet your expectation rather being impatient.
8. Too Much Emphasis on Logo Design and Color
Some of the web hosting providers put extra effort and time in designing their company’s logo at very initial days of their business.
See, I know that logo is the face of a brand and it’s quality matters to your business. But accept it you are not a brand. You are in a process of becoming a brand. And with your company’s growth your logo should also improve over the time.
In the early days of starting your company, you should focus your energy and resources on improving your hosting packages, support system, security, and customer feedback.
9. Carry on Loss Making Server
Another common mistake some web hosting providers knowingly or unknowingly make is carrying loss making server. All their servers are running in profit, except one or two servers which have less customers and the revenue from them is less than the cost of running these servers.
This loss per month may be small but turns into a huge amount in the long run. And if saved, you have a fallback should something unexpected happen in your business.
They keep these servers despite losses because they fear upsetting their customers by asking them to move to another server. Or because any important client’s data is on these servers.
How to Convert Loss Making Server in to Profit
- Merge the two partially filled servers in to one by moving the clients of one server to another.
- Don’t hesitate to explain the situation to the clients and ask for permission to move their data to another empty or partially occupied server and see what do they say. They are also human and can understand that you are doing so to protect your company from losses.
- If you cannot accommodate clients from two partially occupied servers on one server or you only have one server that is partially occupied and making losses then move to a lower configuration and less expensive server.
- Again don’t hesitate to tell your customers about your loss and ask them if you can move them to another server. You can also offer them a discount on the next payment or an extension of the end of their services. It is better to pay some amount to your customers than to lose money in losses.
- Offer discounts to new subscribers for your partially occupied servers. This way, you will reduce your losses and make new customers. A win win situation for both.
10. Not fully committed
Many entrepreneurs choose web hosting business because of huge profit and a passive income with little effort. They keep doing their previous job along with the starting web hosting company.
It is very difficult for them to take that leap of faith and quit their job when starting new hosting company. Also it is not easy to sacrifice a stable monthly salary for a new web hosting company that may or may not meet your expectations.
However, lack of commitment can lead to lack of focus and hinder progress and timely decision making. You can not survive for long in web hosting industry with half-hearted efforts and and ultimately become a summer host.
It is a requisite for success in this industry that you take that leap of faith and quit your job. Without quitting your job, there are high chances that you will consider your hosting business as a side job and will not give your best to it.
You don’t need to do it in a hurry, assess your financial and personal situations. Consider the risks involved and how you will deal with situations if things don’t work out for you.
Remember full commitment to your business require
- A clear vision
- Set goals and purpose
- Discipline
- Consistency
- Resilience and adaptability.
Conclusion
It’s okay if you make some of these mistakes and learn from them and move on. Now that you know about them, it is advisable that you avoid these mistakes as they can have disastrous effects.
We use your brand logo/website link in partially completed videos and put them on your website.
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