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Webdev&Hosting - What way to go?
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Webdev&Hosting - What way to go?

Since a couple of years I am doing websites for creative projects, sport clubs, doctors, artists and the like.. A couple of months ago I started offering hosting along with this (I also made a thread here on LET whether this would be a good idea) and well I have been using a private webhosting for it so far. With the growth of interest in my "new" offer on the clientside (as they often pay waaay too much for their hosting) I am looking to expand.
The question now is: Should I just upgrade my private hosting plan for more resources or go for a cpanel reseller? So far Ive been doing everything as "managed service" so the clients did not have access to their websites aside from ftp. cPanel would obviously give them more possibilities such as logging into their db, applying custom settings etc but the question is

a) Would I want that? Doesnt this shift away the necessity of having me as their "website manager"?

b) Most of them are..well no geeks. They come to me not because they search a Dev to contribute to their project but they are hiring me the get their very first web presence because they have no idea how to.
For these kinda people I cant see a big value in giving them cPanel access, right?

Basically I dont wanna limit my clients intentionally but at this rate, which would be the better choice? I mean I can see myself also taking more complex tasks in the future where a different clientset with more demands (geeks) may hire me so..

Comments

  • Either you're going to manage it for them and go bald from them being idiots, or you're going to sub-manage it for them and go bald from them being idiots. The only difference is how much you charge them per month.

    Either way, you're going to be doing quite a bit of hand holding, or billing (or broke).

    Thanked by 2Ympker ricardo
  • @WSS said:
    Either you're going to manage it for them and go bald from them being idiots, or you're going to sub-manage it for them and go bald from them being idiots. The only difference is how much you charge them per month.

    Either way, you're going to be doing quite a bit of hand holding, or billing (or broke).

    I wouldn't go as far as calling them idiots. There are various things in life I am not familiar with myself so it goes without saying that everyone at some point requires assistance. Right now a lot of them are paying 40-50€/month I will be charging about 20€/month. 5-10€ for the hosting aspect and the other half for me offering to make adjustments/intervene etc.
    Bigger tasks are being paid seperatly anyway.

  • We don't know your clients.
    If they only need 15 min once for first time setup I guess it's fine however the moment the first ticket arrives about them breaking their wordpress and you needing to save it and 15€ for support seems like an insult.

    Thanked by 1Ympker
  • After a few years of telling the same person that uploading "MYKEWLPIX.HTML" to the root of their public_html folder doesn't work when they're referencing C://FILE/, you'll change your mind.

    Good luck with keeping your sanity, and your shorts.

    Thanked by 1saf31
  • Or, "why can't I use my own domain as mail server, with ssl, I freaking paid for the domain" on shared a hosting account.

    Thanked by 1Ympker
  • Personally Id rather keep it all managed due to the fact they go with my hosting to well..just do that. Keeping it managed. If they were out to save money they could pick any 1€/mo host really. And the problem I can see with giving them access is that when something breaks I will have my fair share of fun figuring out what it was and what they did + even if I call it "semi" managed once I give them access they will always see me related and therefor liable as in the person to blame. This is for one because they signed up with my hosting. The other reason is I keep a close relationship to them. All of my clients are from Germany and I have either meet up with them irl or have had thorough phone conversations. I couldnt really see myself blaming them for that as I was the one saying "Hi. Lets leave your current host and come to me." but it can very well end up in a mess not worth the price Id be charging (if this accumulates for various customers).
    So running my own stack and managing everything might be better..

  • Doesn't have to be. Managing your clients using a Reseller account is the best way in this case, unless you can afford a managed vps/dedicated.

    Thanked by 1Ympker
  • IkoulaIkoula Member, Host Rep

    How many customers are we talking about ?

  • @Ikoula said:
    How many customers are we talking about ?

    So far about 5 are hosting with me and a few more are looking to :P Do you have a special offer in mind?

  • @WSS said:
    Either you're going to manage it for them and go bald from them being idiots, or you're going to sub-manage it for them and go bald from them being idiots. The only difference is how much you charge them per month.

    Either way, you're going to be doing quite a bit of hand holding, or billing (or broke).

    This.

    I have clients, and they're absolute morons who need their hands held to cross the street.

    Sometimes, I feel that the money isn't worth the shit I go through.

  • @varunchopra said:
    I have clients, and they're absolute morons who need their hands held to cross the street.

    Sometimes, I feel that the money isn't worth the shit I go through.

    Mate, calm down and don't despair. Hold on, you can do it! All you need to do is to bill them higher, so you can afford a good therapist. Your therapist needs that moolah to buy cocaine and not go crazy himself or his wife will start to fuck around with a yoga trainer, which would cause a yoga center closure and shut down their website too. And nobody needs that to happen!

    You have to do what you have to do. For yourself, society and all of us.

    Thanked by 1bugrakoc
  • IkoulaIkoula Member, Host Rep

    @Ympker Not exactly, for such a few number of customers i advice you to stay on a managed solution.

    Thanked by 1Ympker
  • I won't recommend that you give them any access to cPanel at all. From my experience, that would cause a lot of headache. The worst one I had so far was my client deleting everything outside public_html, 'cause "she don't need it". Stay with being a fulltime fully-managed provider/agency and only provided them access to their site editor - even that I wouldn't recommend a full access (possible with Wordpress, if you're using that). Always tone down to what they can only use on their own.

    If you're going through the dedicated server route, even with Fully Managed, email can be tricky. I would recommend that you outsource this to 3rd-party services like Zoho, Gsuites, Mxroute or Mailcheap. Clients often complain on deliverability of emails, especially if you're not using premium relay channels.

    There is also optimizing your software stack, which I think is pretty fun on its own :)

    Don't think of it as limiting your client, you can market it differently by saying you're doing all the dirty tasks for them. :)

    Thanked by 1Ympker
  • @sanmax88 said:
    I won't recommend that you give them any access to cPanel at all. From my experience, that would cause a lot of headache. The worst one I had so far was my client deleting everything outside public_html, 'cause "she don't need it". Stay with being a fulltime fully-managed provider/agency and only provided them access to their site editor - even that I wouldn't recommend a full access (possible with Wordpress, if you're using that). Always tone down to what they can only use on their own.

    If you're going through the dedicated server route, even with Fully Managed, email can be tricky. I would recommend that you outsource this to 3rd-party services like Zoho, Gsuites, Mxroute or Mailcheap. Clients often complain on deliverability of emails, especially if you're not using premium relay channels.

    There is also optimizing your software stack, which I think is pretty fun on its own :)

    Don't think of it as limiting your client, you can market it differently by saying you're doing all the dirty tasks for them. :)

    Oh lol that "public_html delete" story... Nightmare :O Might be best to only provide them with chrooted ftp access afterall. Or maybe not even that :P

  • @Yura said:

    @varunchopra said:
    I have clients, and they're absolute morons who need their hands held to cross the street.

    Sometimes, I feel that the money isn't worth the shit I go through.

    Mate, calm down and don't despair. Hold on, you can do it! All you need to do is to bill them higher, so you can afford a good therapist. Your therapist needs that moolah to buy cocaine and not go crazy himself or his wife will start to fuck around with a yoga trainer, which would cause a yoga center closure and shut down their website too. And nobody needs that to happen!

    You have to do what you have to do. For yourself, society and all of us.

    I blow it all on weed already. ;_;

  • If you use a reseller you can keep NOT giving cpanel access for most of your customers as you do now, and would be able to give cpanel access in case some customers need/want it.

    You keep managed / no access to them = no trouble for you for most of your customers, and are able to give them more freedom if they ask for it.

    Thanked by 1Ympker
  • I have created some websites and also offering hosting. But it's like a Fully managed hosting, there my customers do not have access to do anything. But of course, my customers do maybe make a couple of changes to their websites per year.
    Still, I use dedicated servers for my hosting, DNS failover, several live backup servers, use Office365 for e-mail etc etc. I use 50% of what they pay me per year for hosting and mail. The rest is for my time.

    Thanked by 1Ympker
  • I've been there. I still offer the option for clients to manage things themselves but to be honest they hardly ever use it. In the end all the average client wants is to get settled in and be able to make minor changes to their site and add content. It's good to offer it though as when you have more tech savvy clients it's probably a plus for them. It's the same when they require a VPS or dedicated. I'll get them up and running but hardly ever give root access or anything. Besides they fact it'll save you a lot of headaches my experience is that clients really appreciate it they don't have to look after things themselves. It saves them time and money and it'll give you more room to upsell your hosting.

    Thanked by 1Ympker
  • YmpkerYmpker Member
    edited February 2017

    Alright so based on the feedback I will keep it all managed and only some geeks will be given ftp access.

    Now due to me being the only person managing things, I'm stuck between the decision of getting a ("managed") cPanel Reseller plan to host my clients on, or a VPS/Dedi and with CWP/Webmin. With the latter I could probably due about the same things Id do with cPanel and could invest the money saved on the license in some solid server (cpu/network port) instead. This would however require me setting up a secure environment, backup servers (which I already have) AND maintain all of it. Now while I can see myself capable of doing just that there is still the loud voices of CWP security flaws and also some negative feedback about webmin s what is the way to go guys?

    Dedicated pimped performance as in an own setup where I know exactly what my limits and resources are or some reseller where the setup is done, however I cant add tweaks to it nor know how oversold it is..

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