By Today, every business needs a website, and that website data needs to be stored somewhere. The chances that your clients require a hosting provider are 100 percent, so if you don’t offer this essential solution, someone else will. Adding WordPress hosting to your portfolio, particularly if you sell web design and other website services, can help you become a more valued vendor to your small business customers.
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If you’re new to reseller WordPress hosting, you’ve come to the right place. We’ll cover everything you need to know to get started, from choosing the best WordPress reseller hosting program to positioning yourself for success.
Table of Contents
- Benefits of becoming a reseller for WordPress hosting
- Choosing a hosting provider: What to look for
- Reseller WordPress hosting pricing tips
- Best WordPress reseller hosting providers
- Tips for marketing your hosting services to SMB prospects
- Best practices for offering reseller WordPress hosting
- Mistakes to avoid as a reseller of WordPress hosting
- Frequently asked questions
Benefits of becoming a reseller for WordPress hosting
We’ve established the first key reason why becoming a managed WordPress hosting reseller deserves your attention: your customers need hosting. But if you still need some convincing, there are some convincing, we’ve got you covered.
- Turn one-off projects into recurring revenue: Landing new website clients is great, but it’s even better if you can turn that one-time website payment into a predictable monthly source of income. Since reseller WordPress hosting is a subscription-based service, scoring more hosting clients means more predictable, recurring revenue coming in each month.
- Maximize control of your website projects: No matter how elegantly designed and well-functioning your websites are, their performance will be hindered if your clients choose a low-quality hosting solution. Offering reseller WordPress hosting ensures you can maintain well-performing websites.
- Deliver better ROI through synergies: Hosting impacts SEO, so if you sell SEO solutions, you can offer a better return on each dollar your clients spend through the synergies between the two services.
- Scale your business: Reseller WordPress hosting is easily scalable, and we’ll show you how you can grow your business without costly and high-risk in-house hiring.
- Improve retention and customer lifetime value (LTV): The more solutions you can offer your clients, the more reasons they’ll have to stay with your agency over your competitors. Boosting retention means you can spend less money acquiring clients and improve the LTV of each client.
Choosing a hosting provider: What to look for
Your success as a managed WordPress hosting reseller largely comes down to which WordPress reseller program you choose. All programs are not created equally, and you’ll make your life—and your clients’ experiences—far easier by selecting a solution that checks these boxes.
Secure, reliable infrastructure
All hosting providers rely on their infrastructure—the virtual and physical resources that make hosting possible—to deliver their services. This network of software, servers, and other equipment determines how safe, secure, and reliable their hosting service is.
You don’t need to know the ins and outs of how cloud hosting works to select an excellent hosting provider: just look for one that offers a minimum of 99.9 percent uptime and around-the-clock security monitoring so you can feel confident your client sites won’t go down and that they’re protected by world-class hosting security.
User-friendly control panel
An easy-to-use control panel will become especially important as your reseller WordPress hosting business grows. You’ll also need to manage tens or even hundreds of websites. Look for a solution that simplifies the management of your reseller account, hosting resources, and routine client hosting tasks.
24/7 tech support
Even with the best WordPress reseller hosting in the world, you may occasionally run into issues. Around-the-clock support means you can address problems the moment they arise, instead of leaving your clients (and their profits) hanging. Ideally, your WordPress reseller program should include phone, email, and chat support, and have an easy-to-understand ticketing system for issues.
Effortless scalability
The best hosting solution should let you easily accommodate your growing business needs, so you can confidently sign more clients without worrying that your quality of service will be impacted. It should also be scalable at the client level, accommodating spikes in traffic and other changes without impacting site performance.
Competitive pricing and profitability
Like most things in life, cheaper isn’t necessarily better. However, your WordPress reseller program should enable you to be competitive enough to land clients, while giving you plenty of room to generate profits for your agency. Look for bulk pricing and reseller discounts that can help you further maximize your margins.
Useful add-on features
In addition to basic hosting, look for a provider that includes other features that can help you add value for your clients (and maximize your revenue). These include automatic daily backups, drag-and-drop website builders, and built-in SSL certificates.
Reseller WordPress hosting pricing tips
Hosting may not be the most big-ticket item in your portfolio of digital solutions, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be a profit generator for your agency. Your pricing strategy should strike a balance between being competitive enough to be worthwhile for clients, while strategically supporting your revenue and profit goals.
How to price your website hosting for SMB clients
To arrive at your pricing for reseller WordPress hosting, take the following factors into account:
- Your resource costs: This is the cost for hosting as determined by your hosting provider. You could potentially reduce it as your business grows and you can access preferential reseller discounts.
- Your overhead costs: This includes costs like server maintenance, software licensing, technical support, and any other utilities you may need to deliver your service.
- Competitor landscape: Market competition will impact your pricing since you can’t be too far out of the range in your niche or area. Familiarize yourself with the pricing strategies that your competitors have implemented.
- Unique value proposition: Do your hosting packages offer value that competitors don’t? This can include superior support, extra features, bundles with other services, and more.
- Target profit margin: Your pricing should generate enough of a profit to make selling hosting worthwhile. This requires finding a balance between competitiveness and profitability.
Strategies for competitive hosting package pricing
As a managed WordPress hosting reseller, determining your pricing isn’t just a matter of figuring out a single monthly rate to charge customers. By incorporating the right pricing strategies, you can offer clients some flexibility while incentivizing them to spend more of their budget with your agency. Try any of these agencies:
- Offer pricing tiers: creating hosting packages with different resources and features enables you to appeal to a range of clients with varying budgets.
- Create bundles: Hosting can be bundled with web design, SEO, or other marketing services to create more perceived value while boosting spending with your agency.
- Offer special discounts: By offering discounts for long-term contracts or for purchasing multiple services from you, you can give your clients some savings while also increasing their LTV.
- Run promotions: Limited-time promotions create a sense of urgency that can encourage clients to use your services.
- Be transparent: Avoid hidden fees and surprise charges. Instead, be completely forthright about how much your services cost. Clients will appreciate the transparency, and it will help build trust in you and your agency.
Best WordPress reseller hosting providers
We’ve done the legwork for you and selected some top reseller WordPress hosting you should consider if you’re ready to start offering this important service.
1. Vendasta
Vendasta’s Website Pro is the best reseller hosting solution because it’s purpose-built for agencies. It includes hosting on the most up-to-date platform in the world, Google Cloud web hosting, which comes with free SSL certificates, automatic daily backups, easy-to-use developer tools, over 99.9 percent uptime, and around-the-clock support. It also includes a code-free website builder and over a hundred themes across all key verticals, so creating sites for clients has never been easier.
The Website Admin Dashboard is where Website Pro shines for managed WordPress hosting resellers: all hosting clients can be managed from this single screen, where updates to the WordPress version, theme, and plugins can be made with one click.
2. InMotion Hosting
InMotion Hosting is a speedy, reliable provider based on the Linux platform. Users can enjoy free domains and SSL certificates, and affordable plans, especially for simple sites with limited hosting requirements.
However, it’s worth noting that signing up requires new users to call in, which can be inconvenient. InMotion also lacks data centers in Asia, which can limit performance for people in that region.
3. HostGator
HostGator is a trusted name in the hosting space, with plans that include unlimited bandwidth and emails, free SSL certificates, and useful tools for resellers. It can also run automatic backups, but there is an extra fee to restore sites from backups.
4. GreenGeeks
GreenGeeks is unique for offering carbon offsets with all its hosting plans, which will appeal to small businesses and agencies with a commitment to green initiatives. Users can also enjoy solid uptime, fast loading speeds, and a free domain name in the first year. One important caveat: GreenGeeks does not include 24/7 support.
5. Hostwinds
Hostwinds is a popular provider thanks to its impressive 99.99 percent uptime promise, reliably fast loading speeds, free SSL certificates, and the ability to white-label WordPress services. Unlimited subdomains and email addresses are also included. However, with no ecommerce hosting plans, it may not be the best choice for agencies with ecommerce clients.
Tips for marketing your hosting services to SMB prospects
Once you’ve chosen a WordPress reseller program for hosting, it’s time to get your services in front of prospects. Here’s how to do just that:
- Form partnerships with complementary businesses: This can be an effective way to get your business in front of new prospects who are more likely to be interested in your reseller WordPress hosting.
- Participate in industry events: Conferences and events—both online and offline—can help you connect with prospects and other professionals in your niche, keep you up-to-date on trends, and give you opportunities to talk about your services.
- Incentivize word-of-mouth marketing with a referral program: Give customers who already love your services a reason to talk about them by offering discounts or freebies for successful referrals.
- Build a strong online presence and brand identity: Your website should reflect the quality of the website services you can deliver to clients, so make sure it’s a worthy example.
Best practices for offering reseller WordPress hosting
Following these practices will ensure your clients are happy with their hosting solution. The result? Long-term recurring revenue that you can largely put on autopilot.
1. Prioritize security and reliability
Security and reliable performance are top priorities for SMBs, and interruptions to either can be costly. Security breaches and data leaks can be very damaging to a business’s reputation, and downtime can directly cut into revenues. Always use current, reputable security software, run daily backups, and use trusted servers.
2. Hosting provider reputation matters
When it comes to choosing a hosting provider, cutting corners isn’t worth the risk. Pick a proven, highly trusted provider that stands behind their product with excellent customer support. Website Pro, which uses the world-class Google Cloud Platform for hosting, is your best bet.
3. Keep up with hosting trends and tech
Your SMB clients rely on you to deliver the latest and greatest in hosting technology, and staying current will prevent competitors from edging out your business. Website Pro takes care of this problem with regular automatic updates that improve the user experience both for you and for your clients.
4. Customer support is a key differentiator
Exceptional and reliable support is often the secret ingredient to keeping clients satisfied and loyal long-term. You and your team should prioritize speedy responses, around-the-clock availability, and robust training to ensure all support staff is equipped to address issues.
Mistakes to avoid as a reseller of WordPress hosting
Fixing a problem usually takes considerably more work than avoiding it in the first place, so being aware of these common hosting reselling mistakes to avoid can save you time and resources.
Not setting realistic expectations
As a managed WordPress hosting reseller, it’s important to set realistic expectations about hosting performance, what’s included in the hosting package, and other key details about what it will be like to work with you. Avoid the disappointment—and reputational damage—that come with promising more than you can deliver.
Neglecting backups and security measures
Regular backups serve as a valuable insurance policy in case something goes wrong with a site. Keeping SSL certificates and firewalls up to date can also help prevent data loss, data breaches, and other deeply disruptive and damaging security risks.
Sub-par technical support
A properly trained and experienced support staff is non-negotiable when it comes to delivering tech support. Don’t have this in-house? White-label teams, like those available through Vendasta, can do the job.
Poor scalability
When your clients experience rapid growth or a surge in traffic, your hosting solution should easily meet the demand. If their business growth leads to downtime or poor performance, they’ll lose revenue as a result—and you’ll likely lose their business.
Frequently asked questions
What is reseller WordPress hosting?
Reseller WordPress hosting refers to hosting services for WordPress websites that are purchased from a major provider like Google Cloud Platform and resold by businesses such as digital agencies to their clients.
What are the benefits of becoming a reseller WordPress host?
Becoming a reseller WordPress host enables you to generate a recurring income stream, have more control over the performance of your websites, boost customer retention, and create opportunities to upsell and cross-sell other services.
