The short answer: someone who builds sites for clients has to choose between one hosting per client (each with their own account and contract) and a hosting of your own where you keep the clients’ sites (and charge for hosting). The second route is reselling. The right decision depends on who answers for the site once it is delivered.
What the site needs
| What |
What to do |
| One hosting per client |
The client is the holder: pays, gets the notices and takes the site with them if they change agency. Less work for you, less control. |
| Reselling (sites stay in your account) |
You charge the client, manage the accounts and answer for support. More control, more responsibility: Becoming a reseller. |
| Commission instead of reselling |
You refer the client and receive a share, managing nothing: Affiliate or reseller. |
| The domain |
Register it in the client’s name, always. If the relationship ends, the domain is theirs. |
| Backups and maintenance |
Who makes the backups, the updates and answers when the site goes down? Write it in the contract: Your own backup. |
Getting started
| 1 |
Choose the model with a pilot client before applying it to all.
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| 2 |
Write what is included: hosting, backups, updates, support and response time.
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| 3 |
Register the domains in the clients’ names and keep the access details in a password manager.
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Whoever hosts answers for the site. If a client’s site is hacked or goes down, it is you they call. Do not host what you cannot maintain, and make clear in writing what you do and do not do. For your own test site, subdomain or folder.
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If your client already has hosting and only needs your work, nothing has to change: you can hand the site over to them. Adding a domain or subdomain.
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Going to host client sites and want help choosing the model? Tell us how many sites you have today.
Open a support ticket
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In our plans
| Situation | Plan | Why |
| One hosting per client: the client is the holder | Pro or Plus, one per client | Pro: 1 site, 10 GB SSD NVMe. Plus: 6 sites, 20 GB. Each client gets their own account, backups and e-mail |
| A few client sites in your own account | Plus or Ultra | 6 sites and 20 GB, or unlimited sites and 30 GB (the space is shared by all the sites in the account) |
| Many clients that you charge and manage | Reseller I, II or III | Reseller I: 10 accounts and 50 GB SSD; Reseller II: 30 accounts and 120 GB; Reseller III: 60 accounts and 250 GB, managed with WHM |
WHEN TO MOVE UP: in short, one hosting per client leaves the contract and the support with the client; reselling puts the accounts in your hands, with WHM, and you charge and answer for them; the affiliate route only refers the client and shares the earnings, with nothing to manage. Move from Plus to Ultra when the client sites pass six or the 20 GB fill up, and to a reseller plan when you want to bill clients and give each one an account of their own. Moving up does not lose the sites. The reseller conditions are in the article Becoming a reseller, listed below.
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