About how many people on these forums, and in the webhosting world, do you think would actually pay a premium service fee, for everything they look for in a host.

IE:

Real 24/7 Support
Support which knows what theyre doing
Excellent Network
Non-Resellers
SLA's which are backed by $ not just service credits
Quality Hardware

There is a good percentage that will pay a premium for good hosting. It also though has to be some what price competitive relative to the market.

Which market would that be? THe market created by undercutting kiddie hosts, or the real world market?

Consumer or business market?

We can't view the hosting market as homogenous. If somebody has a personal blog or a family picture site they're going to visit once a month, they'll be pretty price-sensitive.

For a business, it's a different story. If you look at the costs of running a business nowadays (personnel, rent, telephone, inventory, advertising, etc.), then it really doesn't matter whether you pay 5 bucks a month or 50 bucks a month for your hosting. It's an insignificant part of your overall expenses, and probably about the most beneficial part in terms of how much it does for you per dollar spent.

I have an online store that takes 5-10 orders a day (for the record, it uses under 50 MB of disk space and very little CPU or bandwidth). I used to pay $35 a month to host it. I didn't mind paying that, but I eventually moved because the server was too slow. I then moved it to another host who charged $30 a month. Again, I didn't mind paying, but I moved it again because although their server was faster, they had extensive downtime most weekends (for maintenance, I guess, but they never really gave any reasons), and we were missing orders. I now host it myself, but I basically wouldn't even consider a sub-$10 host for that site. And I certainly wouldn't host it with a company which looks like it's been slapped together by a teenager who doesn't even know how to spell.

Part of your question was "how many people in these forums" would pay for premium hosting service. A quick survey of our customers says that almost none of them visit online hosting forums. A quick survey of posts in these forums says people are really price-sensitive here. So I think there's probably an inverse relationship. Most people who care about support, service, and reliability enough to pay for it don't spend time in hosting forums, so this isn't an ideal place to target those customers.

I believe that's the truth. It makes lot of sense from many respects...

All those things are of most concern and value to me personally when it comes to hosting. If you have all those things - it would show naturally and then customers would come.

I have always been ready to pay more for better equipment and knowledgeable support, keeps me relaxed. That way my mind focuses on things I really have to worry about.

Best,

I think the high-quality segment is a viable segment to pursue, just be advised that you had better be able to deliver better quality when charging a premium. You might want to consider offering things that differentiate you from "the rest of the crowd" to justify higher fees. For example many companies are now required to archive email and be able to retrieve old emails. Not many hosts offer email archiving and companies end up having to find 3rd party solutions.

I think that as long as the person is commerce savvy, they will pay for the quality they need.

The fact is, if you generally check in your local area, the fees that seem so expensive to most of the consumers we run across on the net, are still well below what many local businesses expected to pay.

This is actually why you find a lot of smaller businesses in your local area try putting off an internet presence as long as possible. They think it's too expensive.

So even with the prices that many online, think is too much, your local market will see it as "Wow, that's a lot less than I thought"

The market of local businesses who need some handholding and someone to build and manage their site is enormous. If you ask around, you'll be surprised at how few local businesses have a Web site. Many of the ones that get online do so via a local Web builder who can stop by their office, who they can call on the phone, and who they trust. They often pay a few hundred bucks to get setup with a Web site and non-trivial fees on an ongoing basis, despite the fact that their Web sites tend to use very few resources. Some of our resellers target this market, and they're making a killing. One guy has 50+ of these accounts in a $10 per month reseller account with us.

For those who are good with people, have enough technical know-how to design, build, and setup a basic Web site and who don't mind "pounding the pavement" a bit, this is a lucrative and wide-open market.

I disagree. There are some knowledgable people that use forums too.

Yes, there are plenty of knowledgable people. It's just that the typical forum user is pretty price-sensitive. It doesn't take long over at a typical hosting forum's Offers & Requests area to see that. If you want to target the non-price-sensitive market, forums probably aren't the best place. Most of the people who will see your ad in a forum don't belong to that demographic.

I disagree and by that I say that we actually agree.

There are some knowledgable people that use forums too, but most people who care about support, service, and reliability enough to pay for it don't spend time in hosting forums. That is indeed a more complete image.

Quite simply -- if you can "sell" someone on why they should pay a premium price for services, then you will be able to earn premium price for services. We're not talking about selling something that is "the same" as competitors' services, but something that IS MORE and is also PERCEIVED to be more. Whether it's personalized support or custom solutions bundled in with the web hosting service.

I think a lot of web hosts have moved towards the "let's automate everything" and have left the holistic approach of web hosting services with emphasis on customer experience. But I am inspired by the hosts that go the extra mile for customers -- and I've run into a lot of them here. What do you guys think about that?


JP

What would it take to disagree with you completely? Seems we agree on too many points.....

It would take a lot. I'm such an agreeable person...