Is it possible to reduce costs for clients by reselling and offering subdomains of a domain you already hold? I realise that this would make things more like using free hosting with subdomains, but would the cost benefits make it likely to be a seller?

It would probably depend on the domain. I mean you know that free hosts like freewebs "sell" tons of free subdomains a day, so its possible you could sell subdomains of your own domain, but not everyone wants a subdomain if they are paying. Unless it needlessly comlpicates things it couldn't hurt to offer it.

I have had some clients ask if they could host with me without buying their own domain. I was able to convince them of the benefits of having their own domain, even if they were just running a fansite. Still...different clients, different needs. I think it may be a seller, just not a *big* seller.

You might try offering subdomains on a few different domains - themed, sort of. That would let buyers choose which "theme" they wanted, but also allow for duplication (names, football teams, that sort of thing.)

The one thing you'll want to watch out for is people spamming off of the subdomains. While I don't know that any business would want to host off of someone else's subdomain so there's not the possibility of a business having their reputation tainted by association, if one client spams, it's much easier for the recipients to assume that anyone on that domain is also a spammer.

There's one thing to do with your "drunk domains"...! Use them as alternatives to those who want a hosting account, but don't want their own domain!

Domain name TLD is more attractive. And when people which are paing for the services realize that they need to pay for the third level domain that might scare them away

If you're in the $10 per year hosting market, the average customer might see the ~$10 for a domain registration as an additional price they're not ready to pay. Subdomain hosting could be a seller then.

I wasn't referring to selling them a subdomain, rather letting them just sub with no extra cost purple, like Lesli said, for people who don't want to buy but don't want ad supported hosting either. Themed is an interesting idea-giving a greater degree of personalisation and of control to the client.

I also agree that this wouldn't be a service for businesses, but then I would think that few businesses would be working with a re-seller anyway, most choosing to have their own hosting in some form (unless its because I designed their site of course!).

IMHO it depends *greatly* upon your target market. If you're targeting $10~30/year then subdomains could be very popular for you but if you're targeting $5~20/month they probably wouldn't be in nearly as much of a demand.

I think the domain regstration are not expensive...
Save not much..
better get more client..

Subdomains are for free hosts not for paid , my opinion.

Asking for a domain name will reduce the number of possible spammers.

Actually some of my clients prefer a sub-domain because they are not in need of a domain. But I am planning to start giving away free .info domains with ever hosting account.