I have my web hosting business up for sale, which has been in business for over 8 years.

This sale is unique as I am selling the entire business, not just the customer base. This will allow the new owner to slot in to my position seamlessly without any noticeable changes to the customers, drastically minimising any customer losses from the changeover.


Up for sale is:

• the business name, the current website design and a new design and custom SEO handbook worth $2300
• three servers
• all web hosting customers, domain name reseller accounts etc
• WHMCS owned licence, domain reseller accounts with great pricing

We offer Linux cPanel web hosting as well as Xen virtual machines to Australian customers on Australian servers. We own our own servers and have them co-located in a Melbourne datacenter.

There is also strong potential for ongoing web design work – I currently have three clients who I do ongoing web design work for, and often have other clients contact me about web design work however I have been referring them to someone else as I did not have time to do it. I have not contacted the customer base about web design work in a very long time so there is strong potential for a lot of web design work by actively marketing it – almost 300 potential customers.

We also employ the services of an Australian based outsourced web hosting support company to provide white-label phone support (24/7) and e-mail support (while I am sleeping, and if I go on holiday). We have received great feedback from our customers about the outsourced support team (the customers do not know that they are outsourced support) and the ability to take a break from the business and know that it is in good hands is priceless.

I am not registered for GST.


The details:

• over 290 web hosting accounts
• 17 reseller accounts
• four customer Xen virtual machines
• over 500 domain names (a mix of .au domains and gTLDs)
• 8 SSL certificates ($53 profit per certificate per year)
• almost all web hosting customers pay annually, with a reasonably even spread of renewals each month

The money:

• average of $4238 revenue per month since the start of this financial year - estimated revenue is $50,856 for this financial year
• average of $3581 revenue per month for the 2009-10 financial year – 18% growth
• WHMCS indicates $4602 profit per year from domain names
• WHMCS hosting stats (number in brackets indicates number of hosting accounts) – this figure does not include web design work:
  Monthly: $524.00AUD (22)
  Quarterly: $195.00AUD (2)
  Semi-Annually: $264.00AUD (4)
  Annually: $37,045.50AUD (784) – this amount includes domain names too
  Biennially: $1,960.00AUD (10)
  Triennially: $0.00AUD (0)
  Est. Annual: $45,621.50AUD

I am looking for:

• someone who will run the business with as little change as possible for a while. This will greatly benefit not only the customers but the new buyer as well, as there will be very minimal customer losses from big changes
• someone who can provide a very high level of service to my customers as I want them to be happy!
• someone who is able to offer web design services to my customers, or has someone reliable that they can refer the work to

I am willing to:

• provide direct and prompt help to the buyer during business hours for seven days after the sale to help with a smooth transfer
• reply to any questions that the new owner has in to the future in a timely manner
• sign a non-compete agreement as I am leaving the industry

I don't have a firm price in mind, however most sales that involve a shared web hosting client base only (ie not the whole business) usually go for 6 – 9 months revenue. In light of this, I will be looking for offers above 9 months revenue at a minimum.

Please do not contact me if you are not very serious about purchasing the business. I will not be splitting parts of the business – it must be sold as a whole.

For more information, please contact me at hostforsale.au@gmail.com for an NDA. In your e-mail, please include your business name and website, and whether you are a small (ie one or two man business), or a larger business.

When will people learn revenue != profit.
Good luck with the sale mate.

In all fairness, it's stupid to base it on profit, since it's unlikely that the buyer will keep the clients on the same hardware.

The buyer can work out their own likely profit based on the operating costs of their existing systems, the sellers reported resource usage and the sellers reported revenue.

I agree with this.... but sellers also need to realise this....

Each company will cost a different amount to each seller to squire. I just get over every one seeing the last person list a hosting company and ask for X months revenue so they do the same.

The interesting thing is you never see the ACTUAL sell price of the companies that are listed here. I somehow thing they will be no way near the 9 months REVENUE they ask for. If they are Kudos to the seller for a job well done.

Yeah, I suspect you're right.

I get the impression that the seller rarely recognises how much effort is required to bend their clients into the buyer's setup.

That hits the nail on its head!
I couldn't have put it better myself.
Its not just one big cPanel Transfer ;-)

Would be nice if it was though.
That said, he is using outsourced support, which I am not a huge fan of, as it is always better to provide your customers with support, even if it does mean your stuck behind a desk.

Using seller's figures, he's offering a price with a payback period of over 6 years.

So, I'd have to layout money, roughly $33K, wait 6 years and I MIGHT get my money back, then I may start to make money.

If anyone else is offering to buy with this payback period let me know, think I'll also be a seller.

Rod

What does that add to the.conversation?

Nothing!

as per usual.

QFT

[10 char]

Not much.
It does indicate that selling to a larger provider would be better, as they

better as they could provide support without needing to outsource it.

Jeepers man... lol

Does anyone know if this business is still for sale?

Cheers