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HostSearch > Interviews >

Web Hosting Interview - WebHostingBuzz.com

January 2007

Safvan Malik, CEO of WebHostingBuzz

We start the year off with an interview with Safvan Malik, CEO of WebHostingBuzz, a shared hosting provider out of Delaware, USA � a company that offers reseller options and what they call �Ultimate Hosting�. WebHostingBuzz started life as a reseller in 2002 and they currently have 10,000 customers in �almost every country in the world� that utilize around 50 servers. We ask Safvan a simple question � �How did you do it?� Check out what he has to say!

HOSTSEARCH: Mr. Malik � thanks for meeting us like this and taking some time out of a busy schedule for an interview. It would be good if you could let our visitors know a little about WebHostingBuzz and how it got to be where it is today.

SAFVAN MALIK: You could say WebHostingBuzz.com was my brainchild, but I�d simply call it a product that I introduced back in late 2002. I started as a reseller for a European hosting company. Since then WebHostingBuzz.com has seen many seasons, some good, some not so good, but I am happy that the company is still in existence, unlike most of the other companies that started when I did. We are continually climbing the success ladder one step at a time. We now have three offices located in North America, Western Europe and South Asian regions and we serve over 10,000 clients worldwide.

HOSTSEARCH: I should ask upfront � what exactly is Ultimate Hosting and how does it differ from other products available on the market � dedicated� VPS� and things like that?

SAFVAN MALIK: Many people ask me this question and I knew it was coming. Ultimate hosting is basically a fancy name for a very simplistic approach toward shared hosting. . It�s a numbers game. The environment and the management of this type of web server are typical of a shared box, however, we tighten our grip on the number of hosting accounts. Simply put, we only allow 35 accounts to be hosted on each server. This enables us to better the uptime figures and provide a solid platform for sites requiring more CPU power. Dedicated and VPS on the other hand are a totally different ballgame and do not have any specific similarity with our ultimate hosting plan for the reasons I have already stated - explaining them again would simply make your coffee cold! (Laughs)

HOSTSEARCH: You have done very well in a short amount of time � I am sure a lot of our visitors are interested in becoming resellers and having a go at web hosting, and I am sure they are asking one simple question: �How did you do it?�

SAFVAN MALIK: I wish there was single answer to it but unfortunately there isn�t one, and even if there was one, I would never tell, or would I? (smiles) No, seriously it doesn�t matter how you start your business as at the end of the day all clients are hosted in a data center and on the same box we call a web server. The most important and the hardest part I�d say is bringing new clients to your house of business. The hosting business has gone through many changes and seen many faces since the dawn of the new century and it is still forming, though I believe this trend is mainly because this sector is still in its infancy. Go back 20 years and you wouldn�t find commercial web hosting as a recognizable industry. Now coming back to your question, I thankfully started our operations when low cost hosting was just beginning to take shape. I took advantage of it and devised a plan to lower our overhead costs so that savings could be passed to the customer. Luckily the technique worked for WebHostingBuzz and we saw growth rates of more than 200%. The industry has settled down a bit now but with the emergence of thousands of budget web hosts, few of which have an excellent reputation in terms of providing superior technical support. This has made it even more difficult for new companies to get their share of the cake. Though I am not any supreme �Hosting God� to give others any real advice on running their new businesses - as I am sure there are people out there with far greater capabilities than me - I would say that in my limited experience, targeting niche areas works. Start looking for areas other web hosts out there are not working on. You work on it and I promise the green will find a route towards you sooner or later.

HOSTSEARCH: How difficult is the transition from reseller to a full-blown web host?

SAFVAN MALIK: Totally depends on how you handle it. WebHostingBuzz has gone through many such transitions. Some have gone smoothly and some have gone terribly wrong due to bad planning or lack of time on our side. For a reseller the process is fairly simple. I would say don�t take the transition to heart. Ask your hosting provider to help you if you cannot do it yourself or spend a few dollars and let the experts do it for you. Inform your clients beforehand, move over the data, change the DNS and viola - it�s done before your know it! The only basic thing required is to forget about the post-move scenarios and focus on the current situation at hand. Things cannot be perfect and even if you do make a mistake, it would only sharpen your learning curve and you would be better equipped in the future. We are all humans after all, aren�t we? (winks)

HOSTSEARCH: One of the testimonials on your corporate website is unusually blunt. It says, �I was very skittish about contracting with your company. How good can the service be at that price? Well, you have far exceeded my expectations.� You clearly deliver quality, but in such a competitive environment, we have to ask the same question again � How do you do it? How do you deliver quality yet drive down costs to consumers?

SAFVAN MALIK: People want honesty and we give it to them. That should answer the first part of the question. Long gone are the days of diplomacy, people want answers in straight and plain English. We know that and take a more informal approach. I�d rather clients have some real opinions about WebHostingBuzz. I would rather them give us the benefit of the doubt than rush into arrangements with others based on fake testimonials and then find their website is down 23 hours a day. For the second part of your question, we are not the only ones offering quality. Recent market changes such as reduced network hardware and bandwidth costs, and the easy availability of outsourced support mean anyone can offer these services with a subsidized pricing structure. We have no magic beans or a genie in a bottle. We do exactly the same, however we try to make sure that our targets are met to our clients� satisfaction.

HOSTSEARCH: Another testimonial on your site suggests, �What I didn't expect to find was a cheap host with as many features as WebHostingBuzz.� What types of features do you offer?

SAFVAN MALIK: Again we offer nothing different in terms of standard features. The testimonial you took might have been from a client that has never used a Cpanel host before. If I were to give the credit, I would pass it on to Cpanel Inc who has made domain management so easy and fun. Almost anyone with a little computer knowledge can work inside Cpanel and work out even the most complex problems with the help of a single click.

HOSTSEARCH: I notice that you have a company blog � that�s not something you see on every site. How useful a tool is it for you as a host and for your customers?

SAFVAN MALIK: We want to project our image as a people company. Starting our blog is a good attempt on our side to strengthen that goal. We are all humans. We all go through similar day to day life experiences and our posts are only reflections of what goes on behind the scenes. We have had a great response from our clients. They also post their comments on the blog and this mutual interaction is not only strengthening our business relations but providing a new medium to make good friends for life.

HOSTSEARCH: Where do you see web hosting going in 5-10 years and where will WebHostingBuzz be?

SAFVAN MALIK: That�s like asking if aliens will land on Earth! (laughs) It is hard to say. The industry is volatile and needs to settle down and form a concrete shape. I would say the next 5 to 10 years will define the future of this sector. Time changes everything. One fat, nerdy guy (no offense to fat people) sitting in his dark smelly college room can come up with a device that can change the whole concept of web hosting, shake the very grounds on which it was built in the first place, and become the next Bill Gates. As a result it is hard to predict the future. As far as WebHostingBuzz goes, I can only hope for the best. Our main approach would be to change with the change and that is to continuously alter our targets and stand side by side with the new technology instead of fighting against it.

HOSTSEARCH: Do you ever envisage a time when one or two entities control web hosting in the same way a few players control others aspects of the Internet � your Googles and YouTubes and companies like that?

SAFVAN MALIK: Yes, this is very much possible, but as I said before it would be extremely difficult with the current technology. If the new entities come up with a product that that completely eradicates the need for the personal touch then, yes, nothing can stop it. The very reason companies like Yahoo Inc. and Dell Inc. could not capture this market is because they took, and are taking, the current prevalent forms of delivering data on the Internet. They did not come up with anything new that could redefine hosting as we know it. With the current forms of infrastructure the only major aspects clients consider before making the purchase are need, price and support.

HOSTSEARCH: OK � crystal ball time� What will be the next big thing to hit the Internet and how will it impact people�s lives?

SAFVAN MALIK: To give you a cheeky answer, I would say WebHostingBuzz.com (laughs) but if I knew exactly I�d be working on it and then surprise the world with my genius. As a netizen I�d like the current Internet to change its form. I want it to become more powerful like a virtual world where people can have different parallel lives. The work on it has already begun and there are virtual communities shaping up, for example, have a look at secondlife.com. This concept will only grow more powerful as we break new ground in computing technology. It�s only a matter of time. We just have to wait. This is why I love the Internet. It has given humanity the power to better itself.

HostSearch: Thanks very much for speaking to us today�

It was a pleasure meeting you. I wish HostSearch all the success in the future. Now, where is my other cup of coffee? (laughs)

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