Difference between SSL Certificates

So the time has come to purchase an SSL certificate. You find there are many different types to choose from from various companies.. Sow what is the difference between SSL certificates?

First, it's important to realise what the function and purpose of an SSL certificate from an issuer is.

1. To encrypt communication between the browser of the visitor and the web server
2. To verify the authenticity of the website you are on

Those are the two main functions, both as important as each other.

Now let's look at the different types of SSL's:

Self Signed SSL's

These are free and can be generated by yourself. They will only satisfy the role of encrypting the information They won't verify the authenticity because anyone can generate these SSL's and there is no independent source that will verify the information in the SSL.

These type of SSL's would be suitable for personal use and not for commercial use or handling data of significant importance. As anyone could still hijack your site and generate a self signed SSL for their own dummy site.

Signed SSL's

These are provided to you by an certificate issuer. GeoTrust and Thawte are two which come to mind. The information which they will verify to be true will depend on the SSL you purchase. The difference between GeoTrust and Thawte is negligible. They offer similar products, under different brands which ultimately satisfy the same goal.

Encryption Strength

Typically, an SSL certificate is 128 bits. This does suffice for the likes of securely transmitting time limited sensitive information such as credit card information. Unless the information must remain secure for centuries to come, a 128bit certificate will suffice. For the likes of a credit card, they expire within a few years. Someone which intercepts data that is SSL secured can take hundreds of years before the data is deciphered. By which time, the credit card would have expired and even the owner would be long gone.

Encryption strength can be increased to 256bits or 1024bits or more. Personally, I go with 128bits.

The main difference

The main difference is the level of authentication done. Let's take a GeoTrust RapidSSL for example. They will only go as far as verifying the domain name. So if you request an SSL certificate for say innohosting.com, GeoTrust will send an email to the WHOIS contact for innohosting.com. Thus only the domain owner will receive it and be able to confirm s/he owns the domain name.

Then you can opt of a QuickSSL which is more expensive, but still only verifies the domain name. The difference (apart from price) is that you receive a site seal. The purpose of the site seal is to increase trust between you and your visitors. The site seal is dynamic and will thus display your domain name in the site seal. The same level of verification is done as the RapidSSL which is considerably cheaper.

Moving up in the GeoTrust chain, we have the True BusinessID certificate. This takes validation a step further by validating your business. This may involve them calling the company number or sending a letter to the official company address. Once you receive the letter you will then confirm with GeoTrust that you have and provide any necessary information. You may have to provide identification information to them. This all depends on how thorough the company you are purchasing the certificate from decides to be.

This method further boosts consumer confidence. The encryption still remains the same (it may support higher encryption strength) but the validation process is the main thing that has changed. It will still function the same as their cheapest certificate, except that the level of authentication is more in depth. Your visitors can see that not only is the domain verified but your address is also correct and accurate.

Typically e-commerce sites with high volume will go for this option.

Extended Validation (EV) certificates

You may have noticed that on some sites you visit, your address bar turns green. That is because the company is utilising an extended validation certificate. This doesn't mean they are any more or less secure, but the validation & authentication process is even more thorough. Wikipedia explains the process pretty well, see the quote below:

Only CAs who pass an independent audit as part of their WebTrust^sm (or equivalent) review may offer EV, and all CAs globally must follow the same detailed issuance requirements which aim to:

• Establish the legal identity as well as the operational and physical presence of website owner;
• Establish that the applicant is the domain name owner or has exclusive control over the domain name; and
• Confirm the identity and authority of the individuals acting for the website owner, and that documents pertaining to legal obligations are signed by an authorised officer.

The above definition from Wikipedia sums the extent of validation required for EV certificates.

Wild Card Certificates

Wild card certificates enable the SSL to work on multiple subdomains. The amount is limited depending on which CA (Certificate Authority) is issuing the certificate.

For example, a standard SSL issued to innohosting.com will only work with innohosting.com. Whereas a wild card SSL will work on subdomains too such as client.innohosting.com, forum.innohosting.com, support.innohosting.com and so on. You have 1 certificate which will cover a range of subdomains and the main domain (only 1 single domain).

Do the different types of SSL's really matter?

They can most certainly do. Imagine a website you are wanting to buy from. They have their address listed, but you have no sure way of knowing if that is a real address or a fake one posted to make the company look professional. As a result, you have your doubts and don't purchase.

If that site had an EV certificate, then an independent authority would have already verified the company address to be true and accurate. You don't need to go and visit them to make sure which isn't always feasible. As a result, you would have continued on with the sale.

Where can I buy a certificate?

InnoHosting has issued thousands of SSL certificates already and includes them for free on most web hosting plans. If you have a web hosting account with InnoHosting, then we will install the SSL and make sure it's working free of charge.

You can purchase highly discounted GeoTrust certificates from InnoHosting that will be issued to you directly from GeoTrust. The only difference is the price, everything else is the same as advertised on the GeoTrust website. Due to the volume of SSL's we supply we are able to offer SSL certificates at a low price.

Visit http://InnoHosting.com/ssl.htm to purchase your SSL certificate.

Reseller Hosting with WHMCS

The common question we receive is how to manage the billing & automation aspects of your web hosting company. With InnoHosting Reseller accounts, we bundle in WHMCS for free with our reseller hosting packages (Business, Professional and Enterprise reseller hosting packages).

We bundle in a lot of extras which all integrate into the WHMCS billing system to automate a vast amount of your daily processes.

Billing Automation

Billing is probably one of the most labour intensive tasks you'll end up doing, however because of WHMCS being bundled in with our reseller hosting packages, nearly all of it can be automated. WHMCS will automate:

• Invoice generation
  Will generate invoices on due dates
• Invoice payment tracking
  When a customer pays, the invoice will be marked as paid and the next due date incremented
• Payment reminders & overdue reminders
  Payment reminders are sent before the due date letting the client know their invoice has to be paid soon, when the invoice becomes overdue, overdue reminders are sent.
• Account suspensions and terminations
  Accounts that become overdue by a predefined number of days can be automatically suspended, and eventually terminated. This option can be turned on/off in case you want to manage things manually
• Late Fees
  A late fee can be added automatically. This can be a set amount or a certain percentage of the total due. Late fees can encourage customers to pay early and on time.
• Account cancellation requests
  Customers requesting their account be cancelled can be automatically terminated at the end of their billing cycle
• Automatic account set up
  New orders can be set up and installed upon successful payment by the customer. A welcome email is then dispatched to the customer with their login details.
  

Plus much more perks. As you can see, it can automate a good deal of your web hosting administrative operations.

Domain Registration & SSL Certificates

A feature I quite like is the automation of domains and SSL certificates. No more do you have to manually register a domain name for the web hosting, it can be fully automated. To do this you need a domain reseller in order to sell domains under your own brand. Lucky for you, InnoHosting bundles one in for free. Not only that, but our prices are one of the cheapest in the industry allowing you to set some pretty good margins.

Likewise, SSL certificates can be automatically set up. To do this you'll need an SSL reseller account.. We provide one of those too!

Fraud Protection

One of the many problems facing web hosting companies is fraudulent sign ups. It can be a long manual process verifying all the information manually. However WHMCS bundle in a fraud module and a free MaxMind minFraud account. InnoHosting customers benefit from this too.

New sign ups will be screened and a variety of information checked & verified. This includes cross referencing their telephone number & address with IP they signed up with to see if the locations match, checking if they used a proxy server and much more. A fraud score is determined. You can set orders of a certain score to be rejected or an automated call be placed to verify the phone number.

The above are just three main things which are used regularly. WHMCS offers a lot of other extras which I haven't mentioned above (see whmcs.com for full details).

InnoHosting customers on the following reseller hosting packages come with a free WHMCS license: Business, Professional, Enterprise.

All our Virtual Private Server (VPS hosting) package come with a free WHMCS license too.

For more information on InnoHosting web hosting and reseller hosting services, please see our site at http://www.InnoHosting.com

Web Hosting Business: Returning to Profitability

For those with 1 month+ experience in this industry will know, web hosting it isn't easy. Many hosting companies enter the industry everyday and likewise, many exit.

Most people exit because they struggle to obtain customers and stay profitable. However, there are basic steps you can take to maximise your profit margin..

When your hosting business isn't doing so well, you would be surprised how beneficial it is to get rid of some costs.

One way I have noticed smart companies doing is by consolidating and downgrading. What's the point of having your own dedicated server for just 20 or 30 customers? You have license fees to pay, server security to handle, server management to handle, support for the web hosting customers and much more. Spending $400 a month while only bringing in $180 a month (under the assumption each customer pays $6 per month) is an absolute waste of money.

Put it this way, if someone came to you and offered you another 20 or 30 customers, would you be happy about it? Sure you would, that's another $180 a month. What if they doubled that, offered you 40 to 60 customers overnight? Yup, you'd be over the moon with that amount.. Well, you have the power to do that at any point.. Rather than increase income by that much (while increasing your costs), why not decrease your costs? Why not make a saving equal to you acquiring 40 or 60 customers? Downgrade that server into something more appropriate for your customer base. Not just to a VPS, but downgrade to a reseller hosting account.

We have some customers hosting 300 to 400 accounts with us spread across multiple servers using multiple reseller accounts. The same server that would cost you $400 a month to run and maintain, our customers have been able to reduce it to just roughly, $100 a month. And what if you factor in the support costs? If you outsource, you're looking at at least another $350 a month.. So a total of $750 a month to maintain a full server. With an InnoHosting reseller account, the support is included. We handle the support questions your customers send you under your brand name. Better yet, the option can be switched on and off instantly at anytime. You can handle support yourself, or let us do it.. Or mix & match it..

Total saving: $650 a month!

They don't need to worry about backups, pay license fees or any of that.. It's all managed and maintained. They don't need to do any worrying about the server being up, nor are they alone in the situation. They are rest assured knowing they can fall back on us. They know we are here with them and helping them through any disaster or downtime they encounter. They feel comfortable knowing they have a team with various skills & expertise which they can ask for help and come up with solutions.

Some may say there is a lack of control...This does have some truth. But you need to consider what control do you actually need? The software you need is installed, configured & set up, the features are included at our expense and popular scripts work fine.. Things that are disabled are things you will end up disabling yourself due to the security risks..

For a while now reseller web hosting by some has been perceived as not serious..But many look to the masses. The ones offering unlimited everything for next to nothing. Those environments aren't suitable for a web hosting business. You can't reliably run a web hosting business with a company offering large amounts of space etc. for $8 to $10 a month. It isn't viable.. You're going to be trusting your business with this company, is $8-$10 a serious amount for that company to even take their business seriously nevermind yours? They don't have a viable business model, they won't be in business for long.. They may be the flavour ofthe month, but that's as far as it will typically go. Good news is with InnoHosting, things are realistically priced, already managing thousands of reseller web hosting customers and have been in business for 6 years with a track history to prove it.

Especially with our reseller hosting accounts, we've included the bulk of what you need to get up and running quickly. Whether you're looking to sell web hosting as your main business or you're looking to offer it as an additional revenue stream. We have it all bundled in. The SSL certificate (RapidSSL) is included free, the support desk software is included free, the legal document side of things (terms of service etc.) is included, web site templates, support infrastructure, cPanel web hosting control panel, website builder, billing software (WHMCS and ClientExec) & much more. Things which would initially cost you hundreds and hundreds more to maintain are all bundled - free.

Let's look at costs you will have if you do it alone:
- Support costs (assuming you will outsource) - $350 a month
- Server costs - $300 a month
- License fees - $100 a month
- Server management - $150 a month
- Server backups - $150 a month
- Additional 3rd party software - $100 a month (ball park figure, it really depends on what you decide on).
Total monthly cost: $1,150 a month
It will cost you $1,150 a month for a decent web hosting set up. And that's not even including your time.

That is the bulk of your web hosting costs. In majority of cases, it is all of your web hosting costs.

So let's look at the things you cut down on by moving to an InnoHosting reseller web hosting account.
- Support costs (assuming you will outsource) - $0 a month
- Server costs - $26.95 a month (assuming you purchase a Professional reseller hosting account from InnoHosting)
- License fees - $0 a month
- Server management - $0 a month
- Server backups - $0 a month
- Additional 3rd party software - $0 a month (ball park figure, it really depends on what you decide on).
Total monthly cost: $26.95 a month
You save: $1,123.05 a month!

Imagine having an extra $1,123.05 a month to spend elsewhere or a treat for yourself. You can actually have all of this done within a few days.

Interested? Get in touch with us today.. Schedule a phone call and we'll design a migration strategy for you detailing how everything will be handled (we'll manage your server migration too).. Contact us at https://support.InnoHosting.com

Starting a Web Hosting Company - Obstacles

As with any company, you're going to run into obstacles. You will face new challenges almost every day, and how you deal with those challenges will determine if you come out stronger, or so damaged you end up closing up shop..

The key here is proper planning. From the very basics all the way to the most complex, you need to have a plan of action written down that you're going to follow. As you face each challenge, you would then be able to consult your strategy and deal with it logically.

For example, some challenges you will face:
- Drop in sales
- Increase in cancellations
- Shortage of funds
- Downtime
- Mistakes in service
- Angry customers
- Negative Reviews
- Downtime
- Increased Competition

Just to name a few. You can combat all of the above easily.. Let's take negative reviews for example. So long as you are providing a good service, are confident you have done everything in your power to ensure satisfaction, have been professional and offered resolutions to the customer, then you have nothing to worry about. In your plan of action, make sure you have a strategy for handling bad reviews, don't just go in all guns blazing.

A part of my process to maintain quality is making sure my attention is where it is needed most. I can't possibly monitor all tickets, and not all tickets require monitoring, however it is important you don't miss important tickets out.. A good filter I put in place, is monitoring tickets that have too many back & forth replies. If something isn't resolved within the first few replies, then typically, something is wrong. I will monitor those tickets and see why it is taking so long to resolve. I will go back and consult whoever worked on the ticket and ask why this is taking so long. I typically intervene at that point, implement a structured approach to resolution.

Let's take another example.. Increased competition. Competition is just a way of business. I know a few hosts, in particular one small mainly UK web host that seems obsessed with what we do. Going as far as copying our plan names word for word, our site structure, type of wording, services we offer and even under cutting the prices. Should we be worried? Nope, not at all. A company that copies is always one step behind. Always a minute too late in getting the sale. Lack innovation and shows their inability to come up with their own ideas. Only sees what's on the outside, but isn't aware of the internal processes which ensure we deliver what we promise. We need a little bit of a pinch to keep the heat on, increase our efforts and eliminate the competition. We have a plan of action which keeps such companies at bay. It is a good idea for you to have one too, as ultimately, you will one day face such a scenario too and it will be important for you to stay ahead of the game.. Web Hosting isn't an easy industry, it's not just about getting a reseller account and a website.. You need to make sure you can get the sale, you need to make sure you give your customers a better reason other than price to sign up with you.

Having a plan of action will ensure you are prepared and equipped to handle the many challenges you are going to face.

Starting a Web Hosting Company - Achieving Your Goals

In my previous post, I discussed the planning stages for starting your web hosting company. Hopefully by now you have a clear set of objectives, aims and goals for the direction your web hosting company is going to take.

In this article, I'm going to discuss the approach in achieving your objectives, aims and goals for your web hosting company.

We'll refer to my previous example in the last post - Gaining an understanding.

This bit involves a lot of quick wins, so crossing items off and seeing it get shorter will hopefully give you some motivation in carrying on..

First thing was what tools will you need. I listed what potential software will be needed. The essentials include a billing system, support desk system and a payment gateway.

If you're an InnoHosting customer and on one of our reseller hosting plans, then you will already be equipped with the essentials. The billing system we provide for example is WHMCS which is quickly becoming (if not already) a leading billing system for web hosters. It includes a help desk system already, so that's two down already..

The payment gateway.. there are many to choose from. If you are in Europe or the US, it would be fairly easy to get a credit card processing system in place. If not, don't worry, many systems are available.

First and foremost you have PayPal. A popular choice and I think regardless of whatever else you offer, PayPal should be one of them, at all times. Many prefer to pay by PayPal because of the sense of security they get and also the ease of use..

For credit card processing, 2checkout.com is a good place to start. While you won't be directly processing credit cards, it will give your customers the ability to pay you via credit card easily.

You are also free to browse round and see what other services are available. A good start is looking at the payment modules WHMCS supports. Go through each and every one of them looking for reviews and seeing if they match your requirements.. Give them a call and discuss your needs. If they don't answer during office hours, that isn't a good sign. You're going to be trusting your money with them, you want to be sure you can be assisted promptly if something goes awry..

Next things are the extras you want to provide. Email accounts, sitebuilders, MySQL databases. If you're an InnoHosting customer, then you will have all those ready to offer your customers free of charge.. If not, then take time to evaluate which one will truly bring the most value. The systems you implement should have a real use and provide value to the service. Don't just add things which people aren't going to use.

By getting the elementary foundation set up, you'll get some quick wins in terms of crossing items off your list. Make sure you take the time to go through these things properly. What I have mentioned above are just examples, it doesn't mean you should offer them.

Many rush into things and want to open their doors for business asap without proper planning. Those that do this will manage to open their doors quickly, but then find themselves struggling to get customers. With so many hosts around, proper planning is crucial in ensuring you stand out from the crowd.

Starting a Web Hosting Company - The Planning Stages

So you've decided to start your own web hosting company. Either you're tired of the quality of some hosts and you want to be your own host, want to add extra income and a value added service to your existing business or you just want to start a company. Whatever the reason, you have decided you want a web hosting company.

Starting a web hosting company, just like any other business, is a long and difficult process.. Don't expect that by setting up shop things will just "work out". They won't - you need to make it work out. You need to put in many hours of your time have the self discipline to motivate yourself. It won't be easy - but it can be done.

Before embarking on your journey, it's good to plan things out and have a strategy in place. Don't jump in blindly.. Decide the following:
- Where you want to be
- How you are going to achieve it
- What obstacles will you run into

Now, be careful here.. Don't be vague.. I expect you to elaborate on the 3 points above so it is at least a page long..In this post, I want to go through your planning stages.. things to do before you start your web hosting company.

Where You Want To Be?
Here you need to be realistic, but ambitious too. You don't want anything too easy.. yet you don't want to plan for something which you are unlikely to achieve..

In this section you want to detail your end goal. The goal which when you achieve you can sit back and say "I did it".. How you are going to achieve your end goal should be broken down into small chunks.. These small chunks will be your objectives. Short/Medium term objectives that you must achieve as part of reaching your goal.

You can start off with a bullet point list. I find starting from a high abstract view and then elaborating the best way to get your ideas on paper and in an organised matter without missing out important information..

So let's consider this scenario - You want to be self employed and run a successful company. You decide web hosting is ideal since you have a personal interest and the low barriers of entry..Excellent.

Where do you want to be? The largest & most successful? Don't we all? That's an example of an unrealistic goal to put down.. This is not to say you won't be the largest & most successful.. But the goal is too vague.. We need to be more specific.. In this scenario, you want to be renowned as a newbie friendly web host. You want to attract customers that are new to web hosting. Those are the type of customers that want things to just work and don't care for the specifics. They don't care your server has 16 cores, they don't care you have redundant power supplies.. They just want their web site up and working.

So let's write that down.

Be Renowned as a newbie friendly web host

Don't bother with using professional names or long words in this strategy. It doesn't have to be formal or professional. It's for you. It needs to be clear and concise. It needs to be in a format you can understand and use.

Now, for the objectives..This is where we get a little more specific. How can we be renowned for being a newbie friendly web hosting company? Well, the first step would be to gain an understanding of what it takes to become a newbie friendly web hosting company. So gaining an understanding would be your first objective. Let's write it down..

Gain an understanding of what it takes

It may not be an ambitious objective, it's actually pretty straight forward.. And doesn't sound too exciting.. But it's necessary for two reasons:
1. It is vital to do the necessary research
2. It's an easy start. Once you achieve it, you can cross it off your list - Progress already!

Feel free to expand on the objectives too.. For example, I could expand on the above with a few aims in order to reach the objective.

Gain an understanding of what it takes
- What tools will you need?
--- Will need easy to use helpdesk system
----- System should have a built in knowledge base
--- Will need payment systems
----- Automatic credit card processing
----- PayPal payments
----- Billing System
- What software is best geared for them?
--- A sitebuilder software
----- Must have a web based WYSIWYG editor
----- Have variety of built in templates
--- A control panel system for the customer
----- Control panel will need to be suitably organised so it is easy to use.
----- Control panel must not be daunting to use
- What direct competitors will you have?
--- Host A is a direct competitor
----- Host A offers service X
----- Host A offers service Y
----- Host A has prices Z
--- Host B is a direct competitor
----- Host B has a custom control panel
----- Host B has bundled service xyz for free
----- Host B is at the abc data centre
- What is the potential for this niche?
--- Blogging has become more and more popular and continues to do so
--- Economic situation means more potential people at home.. many may want to look into setting up and online business and are new to the idea
--- Competitors are plenty, but areas for xyz and abc are fully covered by the competitors opening up a potential

Now the above is a very basic example.. Not properly thought out, but really it's to just give you an idea of how to get going..

You have 1 goal, a few objectives, and many aims.. I find the smaller the chunks, the easier they are to achieve and in turn the more progress you will see..

Keep it manageable and organised.. In a tone that is familiar with you.. You may go through a few draft copies before you eventually settle down on a list that you are comfortable.

It doesn't have to be in the format I've put above.. That is just what I am confortable with.. You can do it however you like.

On the next post we will look into the the 2nd objective "How you are going to achieve it?"

Web Hosting Fraud Protection

Fraud, just like in other industries, is a serious problem in the web hosting industry as well. I can never emphasise enough the importance of fraud prevention. Fraudsters not only cause grief to the owner of the credit card/paypal accounts they steal and the web host, but collectively have a damaging impact on the internet. They (greatly) contribute towards spam, phishing, virus/malware/adware distribution and the distribution of pirate software. As a web host, it is your responsibility to do as much as possible to combat fraud.

Those utilising Reseller hosting are just as responsible. You need to use all the resources available to you, your gut feeling and take pro-active measures in preventing fraud.

In this article I would like to go through some steps you can take to prevent fraudsters from gaining acess to your systems.

The article is intended for those offering web hosting on either a shared platform (like reseller hosting) or dedicated platform (such as VPS or dedicated server)..

When you receive an order, it's important to pay attention to detail. Fraudsters are usually signing up with many hosting companies at a time, it's not their money so they don't care how much it costs. Typically fraudsters purchase the more expensive packages to lure the
provider into accepting. They hope they will be blinded by the money and be more interested in the money than doing a proper check. Well, take a good look at that money because it won't be in your account long once the original account holder notices it and disputes the transaction.

Here are some elementary checks you can perform to combat fraud..

1. Check the WHOIS of the domain.
Verify the details of the WHOIS match that of the domain. Check the domain nameserver history. Has this domain been hopping unsually from host to host, is it a new domain.. Does the domain name make sense. Is it using WHOIS privacy? If the details don't match, then prepare to be more thorough.

2. Check address on Google Maps
Although simple, check the address on Google Maps. Does it resolve to a proper location? Does Google return an error? Not a very accurate check, but still work checking nevertheless.

3. Check content of the website
Does the site have any content? If it's been established for a long period of time and has no content, then it raises and eyebrow, but this alone is not enough of a reason to reject as their are legitimate reasons why the content may not be what you expect.

4. Check for spelling errors
Check the information provided. Has everything been spelt correctly? As the user spelt his/her own name, addresses and such correctly?

5. Check for grammatical errors
Do you see grammatical errors in the information provided? Elementary mistakes? No capitalisation, no full stops, incorrect formatting and such.

6. Check password decided
Majority use a password which is hard to guess. What did this user decide? Is it something easy to guess, same as the username?

7. Check for anything out of the ordinary
Check for anything else which doesn't seem normal to you.

8. Telephone verification
Ring the person to check the details with them. If everything checks out, use the opportunity to welcome them to the company and ask them if they have any questions.

If in doubt, ask the customers. Yes, some of them do find it offensive, some of them refuse to give anything further and just say they will go elsewhere, but majority co-operate very well.

Additionally, you can sign up with various agencies to do more thorough checks. For example, InnoHosting on large orders does many in detail checks such as checking the owner of the telephone number provided, credit checks, bank account checks, address checks and more.

The above should be in addition to using an automated service such as MaxMind.