The harsh reality is that when you offer web hosting to clients, they simply don’t care HOW it works! All the clients really want to know is that their website is secure, reliable, and ultimately gives a GREAT impression to their prospective customers.
A good – or bad – hosting provider can make or break that agency-client relationship.
Starting and Growing a Business Isn’t Always That Different
I am Pete Everitt, a digital entrepreneur. I’ve built a successful digital agency, run a podcast and a digital academy, and I’ve co-founded SEOHive, a white-label SEO service equipping and educating agency owners to sell and deliver recurring services to their clients.
My relationship with Cloudways started four years ago, from the 1st month of my digital agency, SO….
When setting up the business, I carried out a lot of the development work myself along with sales, marketing, project management, and finance, etc. Finding a reliable and scalable web host was crucial in those days because I simply didn’t have the time to worry about complex hosting setups or transferring sites from one server to another.
Enter Cloudways.
I built and tested the first iteration of the SO… website on a Cloudways staging address and took it live within the first month of launching the business.
That’s how my relationship with Cloudways began.
Since that time, as the business found its feet and started to grow into six figures, it was important for me that Cloudways stayed flexible with their offerings. Thankfully, they lived up to my expectations.
Cloudways gave SO… a platform to offer multiple levels of hosting contracts.
This meant that as my clients’ list grew – and their requirements became more unique – Cloudways was able to provide and maintain a reliable service that I had total confidence in.
Moving From a Customer to an Advocate
Apart from the Agency, I run the Marketing Development Podcast and Marketing Development Academy. These initiatives help support Marketing Consultants and other Marketing Professionals develop their skills, businesses, and careers through exploring the broader themes of marketing and allowing them to dig deep into particular topics through online courses.
Naturally, I turned to Cloudways to host this little ecosystem, and now I run dedicated hosting resources to power my learning management system (LMS), sales, funnels, and general hosting.
Through my courses, I’ve been able to refer Cloudways to others to help build their businesses and processes.
One of the key things I’ve learned through my podcasts and courses is that openness and willingness to share the “behind the scenes” setup goes a long way in building trust and adding value for my target audience.
The simplicity of the Cloudways dashboard and tools, like the Website Migrator plugin, means that I always have the confidence to share this with my audience and recommend the service to all influencers in the Digital Agency space.
The Results of Good Hosting Speak for Themselves
In our line of work, a bad experience for a customer can do more damage to our reputation than a positive one. This is why those of us who use third-party services, like Cloudways, that have direct consequences on our clients (and their end-users) need to ask the following questions:
- Is this service going to meet (or even better, exceed) my and my clients’ expectations?
- Is my data (along with my clients’) going to be safe and be treated responsibly?
- Can this service change over time to accommodate all the quirks that come along with growth?
- Does the service have the infrastructure to support me in managing my clients?
- Can I trust this service with my reputation?
Only if you can answer a resounding “YES” to all of those questions would I recommend that you proceed with any service!
In my experience of over 4 years with Cloudways, not only have they met, but they’ve exceeded my expectations
I have a hosting environment with 20 servers supporting over 100 clients, but I sleep well at night knowing that Cloudways has me covered.
True success for any Digital Agency is the success of its clients. A proactive and reliable website host with a progressive outlook gives you the tools you need to ensure success well into the future and to help your clients make more money as well. That’s what Cloudways has done for me.
Ask yourself – are you giving your clients the best platform for success, or do you need to consider Cloudways?
Sarim Javaid
Sarim Javaid is a Sr. Content Marketing Manager at Cloudways, where his role involves shaping compelling narratives and strategic content. Skilled at crafting cohesive stories from a flurry of ideas, Sarim's writing is driven by curiosity and a deep fascination with Google's evolving algorithms. Beyond the professional sphere, he's a music and art admirer and an overly-excited person.
