Knowledgebase

One of the most common questions we get from Resellers is how much do we charge to upgrade a Reseller Hosting package?

If you're using our Startup Hero package, you can upgrade to our Entrepreneur.  If you're on our Entrepreneur you can upgrade to our Corporate.

But what if you're already on the Corporate?

You have two options:

1. Upgrade to a VPS hosting package
2. Buy another Reseller hosting package

The majority of our Resellers choose option two.  The largest AppsGators Resellers have 5 - 20 different Reseller hosting packages.

They then use WHMCS to rotate through these packages, to fill the one with the least number of customers.

This creates a high level of redundancy, since all customers aren't placed on the same server/node. This also provides a very cost-effective way to scale your business without having to buy your own servers.

Purchase Another Reseller Account

The first step to getting this setup, is to buy another Reseller Hosting package:

Personally, I recommend going with the Startup Hero package as you can always upgrade it to the Entrepreneur later.  This helps keep your costs low.

If you're wanting to use your same primary domain as your nameservers, you can sign-up using a subdomain.  Simply select the third option during the order process:

In my example, my primary reseller domain is resellerhostingus.com.

For my new package, I'm going to be setting up ns3.resellerhostingus.com and ns4.resellerhostingus.com as nameservers for my customers.  Therefore I'm going to signup using the ns3.resellerhostingus.com subdomain to help keep track.

I then choose my payment period:

Remember, we reward customers who choose to signup for a longer pay period with a discount, therefore I recommend going with the 24 month price.  Reseller hosting is all about ROI, so why not make the most?  More profits!

It's then probably a good idea to add a dedicated IP address so your customers will have a higher level of email deliverability.  This will greatly cut back on your support requests:

You're then ready to complete the checkout process:

Register Your Nameservers

Once your new package has been ordered, the first thing you need to do is setup the nameservers that your customers are going to be using to connect to it.

First, we have to register them on the domain registry level.

If you registered your domain with us (which will make this process a thousand times easier) you can easily navigate to My Domains -> Select Domain -> Private Name Servers:

For this package, I'm going to create ns3.resellerhostingus.com and ns4.resellerhostingus.com.

To get the IP addresses, I open in a new window, the Reseller package I just ordered:

You can ignore ns1.ns3.resellerhostingus.com / ns2.ns3.resellerhostingus.com.  In my opinion that looks sloppy, so we're going to customize them.  You just need to know the IPs.

Back to My Domains -> Select Domain -> Private Name Servers we enter the IPs:

Click save changes then repeat the process to setup ns4.resellerhostingus.com using the second IP:

Once this is finished, we need to add the A records on resellerhostingus.com is hosted.

In my example, this is on my main Corporate Hero package, not the package I just ordered.

Therefore, in the AppsGators client area, we'll navigate to that package:

Under actions, we need to click Login to WHM.

Once inside WHM we want to go to Edit DNS Zone and click on resellerhostingus.com:

We'll then add the corresponding A records to the nameservers we just registered:

That's it!  You're ready to configure the new package in WHMCS.

Add The New Package To WHMCS

Once your new package is online, your nameservers have been registered, you're ready to add the new package to your WHMCS.

To begin, login to your WHMCS admin area and navigate to Setup -> Products/Services -> Servers:

Then click Add New Server at the top:

You'll then need to fill out some information about your new package.

I like to pull up my welcome email from AppsGators (also archived in our client area) as well as the package home screen in our client area:

You will then fill out the server information which should look something like this:

Name: This is to help you keep track of the server in your WHMCS.  You can use the hostname or just the server name as I did above.

Hostname: This is the hostname of the server.  It will be found under your "Server Information" of your reseller package.

Assigned IP Addresses: You can leave this blank as it's only used for VPS.

Monthly Cost: This is the cost of the new Reseller package.  This helps you track profits in your WHMCS reports.

Datacenter/NOC: This is the provider of the Reseller package, in your case AppsGators.  Your clients WILL NOT see this.

Maximum No. of Accounts: This is the maximum number of clients your WHMCS will add to this package.  I recommend going 25 - 50 depending on how much usage you plan.

Server Status Address: If you want to display a Network Status page inside your WHMCS, you can follow their directions here to set that up.

Enable/Disable: You don't want to check this unless you don't want to start filling this package with customers.

It's then time to enter the nameservers we registered in the beginning.  Remember, this is what is going to connect your customers to this new package:

Finally, you need to enter the server details.  You can get this from your AppsGators welcome email:

Type: You're going to select cPanel as this is the control panel we use.

Username: This is the username to the new Reseller package you just ordered.  It's found in your welcome email.

Password: This is the password to the new Reseller package you just ordered.  It's also found in your welcome email.

API Token: This is generated inside Web Host Manager.  Simply navigate to the AppsGators client area, select the package, then Login to WHM.  You can then generate a new token:

Secure: You'll want to keep this checked as it's highly recommend you use SSL for these connections.

Port: Leave default

Finally, you'll want to click "Test Connection" to make sure you entered everything correctly.  If it fails, you want to check your reseller username/password.

Click Save Changes and the server has been added.

Create A Server Group

Now that the second package has been added, you need to create a server group so your WHMCS will rotate between the correct servers.

Go back to Setup -> Products/Services -> Servers to do this:

This time, click on Create New Group:

You then have some options to fill out:

Name: This can be whatever you wish to call the group.  It is not seen by customers, but helps you keep track of your packages.  For my example, I'm just going to call it US as these servers are located in the United States.

Fill Type: You can choose to add customers to the least full server (what I recommend) or you can manually activate your fill server.

Selected Servers: This allows you to choose the packages of the group, which in our case we only have two.

Click Save Changes and the group has been created.

Assign Your Hosting Products To The Group

Finally, you need to assign your hosting packages to the server group so the system knows to rotate them based on package.

To begin, you need to navigate to your hosting products inside the WHMCS admin -> Setup -> Products/Services -> Products/Services:

Beside the hosting product you wish to add, click the pencil icon:

Then, under the Modules sub tab, you'll select the group:

In my example above, I select the new group we just created (US) and click Save Changes.

That's it!  Now, when a customer signs up for a hosting package, WHMCS will automatically rotate amongst your reseller hosting packages.

This is how to create a reliable infrastructure and keep from overselling your resources!

How To Add A 2nd Reseller Package To Your WHMCS

I filmed a video tutorial where I also walk you through all these step-by-step so you can follow along:

If you have any questions, feel free to comment below!