Liam Eagle: LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

It seems like marketing comes up more than
any other subject in story meetings and on
the pages of this magazine. Of course, marketing
- and all the individual undertakings
that fall under its rather broad umbrella
- is among the most tangible differentiators
among the small-shop and reseller businesses
that make up the vast majority of Web
hosting companies, since most of them are
working with strikingly similar technological
backup. Marketing is worth a little scrutiny.

With this in mind, we chose to close out
2005 with an eye to planning marketing
strategies for the coming year – in our cover
story on that very subject, and in a series of
supplemental articles that highlight a few
specific, and very different, examples of
niche-market Web hosting operations.

Our cover story, written by Dennis McCafferty,
lays out an ideological and practical
framework for designing a plan to get the
most out of your marketing budget in the
coming year. From focusing your efforts on a
specific segment of customers to direct customer
acquisition tactics and communications
and marketing efforts targeting existing
clients, the article dissects the strategic
foundation of a winning marketing strategy.

The targeting of a specific niche is a big
part of marketing for the small Web host.
And we explore that approach this issue
with features examining two very different,
but very parallel, Web hosting niches.

Wayne Epperson’s feature on Christian
Web hosting looks at a segment of hosting
providers that ties faith directly into its policies
and marketing, intentionally distancing
itself from potential markets while finding
strength in an extremely loyal base of customers
that shares its very specific values
and principles.

Adult hosting, almost the antithesis of
Christian hosting, makes its values a big
part of its sales pitch as well. In his feature
on adult Web hosting, Philbert Shih discusses
how the role of the adult Web host has
changed since the days when adult content
was the most technologically demanding
application on the Web.

Marketing successfully takes creativity, vision
and courage, but above all it takes planning.
And we hope this issue will help put your
Web hosting operation on the path to designing
an eff ective plan for 2006.