Liam Eagle: LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

Read the Digital Edition – Usually, our cover story is a big feature within the magazine – a lengthy, hopefully insightful look into an issue that is of great and immediate significance to hosting providers. But in those cases, the issue tends to include a lot of other content, not necessarily on the same theme.

Much more rarely, we’ll give over an entire issue to a theme, or a concept – something we want to explore in a kind of detail that isn’t possible in a single article.

This issue is one such case – our Small Business issue. In a series of profiles, we set out to illustrate in great detail the variety in small business IT needs, and the hosting relationships that develop out of those needs.

I might assume, based on the fact that you’re reading this magazine, that you are receptive to – even seeking out – new ideas on how to operate a hosting business. If so, you’ve probably already been exposed to the notion that there is a tremendous opportunity for hosting providers in the growing small business market.

And yet, the term small business is awfully unspecific. Aside from a general sense of size (which, certainly, might offer some insight into IT needs) it doesn’t offer much information about the specific company.

In helping hosts to address the small business market, we set out to help them understand small businesses on a more individual basis, by profiling a series of small businesses that are also web hosting customers, examining their IT needs, as well as their relationships with the hosting providers who support those needs.

Our series of eight small business profiles includes a mobile app developer, Hidden Pineapple; a web designer, Design903; a rock band, Decibilt; a blog, Werd; a contract- and appointments-based business, FM Automation; an online game developer, WoozWorld; an online retailer, Gathered Foods; and a SaaS operator, Vonigo.

Overall, we set out to illustrate a fairly straightforward point that “small business” can mean any number of things, and the size of the hosting needs can vary greatly among businesses of a similar size. In each case, we examine the relationship with the small business’s hosting provider, and illustrate how specializing in the needs of a certain type of customer can help a service provider be prepared to stand out to customers of that particular type.

There are some great stories in here. My hope is that reading this issue will give you a greater appreciation for the scope of what a small business can be, hopefully generate some new excitement and interest in your own customers, and perhaps give you some new ideas about how you can serve them.

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