Making a reseach about the demands and host's policies, we'd like to ask people who run he hosting business or just involved in it by some other way to tell how often are they asked for providing the customized accounts?

For us th number is not very huge - mostly people use the given standard plans, but sometimes we get really specialized requests. Is it oftent practice for you?

Clients may also respond, by telling if they would rather prefer custom-tail plan for their webhosting needs or the stadard offers are still more attractive?

Thank you

We don't have any "plans" at all, we will tailor each account to suit the clients.

I only offer shared hosting at this time which is probably why I haven't seen any demand for custom plans. I think the price vs features is too high to in shared hosting for it to make sense. That probably didn't make sense, what I mean is the difference in pricing between plans with vast differences in features isn't high when it comes to shared hosting (in most cases). I could see there being a demand when it comes to VPS and dedicated servers. Even with reseller hosting I've seen some hosts offer a cheaper pricing if you mention that you don't need WHMCS.

Dedicated customizations requests come more often, while shared plans are used as is. People often do not know what they need, and often have really special requirements unable to be met by the standard plans.

Not too often. Usually, most people are satisfied with the offered plans, however sometimes we get such requests, and as it has already been noticed - for dedicated servers.

We only provide shared hosting accounts and it's not very common for requests for custom plans with shared hosting.

Thanks a lot for your answers here.
Lets rephrase question a bit: If you asked about custtom plan on shared or any other web hosting service level would you rather agree to do that or refuse?

Shall rather agree. The clients are the income source, since we have enough physical abilities why not let people choose us for their needs, providing their requirements are not completely mad.

Thanks. My thoughs are about the same. Anybody else to respond?

From a customer service standpoint it makes sense for a hosting provider to make exceptions, but by doing so sooner or later all they will have will be exceptions and a nightmare when it comes to revenue tracking.
If you structure your offerings correctly your clients won't need to ask for exceptions: they will see the value in upgrading to one of your different packages that includes all the additional features they require.

but by doing so sooner or later all they will have will be exceptions and a nightmare when it comes to revenue tracking.

Why? ???

may agree about the reasonability of such way of serving when the physical abilities are allowing to do so. Do not think this will be troublemaking to track revenues from the cusom planned clients, as they are just another client for billing system which doesn't appear to have any dependence on the specifications of the certain account, but just a price

Originally Posted by chrishirst

Why? ???

At a certain point a business will need to take a closer look at it's expenses and revenue. Say, for example, that you are reselling servers, you make an exception for a few clients and give them msSQL for free. (even though it costs you to provide it) Sure, for the first few the expense is covered by revenue from other clients, eventually after enough exceptions your books would show that you are losing money on server rentals, when in fact it is lack of msSQL rental that is causing the problem. Without proper "inventory control" (i.e. encouraging upgrades to more robust packages) and aggressive tracking, exceptions will eventually hit your bottom line in a big way....."where did we put that list of all the clients with free msSQL, we gotta start charging all of them"

I don't believe anyone suggested that any features were "free" in the customisation options.

Usually by offering custom accounts the costs would be allowed for and a commensurate payment made for the features.

By tailoring account packages and features, we actually have better control over how resources are distributed.
By selling features in packages to clients that do not need them, we remove those resources from the server pool thereby wasting them.

We aim at a 15% - 20% undersell of the resources which gives the scope for the "bursting" and reduces the likelyhood of a clients being suspended.

I think nobody select a fixed plan everybody customize his own plan according to the requirements. All the best hosting companies provide this option to satisfy their client needs.

Many companies are able to meet the needs of the web masters if they are not again their TOS.

Customized hosting accounts are preferable because sometimes there are a lot services included in the plan which one might never use so why pay for it.

Customized hosting accounts are preferable because sometimes there are a lot services included in the plan which one might never use so why pay for it.

I bet it is only true for those who have experience in hosting world, while those who are not literate enough in this area will rather prefer fixed set of features.