All Reseller Pro customers can now create FTP logins which give FTP access to a specified group of packages (or all if you so wish) at the same time. Rather than having to login (and out) of each FTP account, they will all be displayed and accessible at once through your FTP client.
[Update 29/1/13: You can now also offer multisite hosting through eXtend. Click here to read more and find out how]
Multisite hosting
One of the biggest trends amongst web hosts is “Multisite hosting”. More and more are giving customers the ability to host multiple websites from one account. Now you can do the same.
By using our new “Multisite FTP” feature, you can offer your customers multisite hosting packages. Simply group a customer’s hosting packages together, create their username and password, and they can now access all of their hosting from one single FTP login and screen.
• Create new multisite hosting packages to sell to your customers
• Your customers can access all of their websites from one FTP login
• Group as many packages together as you like
• Set your own prices
This is also a great time saving solution for you, and will speed up your design/ dev work if you have multiple customers across multiple hosting packages that require changes.
Creating groups
To create a group, log in to your RCC and go to “Manage Hosting Accounts”. From here you can create groups by highlighting which packages you wish to group, and then clicking on the “Group” button. Once you are done, you are ready to set up your multisite FTP access.
Setting up multisite FTP
In your RCC, click on the “Master FTP and Multisite” icon. Choose which group who want to set up multisite FTP for, and which domain name the username email should sit on. Once you are happy, simply click the “Create” button.
Now you can log in using an FTP client (such as Filezilla) and access all the sites in that group. The host information your FTP client will ask for is any of the domains that are part of the group (using the format: ftp.domain.com)
If you would like to log in as a single FTP user to access all websites in your Heart Internet account via FTP, you can choose to use our “Master Multisite” feature. This can also be found in the “Master FTP and Multisite” section of your RCC.
SFTP ?
Hi Neil,
We don’t offer SFTP.
Jenni
while still useful it would be better if you had a single FTP login which then listed all of your websites as folders – this is how Fast Hosts used to work and defiantly made working on multiple sites more efficient
I may be misreading what you are suggesting, but this is what the “Master Multisite” does. It lists all your customers’ website folders in one place for you to access. It displays them as folders.
when i tried it with the IP address it would not connect – to connect i needed to put http://ftp.sitename into the host box which would mean i would need to change the host if i wanted to switch between websites?
No, you can edit them all from the same host information. The host name is “ftp.one-of-the-domains-in-the-group.com”. Your username and password are set in the “Master FTP & Multsite” section of your RCC
So you can! i guess the award for blond moment of the week goes to me! i assumed when i could not connect with the IP address on the page that i would need to enter the hosts each time didnt think to check the folders
Thank you for the update its going to be very handy!
Excellent, hope you find it useful.
sounds like a great idea, how ever the security of this scares me a bit, can this be locked down so it can only be used from a certain ip?
Dave,
Thats already in place. You set it from the same page using the “Master FTP Unlock” feature
Cheers
Matt
So what you are saying
1) Just ONE FTP for as many sites as I want to Group?
2) They (the Client) still have their own FTP
3)Can we Backup Groups
Thanks
Davide
Davide,
1) Just ONE FTP for as many sites as I want to Group?
Yes, that is correct
2) They (the Client) still have their own FTP
Yes they do
3) Can we Backup Groups
Yes. Its the same as normal FTP, you can just click, drag and drop the files in to wherever you want to back them up
Cheers,
Matt
Tried to move folder “x” from one domains folder to folder “y” on another domain’s public_html –” Error operation not permitted”
Wayne,
Thanks for the heads up. Can you raise a ticket with support so they can investigatewhich sites this is happening within detail for you?
Cheers
Matt
Does this work with vps? If not is there plans to?
I think this is a bit misleading….
Its not ‘multi site hosting’ its ‘multi site FTP access’ – two totally different things in my opinion.
We don’t have the ability as yet as resellers to offer our customers ‘multi site hosting’ eg “buy one hosting plan, host 3 websites on it” etc. – this is multi site hosting in my mind……
What we have here is better management of FTP accounts for customers that have more than 1 hosting plan with us.
I’m not knocking the feature. Its great, but the terminology you are using in this blog post is very misleading (was for me anyway).
Hopefully this reply might save a reseller spending several hours trying to figure out how to set up ‘multi site hosting’ in hostpay for this new feature…
‘Tim’
The title of this article has changed to suggest multisite… Does this mean the grouped sites will reside on the same server? Hence i can use a single CMS to operate many sites (for the same client)? Or is this still a no go with your guys?
for example wordpress multisite? or Expression Engine Multisite, hell even pyrocms multisite?
I imagine not, but really hope it is now possible. Currently we have to go elsewhere for this type of service…
Tim,
Apologies if you were rooting around HostPay looking for it, but it isn’t managed through that control panel.
It’s not an automated feature and will require manual set up on your part as the reseller, but it allows your customers to access all their websites from one FTP login.
Cheers
Matt
Neil,
We over looked a key aspect of the new feature in the original blog post, so updated the title to reflect this.
The grouped websites can sit across multiple servers, they aren’t moved on to the same web server by the grouping process.
Cheers
Matt
Adam,
This is only available on our reseller hosting platform. If you have cPanel on a VPS you should already have a similar feature.
Cheers
Matt
Hi, it is great resellers can now offer multisite hosting packages, will this be integrated into host pay in some way? Will a client be able setup a new hosting account by themselves or will it have to be done manually by the reseller? I think the only way right now is to give the clients discount codes and make them go through the checkout each time and give them a limit.
Hi Darren,
Thanks, it won’t be implemented into HostPay at this time. Re your second question, if you group the sites and then give the customer one lot of FTP details then they can access everything that way.
Thanks!
Jenni
I agree with Tim on this one – On first look I thought great! Finally I can offer 1 hosting package to a customer who can then create 3 separate sites under 1 login. For example my customer opens their account they have an account which can host 3 separate sites. They have 5 domains on that account and they can assign 3 of the domains to 3 separate hosting under 1 login. They should then be able to upgrade to 5 hosting accounts for their other domain names.
This is what we need – “We don’t have the ability as yet as resellers to offer our customers ‘multi site hosting’ eg “buy one hosting plan, host 3 websites on it” etc. – this is multi site hosting in my mind”
I know this feature you for the muli-ftp is a great “stepping-stone” towards true Multi-Site Hosting.
Thanks
Chris
I agree with Tim….it seems we are being left behind in the “host multi-site” stakes….people will be thinking this is add-on domains
Got to agree with Tim, V confusing especially the e-mail just sent out! Ideally a Hostpay feature where the user can purchase a hosting account which allows xx amount of websites is what’s really needed. Even if this Meant being sold as an add-on at additional cost to myself.
I think Darren is correct….and once again HI are not answering the question….or choosing which bits to answer.This isn’t buy one hosting package host multiple sites this is just “make it easier for the customer” to manage all their sites in one login.What this is not is add-on domains which is what we all want.Once we get that I think everyone will be happy and HI will be getting a lot more resellers on board.I too had a bit of wee come out when I saw this but when I read it ….it wasn’t what I thought it was.
This is a very welcome feature. It great that you continue to develop what is already and excellent service.
I concur with Neil, it would be good if we could move to having an option for secure ftp as well.
Hi there, thanks for continued development of the reseller programme – all good stuff.
But just to clarify re “selling” “multi-site” products on hostpay:
Can we now set up a product the has a single price but allows the customer to run a number of websites- for example the new product is called “3 Site Package” and the customer can set up 3 different websites with different domains using the single product purchase?
Thanks, JK
Danny,
If I left any part of the question unanswered, it wasn’t intentional. Which bit did I leave out?
Cheers
Matt
JK,
This feature is not currently available through HostPay, It requires manual set up in your RCC.
Cheers
Matt
I see this as a feature which could be useful, but what I would really like is better hosting of subdomains, where each subdomain is hosted on its own server, rather than in a folder within the root domain’s public_html folder. Then a subdomain’s files can never be deleted accidentally, which is currently a danger.
Subdomains are great for creating separate sites within the same company or organisation, but when there’s a danger that an entire site can be deleted or messed up while editing another in the same folder it’s not worth the risk.
thats ssh, you have to signup for that for all hosting account in the group
it can easy be done on there system as its setup to work in there own hosting pro, but they are just not doing it, i have no idea why, i be thinking its to help with security as it helps to hack more than 1 website, but they can always map the domain to there own root using the same way they are doing the ftp side of thing and making it linked to 1 control panel if needed,
but if it was just security why is it working without problems from there hosting pro accounts???
(i hope they do not remove this reply as its as very good info for all resellers)
We haven’t implemented multi-site hosting through HostPay or through eXtend, and we haven’t made any claim that we have. We know this is a feature a lot of resellers want, and it is absolutely on our road map.
The current multi-site FTP feature does allow you to offer multi-site hosting through an FTP client, but we haven’t said any thing to the contrary.
Pablo,
We’ve given step by step instructions in how to use it in the blog post above. Our intention was never to be confusing, and we have tried to be clear on how th feature works. You can ungroup websites using the ‘ungroup’ button.
The domains are not sat on the same hosting account, but they can be edited and managed from one FTP login.
Cheers
Matt
Have to say that there’s a distinct feeling of dogs and bones here. OK so the term is ambiguous but I had no difficulty seeing what HI was offering and I welcome it.
Just wanted to say, I set up “Multi ftp” last night and I think it’s great…One FTP account and I can see all my clients in their own little groups…So easier then opening different FTP’s all the time….
One thing I would like to say Now that you have done this..Please sort out Mysql back up as I think it needs sorting ASAP…its not multi as you can only do a few at a time
Many Thanks
Davide
This is a very handy and time saving feature. Thanks HI.
I don’t think it is ‘true’ multi site hosting how I believe MSH is set up. I also don’t think HI are being misleading, devious or anything else, as they have created a new inclusive, no extra charge feature for resellers. For myself, it will save me an awful lot of time flirting in and out of FTP accounts.
Where as resellers, when we login as a superuser, this gives us the dropdown to any hosting account at the top of the control panel. I think what the people who have mentioned earlier in this thread would like to see for selling true multi site hosting, is the availability for a customer who may have 5 websites hosted with a HI reseller to have the dropdown at the top of say a ‘lead account’ control panel, which would then mean customers really only have to remember one login.
Basically the reseller superuser feature made available as multi site hosting to our punters.
I hope I haven’t warbled on and you get the gist of what I see as true multi site hosting.
All in all, HI is still the best VFM and most importantly provide superb support.
Regards, Billy S