«Domains reflect the real situation in economy». hoster.by —about domains&and hosting

"If the economy is stagnant, new domains are not really needed. When the economy is good, domains are good too," said Sergey Povalishev, general DIRECTOR of hoster.by. He also spoke live about the prospects of the Belarusian domains, why prices for hosting in Belarus are higher than in neighboring countries and where the $2 hosting comes from.

 

 

Traditionally, there was no smooth growth in the .BY and .BEL zones in 2020. But they did not go minus: the national domain zone grew by a symbolic 258 names, or 0.17%. Sergei Povalishev believes that the registration of domain names is related to the situation in the economy.

 

- No matter what kind of advertising campaign you run, no matter what prices you set for domains, it all comes down to market demand. When you open a new company or line of business, of course, under this need a site. If the economy is stagnant, businesses are closing, of course, the new domains are not very necessary. When the economy is good, so are the domains. Domains reflect the real situation in the economy.

 

According to Sergei Povalishev, the cost of registration is not a key factor.

 

- In Belarus, a domain in the national zone will cost about $12 per year, which, you agree, is not a serious expense for business. In addition, the national domain should not be too cheap, so as not to provoke mass registration for spam.

 

Why are hosting prices higher in Belarus than in its neighbors?

- The hosting provider business around the world only becomes profitable when you really have a lot of customers. "A lot" means hundreds of thousands or even millions of active sites. In Belarus, the market is much smaller than, for example, in RUSSIA, not to mention the countries of Europe or the United States. Accordingly, prices will be higher here," said Sergei Povalishev. - "In addition, we have always focused on quality. And for such a provider, the critical element is professional round the clock technical support. If you are constantly monitoring the state of the servers, if even at night calls and emails are answered by high-class specialists, it is expensive for the company. In our case, we need about 20 engineers to close all customer issues 24/7, including holidays. A small provider with a few hundred sites, unfortunately (or fortunately for us), is not able to maintain a staff of highly qualified professionals who will work 24/7.

 

Sergey Povalishev also listed what difficulties hoster.by faces:

 

limited market: we are already approaching its "ceiling";

lack of access to attractive loans. For example, in Russia, Europe, and the United States, you can get much more favorable terms for the same purchase of equipment. Leasing programs in other countries are also more accessible.

Equipment suppliers themselves (as it happens in Belarus) do not offer low prices, in Russia they are more attractive.

"It all comes down to the fact that the provider wants to quickly increase the customer base to raise prices later. About hosting for $2.

- Everyone initially runs their business differently. Someone creates a company to make a quick buck: now we'll get the customer base and sell it to a bigger player. Fortunately there is no one to buy us, over the years we have acquired dozens of small and medium-sized providers who bet on low prices, - says Sergey Povalishev. - Where does the $2 hosting come from? When you are just entering the market, when you have no experience, no competence, no capabilities in terms of equipment, the only thing you can compete with is the price. Yes, you can pompously state that your goal is to prove that reliable hosting can be cheap. But in the end, it all comes down to the fact that the new provider wants to quickly increase the customer base in order to raise prices later.

 

According to Sergei Povalishev, it is difficult for small hosts to maintain a high level of service.

 

- The banal reason is that they need to invest in equipment, which quickly becomes obsolete. Or, for example, if a small provider has all clients on a single server, there may simply be no backup in case of failure. In our case, if necessary, spare equipment is connected instantly, and we have almost a thousand servers in our server fleet today.