Once you pass 10 sites, the game changes from "a hosting plan" to "an operations system." What the sane setups have in common:
- Centralized management — ManageWP / MainWP / InstaWP or a panel that does bulk updates, uptime monitoring, and one-click staging across all sites. Doing 20 WordPress cores by hand is how mistakes happen. 🔁
- Isolation between clients. One hacked site shouldn't take down the other 19. Separate accounts/containers, not 20 sites in one cPanel.
- Reseller vs your-own-VPS. Reseller hosting = they handle the server, you handle clients (great to start). A managed VPS/cloud = more margin and control once you have the volume and the skills.
- Billing & handoff clarity — decide up front whether you own the hosting account or the client does. This prevents ugly breakups later. 🤝
- Backups per-site, tested, off the host.
Agency folks: what's your stack for managing many sites, and what would you tell your past self? 🧠
