A great place to start is webmaster forums. Sign up to about 25 forums and build up your profile on each of them. A great for is Web Hosting Talk. you should find more information about advertising your hosting there.
most of our customers come through recommendations (never underestimate word of mouth) our web design services bring a lot of hosting customers as well .
Where did you find so many webmaster forums? I know only 5-7. Sure, I can always enter 'webmaster forums' in Google, but most of returned forums are useless...
Having some really unique offering. It seems like all webhosts are the same now. Customer service and uptime are much more important than price it seems now.
Reviews are big. I would add my site to review sites and coupons sites. A good start would be Web Hosting Coupon Codes. They have a list of a lot of web hosting companies and coupons for each. Lots of people search for coupons for web hosting and this is free exposure. Also, if you do not already have an affiliate program I would get one quick.
That's right. If you don't care that 99% of hosting reviews are fakes. We also run webhosting directory, and you would be surprised to see how many fake reviews are posted about big hosting companies. 99% of hosting reviews about big companies come from single IP
Right so the key is and this is what i would do is to have your customer post reviews based off actual results. This is the honest way of doing things. Which is how my hosting biz is run.
i suggest posting your site in review sites, and ask people that use your service to post reviews, and rate your services. That is i think the best way. also as someone above me said, forums are great. People are constantly looking to improve their sites, technically, design improvement, but also their content. As far as i am concerned i think for a big site, you need a very well organized webhosting provider. Low CPU and Solid Servers are the main things people look for. Also if the prices are right, you will be successful.
As Dreadman said, dont under estimate personal recommendations. Most of my clients come from recommendations by existing clients. I take the time to build personal relationships with my clients, and they know they can come to me for any help / advice. SERVICE is the key to success.