The hosting model supports hosting of merchants or other businesses by an Internet Service Provider (ISP) or other hosting provider.
There are two possible sides to the hosting business:
- hosted stores
- (optional) a site that allows merchants to locate the stores that are hosted by the provider
In order to manage relationships with the hosted stores, hosting models usually include a hub. This hub provides self-provisioning tools that allow the merchant to create and administer a store, as well as tools that allow the hosting provider to manage all hosted stores.
Hosting providers may also include a site in which merchants can find and access the stores hosted by the provider. This is called a store directory.
The following diagram illustrates an example of hosting.
In this example, the merchant enters the host's site and creates a store that will be hosted by the site. Merchants have access to easy to use self-provisioning tools that allow the merchant to register and to administer a hosted store. When a hosted store is open for business, merchants can access the store via the host's store directory or by entering the hosted store directly.

In this example, the merchant has the option of entering the hosted store or business directly, or browsing the host's site and then being transferred to the hosted store or business.
Hosted stores can be created as either consumer direct or B2B direct stores. In some cases, a single merchant may own multiple stores of different types.
Types of stores
The following diagram illustrates the types of stores that compose the hosting sample.

The sample hosting site contains a hub (hosting hub), two asset stores (catalog asset store and the hosted storefront asset store) as well as the store directory. The hosted storefront asset store can be either a consumer direct or B2B direct store and merchants select the store type when they create a hosted store. The store directory is a listing of all the hosted stores in the site and acts as a gateway to them. The hosted stores are created by using the assets from the two asset stores.
Note that merchants may choose to create their own catalog data, rather than using the catalog defined in a catalog asset store. This variation creates a second implementation of the hosting site, as illustrated in the following diagram:

As you can see, there is no catalog asset store, therefore the store creates its own catalog data.
Extended Site
The Extended Site sample site is similar to the hosting sample, however stores in an Extended Site sample cannot create their own catalog. In this case, all stores have a shared catalog.
To learn more about the types of stores in the hosting business model, as well as who can access those stores and with what tooling, see the related links below.