The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Community => Coffee Lounge => Topic started by: WinslowPorker on October 19, 2010, 08:45:28 pm
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Hi folks,
i have just started up a jam making business, only on a small scale but good fun all the same! anyway i have brought myself a web domain, problem is what do i do next? ??? i think i can manage to design the pages but again any advice is more than welcome. next thing is how do i get it on the web?? I really am a total loss ??? ???
All help greatly appreciated
WP :wave:
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Who have you registered the domain name with?
What you need now is hosting - you can pickup some pretty cheap hosting, whats you budget? It maybe easier to host with the same company you have registered your domain name with but you dont have to if its too expensive.
Ta
Barry
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You can get free hosting from microsoft here:-
http://smallbusiness.officelive.com/en-GB/
Ta
Barry
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My poultry site uses a Joomla template and the shop uses prestashop - both very simple!
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Hi WinslowPorker - self employed website designer (not a plug - or just a wee one) if you would like some down to earth advice just call me and I'll help - same to anyone here, clare (Brucklay Pygmy Goats)
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I've got a website through WEBS.
They do free hosting, you can get a free domain name (ending with webs.com) or you can upgrade for a charge to get a custom one. The free package gives you the option of a shop with up to 5 items for sale too. There's loads of templates to choose from and it's easy to use and set up (it's got to be, I managed mine on my own ;))
Have a look at mine
http://www.happyhippydesigns.webs.com/ (http://www.happyhippydesigns.webs.com/)
HTH
Karen x
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Hi all,
Thanks for the advice.
I got the web domain 'jessicasjams.co.uk' ( for all who dont know me Jessica AKA Princess is my daughter) from 123 reg and their hosting ranges from £1.99 - £14.99 a month, but i am totally lost on what the features actually translate to ??? at the moment we do not plan to sell online, but i suppose in the future we may, so probably need to make an allowance for that. I think it comes with web templates. I suppose i just need some advice as to whether this is any good, is their better etc etc.
I am still lost, bust it is getting clearer ;D :wave:
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hi WP
I used the same people as Karen, Webs. I then transferred my own domain to it for a slight price increase.
www.itsbaaathtime.com
I have a shop on there and everything and they help you build it. Its been fine for me but I can appreicate that more web-savvy people would be able to make a site look better :)
Lisa
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I also use 123-reg as my domain name registar - I'd advise sticking with them for hosting too as its a pinch to setup and you dont have to mess with any DNS settings. Anyway enough techno babble.
If you dont need to sell directly from the website then just a simple hosting package will do.
Use the voucher code 'hosting10' for 10% off too :)
Ta
Baz
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Of course it's perfectly possible to do it youself even if you're not particularly expert especially with all the advice and guidance from TASers if you don't feel up to it though you could do what we did and find someone on the people per hour website to do the site, you post a description of the job that you have and people give you quotes, you can check their feedback and pick whoever takes your fancy.
It was the design aspect that we found particularly helpful, we gave them some pictures which they put together to make the header which worked really well and they spent a lot of time finding out what we wanted from the site then giving us plenty of opportunity to play around with it and make sure we were happy. We also got someone from people per hour to design our logo which was much better that my amateur attempts to draw an owl (although the husband was very tactful in his feedback).
www.HootersHall.co.uk
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Nice website, sitc
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There are many ways to get a website set up, its a question of picking the right one for you.
First up is figuring out what you want the site to do for you.
The simplest website is just to treat it more or less like yellow pages - throw up a single page or the usual small selection of pages (home/products/about/contact) that says who you are, what you sell and how to contact you to buy it. With this sort of site, you're probably expecting people to visit it once they already know about you via some other route and be browsing the site to find your contact details. One advantage of this kind of setup is that it requires very little maintainence, you could get away with only thinking about it once a year. In this case, simple 123reg basic hosting might do, if you can find someone who can help with a basic design and few static html pages.
Next step up might be a site that functions more as a store-front or brochure. It would have all the same as the above but in addition a set of pages that you would keep more-or-less up to date with details of all the jams you sell. This kind of richer content might start getting you a bit of traffic from random punters googling for a specific kind of jam, it might also help with getting repeat orders if people can find your new jams, or special offers on old favourites.
In this case, the 123reg plus account with say drupal or joomla to use as a content management system would probably suffice. This kind of site would require a bit more effort on your part though, maybe monthly changes to make sure the product catalogue is up to date.
A slightly fancier option would be the above, but including a blog or other articles about jams, jam making and sundry related topics. This could probably be handled with the same 123 package as above, but would require a lot more commitment form you to provide the content on a regular basis. The upside is that regularly updated quality content is just what you need to get much new traffic from google.
Most basic hosting providers don't seem to provide much in the way of online shopping services and this can be a complicated business to setup yourself. Webs mentioned earlier seems to have a reasonable offering in that regard. The other good news is that there are dedicated providers like shopify that can handle this for you at a later stage if you do choose to go down that route.
I think that's a long enough ramble for this time of night, but my main bit of advice is to spend a bit of time figuring out exactly what you want to do first - I'm sure we can help you find the right tech solution after that's decided. Building a website is often the easy bit compared to finding the regular time to keep it updated and full of good content!
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I've used 123reg for a few years now and always found them to be good. You do need hosting- 123reg charge, but it is simple to use, and they do have free website page builders you can use. Some websites do free hostings alongside easy to use website building programmes. I've just discovered Weebly- http://www.weebly.com (http://www.weebly.com) who I have found pretty good so far.
Claire- how do you get your business for website designing? It is one of the few things my OH is actually qualified for, and I sometimes wonder if he wouldn't be better doing something like that.
Beth
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Hi Beth - 90% of my clients are through word of mouth over 10 years of hard work - they are mostly small to med. businesses wanting a site that works ie found by google not just on the internet. I don't advertise any more as I found it a waste of money only one call coming from Yell in a year, so I try and keep my costs as low as possible, when updates come in get them done quickly etc. Good luck
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123 reg is excellent.
Really simple way and very inexpensive to do.
Set up web forwarding to your free website.
Set up free e-mail forwarding in the control panel.
This website www.weebly.com (http://www.weebly.com) has a very slick easy interface to set up a website & is completely free.
Will be good enough for an info website and is very easy to do.
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We use weebly too - you can chop and change as much as you like or have time for and it really is very simple....even I can do it, a total computer eegit ;D Still loads more to put on, but we have made a start at:
www.scothebs.co.uk
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Fleecewife
just looked at your website. looks fantastic.
love your veggies :carrot: :brocolli: :peas: :pig: :sheep: :chook:
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Thank you Manian :-[ :) I want to make the veggie section much bigger with written details but just no time yet. I also need a much longer lens on my camera to get better pics, especially of sheep.
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I use webs too - used to be a manual web developer back in the days of text editors but can't be bothered to learn the techie updates so just used a template http://kirkcarrion.webs.com
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Well ill be, Ive been doing websites for 12 years and I had never seen Weebly. I was quite impressed, just the job for people who want to do their own thing.
One of my websites was featured on Sky tv this week, voted 2nd best Angling and fishery site on the net ;D I was well chuffed ;) www.emeraldpool.co.uk (http://www.emeraldpool.co.uk)
Odd thing is I never really ever blow me own trumpet and always say I'm so so and not right up with the new mods. Oh well trumpet blown, now I'm going to remove me red face. :-\ :D
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Maybe it's because we're on here because of "what we like to do" and not "what we do to earn money" it's difficult to mix the two - and I don't like to advertise but if someone asks - then help always given, must admit, enjoy talking about the goats more than about websites!!!
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Talking of talking about goats- maybe this would be up your street?
http://www.anglo-nubian.org.uk/ (http://www.anglo-nubian.org.uk/) See the notice on the home page there. Not sure how much the renumeration would be though.
Beth
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Maybe it's because we're on here because of "what we like to do" and not "what we do to earn money" it's difficult to mix the two - and I don't like to advertise but if someone asks - then help always given, must admit, enjoy talking about the goats more than about websites!!!
I couldn't agree more :D If we looked to hard at how much it costs to produce things and what we spent in time from a money point of view, think we would all be checking into the nearest funny farm rather than smallholding ;D
your comment also made me a bit aware of what I had written ??? :-[ So for the record; I should make it clear, that my websites rant done for profit or business. I started doing it when I became so ill as a way of keeping my brain signals going or exercising the grey matter ;) I do however pass on money to charity if its insisted: I only do sites for friends, mostly family they benefit from my activities for nowt, all i can say is what I get from it and animal husbandry ifs priceles, to many people sit and dwell, gotta keep moving while you can, no dowbt in the future ill sit dwell and moan, mind you reckon I went trough a bit where Ive already done that :D I know because my OH reminds me often ;D ;D :D :D
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my turn!
have finally decided to go ahead and set up the business properly so now need to have website and all that is attached to it! Have no money to get someone to set it up for me so I need to go for it myself.....
I will need to keep it updated with changes to my products and will eventually want people to be able to order online as well.
I also want to be able to post recipe suggestions on it.
So do i buy the domain name first and then use whoever (had a look at weebly and liked that) to set up the pages?
and i dont think i understand hosting - is this just someone to support the site? or is it something else?
thanks everyone! ??? ???
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If you do a website through webs you can get a free site & free hosting - no outlay whatsoever - only drawback is you have webs.com at the end instead of .co.uk and some ads on your site - but you can sell up to 5 different price points, have photo's, blogs, forums etc etc etc.
It's who I use and it's really simple to set up, have a wee look !
http://yonderton.webs.com (http://yonderton.webs.com)
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my turn!
have finally decided to go ahead and set up the business properly so now need to have website and all that is attached to it! Have no money to get someone to set it up for me so I need to go for it myself.....
I will need to keep it updated with changes to my products and will eventually want people to be able to order on line as well.
I also want to be able to post recipe suggestions on it.
So do i buy the domain name first and then use whoever (had a look at weebly and liked that) to set up the pages?
and i don't think i understand hosting - is this just someone to support the site? or is it something else?
thanks everyone! ??? ???
So sorry very late reply but Ill try and outline stuff for you :-\ here goes ;D ;D
1/ Website: A site on the web that you add content to so that others can see what you choose to show.
2/ Domain Name: Most Every website has a domain name example is www.theaccidentalsmallholder.net (http://www.theaccidentalsmallholder.net) .co.uk domains can be bought for around £6.00 for two years.
3/ Hosting: A person or company that supplies you space on the web where your website resides, They use a computer (Server) to store your site, you can change your site and add to the server.
The sites mentioned i.e. weebly etc provide all this at no charge and will do what you need for now.
If however you want to sell on the net then you really should have secure sites: Security is something you apply to your site in the form of a certificate and shows customers that they are buying in a safe environment. I have stayed away from e-commerce (Shop sites) up to now; Ive just completed my first shop site for my other half.
If you want anymore info please ask away, anything I'm unsure of I can soon find out and come back to you, I know there are other website builders here as well. hope that helped and didn't confuse you more.
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my 16 year old had to design a website and get it up and running for his ICT GCSE he got an A* and that was 2 years ago at 14! if you know anyone who is doing ICT GCSE at school they could probably knock you what you need up in no time with loads of bells and whistles!!! - probably cost you a McDonalds? That generation can use technology like we can't imagine its second nature to them.
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I missed this - I've 2 sites up on webs.com, one just using the free domain and the other with a bought domain transferred in.
Happy to give you a hand if you're not already up and running, next time I'm over..
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I've done it!! I am so chuffed with myself - and many thanks for every single piece of advice and help, I really appreciate it.
so my site is......
www.laurasallsorts.co.uk (http://www.laurasallsorts.co.uk)
happy to receive feedback - oh and orders of course!!
and i know the mothers day date is wrong - will be changing shortly :)
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Well done, Laura. I've just been asked to set up an easily updated website for a PC eejit friend so might just use one of these systems too.
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Lovely website Laura - and delicious sounding goodies :yum:
I wish you loads of success with it ;D
Karen x :wave:
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Very nice - and any time you need a taste tester for non-meat items, just call ;D
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thanks everyone :)
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Nice job, glad youve got a site off the ground; enjoy