What Are The Best Ways To Design, Produce And Host A Website, And What Are The Price Ranges For Each?
We’re starting a small business & want to create a website. Obviously we want it to look professional but we don’t have much start-up money. What are the best ways to get our website designed, produced & hosted, & what would the price ranges be for each of these activities? Thanks so much in advance!!!
Tags: Best, Design, Host, Price, Produce, Ranges, Ways, Website, What
February 9th, 2010 at 5:30 am
One cost effective route you could consider is using a CMS system. A CMS system stands for Content Management System. A CMS contains all the tools you would need to publish a website & is very expandable. For example Joomla — One of the highest rated CMS systems. http://www.joomla.org
I personally use Joomla myself for both information sites & product driven sites. Now as for making your site look professional you can purchase templates at varying websites for very low investment. I do personally suggest getting a professional logo designer ($100-200) for your top graphic but the template designers do supply you with the “source” files for graphics. Which means you can take their graphic, put it into a graphic editing program, such as Adobe Photoshop (download a free trial if needed) & edit the text to your company name.
A few example sites for Joomla templates are :http://www.joomlart.com http://www.rockettheme.com http://www.joomlashack.com
There will be a learning curve to use the administration functions of Joomla but it is not that difficult & there are many free video & text tutorials on how to use manage Joomla. The installation of Joomla is also very easy most hosts offer “fantastico” in there control panel which allows a one button push install of Joomla. (and other programs)
You will also find a very strong community behind Joomla CMS which is good because you are able to find many free add on extensions which benefit your website. Such as newsletter functions, voice or text customer service, user forums, & many more. You can see lists of common components for Joomla at http://extensions.joomla.org/
Website hosting is a very competitive market so standard hosting packages are relatively low cost. For the majority of websites a basic Linux plan will suffice.
I find Linux to be much faster & cost effective then windows plans. Unless your site is going to be specifically designed in .asp or unitizes specific functions to windows servers I don’t suggest Windows hosting.
I use the plan below myself on multiple websites for the past few years & have never had any issues.
Linux plan :
Winter Special – $4.95! (12 & 24 month plans)http://www.lunarpages.com/id/treespuncom…
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Shell Access Available – $2 per month
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SSI – Server Side Includes
Customizable Error Pages
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POP3
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Email Accounts Unlimited
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Good luck in your search & with your company.
February 9th, 2010 at 7:50 am
I am web-developer,if you want my help,please mail me at bhaskar.gangwani@gmail.com i will explain you everything.
February 9th, 2010 at 10:42 am
If you want to start up a site try bikster.com. For a great designer, that will validate your coding in XHTML & CSS try http://www.giant-design.com/
February 9th, 2010 at 2:26 pm
Emarketed designs a website that looks a professional. They also SEO the site to easily navigate by the visitors.
February 9th, 2010 at 7:48 pm
http://www.vodahost.com
they will give you the software to make the website which is really simple to use & they will give you one free domain name & they will host it for you for cheap.
the one draw back the website is made in such a way that you can only host is with them on there servers so if you want to host your own this is out of the question.
February 9th, 2010 at 8:16 pm
I suggest you visit http://www.hostingcouponoffer.com they come with a free domain name, unlimited webspace & trasfer & a softweare suite which would be sufficient enough to help you design & produce your site.
Also if you were to hire a web developer they could easily use the tools provided.
When you sign up use coupon code 25OFF for 25% off all their plans at $4.84 a month.
February 9th, 2010 at 8:52 pm
As you may know a domain name is just a name, not a real website. If you are going to create your website: 1- Buy a domain name. To get a domain name, you have to pay an annual fee to a registrar for the right to use that name. 2- Buy a web hosting service to provide your online space & enable you to get your website online at your purchased domain name.
To get further information take a look at: http://www.threehosts.com/build
You need a web hosting service which supports online payments like, Master Card, Visa & PayPal. It is very important that your service be uptime. It means that you can access your account whenever you want to update your web pages, & your visitors can view your website whenever they type your website address. If your hosting service is not uptime it is real hell!
If you want to start your website I recommend purchase your domain & hosting together. In this way it is possible to get your domain for free. Some hosting services offer this gift today.
If you want to run a successful e-commerce you must choose a reliable web hosting service. The security of your business directly depends on the security of your hosting service. (Hacker safe)
Take a look at: http://www.threehosts.com/business
There you can reach the three reputable companies that are leaders in the E-commerce web hosting industry. They fulfill all your requirements to sell online. By using each of them, everything you need for your business website is provided in one eCommerce Hosting Package.
Good Luck!
February 10th, 2010 at 2:03 am
One thing that most businesses tend to neglect is their website. Cost is always an issue, especially for start up companies. However, part of the environmental analysis that you should do when entering a market is what drives customers to your future competitors & what they do well.
Most of the time, you will find that even a local company will have at least 7/10 people who visit the store research that company at one time or another. What will your website say about you?
You should always consider what you will expect your needs to come from your website in the future. Websites are a very cheap form of not only advertising, but a way to cut costs by automating & assisting your business operations, generating leads, etc. If you divide out the costs on a per day basis, you won’t find any cheaper marking/customer relationship strategy than a website.
If you are starting out, you need to find someone who will listen to your needs & be someone who can help you in each stage of your business life cycle. Not a lot of web designers are capable of doing that as the general designer is not that good at customer relations & business. That isn’t their forte.
I suggest that you visit http://www.rexibit.com & use their contact form to contact the owner. The owner is a freelancer, but is well versed in the needs of a business & can help you as you start out small & not suffer repercussions from bad planning decisions due to trying to cut costs. He is also quite affordable & will work with your budget.
February 10th, 2010 at 7:07 am
As for design there are many options:
1) Hire a professional design company. (Expensive)
2) Hire Joe Bloggs Son. (Not so expensive)
3) Build it off a free template. (Not so expensive)
As for hosting:
I recommend & personally use:http://www.hostmonsterplus.com
They have unlimited space & transfer.
They give you a free domain for life.
They have php & mysql if you ever use those.
You can also add as many domains (.com, .net, …) as you like so you can have many different sites for 1 hosting price.
They also give you free $50 Google Credits for advertising your site.
It’s only $5.95, it’s the best cost for quality service I’ve found over the years, & the reason I’m still hosted with them.
If you go with them & have any trouble making your site feel free to PM me, I have a lot of experience there.
Whatever you choose, the best luck to you & your new business. Questions are the first step to progress.