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THE
EARLY DECISIONS |
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How do I choose and protect
a name for my website? |
This is not too
difficult. Firstly, we will show you how to check the availability of
"domain" names that describe your business name as near as possible
- there are literally hundreds of sites where you can check this. We will
then help you register your unique domain name if you don't already have
one.
This registration process takes only a few minutes and costs between £2 to
£10 per year depending on the type of domain name you require (note that
".com" sites cost more than ".co.uk" because they
are more universally recognised throughout the world).
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Do I have to keep the site
on my own computer? |
Small
businesses are not normally set-up with sufficiently sophisticated computer
facilities that can provide an uninterrupted service to people accessing its
website through the internet. We therefore recommend using an affordable
"hosting" service which holds your website on their computers (let's them
have the headache of providing the technology).
The hosting company will
charge depending on the service they provide to you. We will help you choose
an appropriate host for your website and establish your site on their
servers. You can expect to pay around £20-30 per year for this service.
Your site can then be
maintained and modified on your computer and regularly "published" to the
host's servers which make it instantly available to everybody on the
internet.
We recommend using Webhosting UK as a good, reliable and affordable
hosting option
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Will the site be simple or
do I need a custom-built site? |
This will of course depend
on the business, how you intend to promote your business through the
website and quite importantly, your budget.
Simple websites holding basic details of the business
and limited graphics can be created quickly from standard templates in most
website authoring tools - this is the fast-track to developing a simple
website - with very basic sites being available in a matter of hours. They
are usually unencumbered with function and simply provide a contact point
and information source for potential customers.
Custom-built
websites takes a little more thought, planning and time but
normally produce a more useful end-product - and yes, it costs more to
produce.
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Is the site going to change
frequently or rarely? |
If the answer is
frequently (i.e. a dynamic site) and you are planning to make these
changes yourself, you will need appropriate software on your computer to be
able to maintain the site. We will advise what you need to do this.
If rarely (i.e. a
static site) then it might be more cost-effective to pay somebody else (with
time, knowledge and also the appropriate software) to maintain it for you as
and when you need the site changed. We can provide this service.
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Do I need expensive new
software? |
Not always. There are many
different web-authoring tools on the market today. We develop sites
exclusively with Microsoft Front Page and its replacement Microsoft
Expression Web, because that is where our experience
lies. We use all sorts of packages to create and modify graphics but always
create our websites with Front Page or Expression Web.
We know Front Page and Expression Web may not be as
feature-rich as products such as Macromedia produce but they give solid control
over the web-authoring environment with tools that have the same Microsoft
"look and feel" (like Word, Excel, Powerpoint etc.). A copy of MS Front Page
2003 will cost around £90-£100 from Amazon.co.uk. A copy of Expression Web
varies - we can help choose the right package for you.
We will review your system and
help you decide what is appropriate before you make any purchase.
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How do I promote my new site on
the internet? How do I get it noticed? |
Firstly, it is no surprise
that Google is the most-used search engine in the world today. As a Google
registered Webmaster, we can help to get the site noticed by submitting it
for Google indexing. It takes time for this to work through their database
of websites but it should be showing search results within a matter of
weeks.
Secondly, effective and
relevant "meta-tags", "keywords" are essential. Also the more links you have
to/from your site to others, the more noticed you will become. Therefore we
will make a few suggestions about how to work with the flow instead of
against the tide.
Thirdly, you can pay Search
Engine Optimisation (SEO) companies in a variety of ways to promote your
site. Not all of these are reputable so we will work with you to find a
reasonably priced solution that guarantees top 10 placement in the most-used
search engines. There are many different ways to pay SEO's, so let's look at
what's right for you.
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THE PROCESS
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1. Decide on domain name for your website (i.e. www.myweb.co.uk) and confirm
availability
2. Register the domain name through the internet - pay online safely and
securely
3. Select a hosting company to host your website - pay online safely and
securely
4. Register your domain with the hosting company (it may take a few days for
them to organise their servers to host your domain) - they will normally send
confirmation/registration details through email that will contain user-id and
password - keep these details safe because we will need them to publish the
web-pages we create for you.
5. Order and install any additional software you require to enable you to
publish directly from your computer to the host's servers (eg. via Front Page or
Expression Web)
6. Design discussions required to agree the scope and complexity of the website,
including navigation, site map and path through the site
7. From preliminary discussions we can estimate the costs of developing the site
given our understanding of our role and the amount of input required from you during the development process
8. If in agreement we begin development either on-site (if the appropriate tools
are installed) or back at our base
9. We produce a temporary home page for the site, stating a new site is under
construction - with your agreement we publish this to the internet.
11. We normally produce some skeleton screens within the first few days to allow
you to provide feedback on the general style, content & navigation
12. Through discussion with you we refine the requirement and produce
working pages in a test environment
13. We continue to test and refine the requirement through discussion and
involvement with you until we have sufficient working pages to publish
to the internet and allow access to the public
14. Once the site is completed and published to the internet we hand over total
control to you and copy the working version of the site onto your own
computers for on-going maintenance and modifications.
15. As a Google-registered Webmaster, we have the ability to help get your site
noticed through Google searches by following some guidelines and good practices.
This is a service we offer in addition to the website creation and publishing.
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THE COSTS |
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| Domain
Registration |
£5 to £10 per year depending
on the type chosen (for example .co.uk or .com) |
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Website Hosting |
£20 to £30 per year
depending on the service provided (some cost a lot more than this). Small
business sites do not usually need more than the basic offerings. If in doubt, ask
us. |
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Alan's Computer
Services |
Initial one hour consultation £25,
additional web-development @ £20 per hour. As a rough guide you can expect
to pay between £40-60 per page depending on the content. You can help reduce costs by being more involved in the development.
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If you
intend to self-author and self-publish you will need a
web-development tool like Front Page or Expression Web from
Microsoft - otherwise you pay somebody else (like us) to do
it for you.
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MS Front Page
2003 MS Expression Web
(Full licence) |
£90-£100 depending on where
it is purchased - try Amazon.co.uk for starters
£85-250 depending on whether it
is an upgrade, home/student version or full licence.
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