Wanting to set up a website to sell my paintings

Dinah93

Hi all,



as the title says, I am wanting to create a website in order to have an online forum for selling my paintings. However, I don't know where to start! I am happy to do it myself, as it will need frequently updating/altering as I do new paintings, or sell old ones. My requirements for my site are

• Professional design
• Easy to remember unique website name ie www.mypaintingssite.com rather than www.lotsofrandomletters.com/code/mypaintings
• Easy to update and alter
• Photo hosting where can zoom in on the pictures to see more detail
• Secure online checkout ability
• Multiple pages
• Works on multiple browsers (I don't like IE!)
• Reliable service

So, if anyone could reccomend a book, piece of user-friendly software or something, I would really, really appreciate it. I'm reasonably technical, and good with software (used to be a photographer), but this is a whole new arena to me.


I found office live do a free website thing (Won't let me link) but I have no idea if it is any good, or if I can have a checkout or it will work with Firefox for example. I'm very open to other ideas.

cymru78

Hi
I hope I can help you here.

For hosting I use http://www.freevirtualservers.com/ and I then installed cubecart and away you go.
I also bought my domain through that company and I have also used them in the past.
I currently use them for free hosting as a trial, then if I end up needing to pay due to bandwidth or popularity, then I will go down that route.

Cubecart is very easy to use, but there is no function to zoom in on the pictures to my knowledge.
Also very quick to get it up and running.
For checkout, you can easily use paypal, nochex etc through cubecart

I can also recommend Joomla but I don't think this would be what you are looking for and can take a while to get up and running.

There is also oscommerce, but this can be confusing and sometimes takes a while to get used to all the option.

Zencart is also popular for website building, but I have no experience of this.

ABH_3

Dinah93 wrote: »

Hi all,



as the title says, I am wanting to create a website in order to have an online forum for selling my paintings. However, I don't know where to start! I am happy to do it myself, as it will need frequently updating/altering as I do new paintings, or sell old ones. My requirements for my site are

• Professional design
• Easy to remember unique website name ie www.mypaintingssite.com rather than www.lotsofrandomletters.com/code/mypaintings
• Easy to update and alter
• Photo hosting where can zoom in on the pictures to see more detail
• Secure online checkout ability
• Multiple pages
• Works on multiple browsers (I don't like IE!)
• Reliable service

So, if anyone could reccomend a book, piece of user-friendly software or something, I would really, really appreciate it. I'm reasonably technical, and good with software (used to be a photographer), but this is a whole new arena to me.


I found office live do a free website thing (Won't let me link) but I have no idea if it is any good, or if I can have a checkout or it will work with Firefox for example. I'm very open to other ideas.

There's some information contained in the links here:

NVU free webeditor - lots of videos or 'How to's'.
As well as free templates etc amongst other things.
http://net2.com/nvu/download.html

Free website builder
http://www.webs.com/

Easy site builder with cheap hosting
https://www.one.com/en_GB/

Godaddy - cheap hosting
https://www.godaddy.com/Hosting/Legacy.aspx?ci=7648#tabs

Totalchoice hosting - also quite cheap (I have a domain with them, they've been fine)
http://totalchoicehosting.com/

Heartinternet, rumour has it that these guys sold 123.reg and then set-up heart, they're as good as 123.reg and do their best to be better. I also have a domain with them and use them for purchasing domain names. This is due to some hosters having bots\scripts running that autobuy domains as soon as you look them up, heart don't engage in that sort of thing and I've managed to get every domain I've purchased through them.
http://www.heartinternet.co.uk/

At least two of the links provided offer 'one click' web building, which may interest you. I've no interest in them other than in those I've advised above that I have a domain with or have provided me hosting.

HTH

amcluesent

>I'm very open to other ideas.<

Why not just sell through a portal - http://www.newartcollectors.com/

DatabaseError

lots of 'art' is sold through e-bay

chunter

I did a website for a painter a couple of years ago. The problem with having your own website is getting the footfall.
Unless you're specialising in a particular type of art, you're going to need a considerable marketing budget.
There's an abundance of artists with their own website all killing themselves to get to the top of Google.
I'd go with the portal idea and Ebay to start with. Until you're established. Especially in the current climate.


I got my man to use Paypal checkout so the seller pays a fee when a painting is sold, otherwise the service is completely free.
Alos make sure you create an email subscriber list. Send them an email every time you get a new painting.

Dinah93

Bit of an update, I'm about to purchase some space through one.com. I entirely understand what everyone is saying about needing to market it/get footfall etc and completely agree, however I want to sell my paintings at craft fairs/ebay/ebid etc as well, and I think having my own stand alone website where I can explain about my work, and the prices I charge for commission pieces etc, as well as my own website to put on business cards/promotional information (just been offered my first exhibition!), is an important part of establishing my paintings as a 'brand'.

So, once I purchase my site through one.com, I'm hoping a big button will pop up saying 'build your site here' so I can actually make it look like something, not just own the space!!!

nowtsquared

Have you looked at how foks sell stuff through Google Base and you could use Google sites to develop your ideas before setting sail with your own fully customised pages.
HTH

buglawton

I posted about Jalbum a little while ago:
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=1780441

...as well as being able to host your galleries on either your own site or Jalbum's, there seems to be a built in facility for selling your images using Paypal. Might be worth a look.

faevilangel

to have a zoom in on images will need something like css lightbox
when the user clicks on the image it makes it bigger and blacks out the screen around it

how many would you need to add and do you need a checkout system ? You could use wordpress and add the items individually using the page function then add the paypal code etc

buglawton

Some Jalbum skins offer a read made Lightbox effect in the gallery - loads of free ones to choose from and some premium ones. See http://jalbum.macosxsupport.com/ for one example.