Making up a website

hjb123

Hi,

Am wondering if anyone has any idea of the cost of getting a website made up? The website would be for a holiday cottage and we already have a web address that we seem to be unable to access as we made it up when we started with freeserve, and have now come through wanadoo and am now with orange. The website is looking very dated as it is about 10 years old now or thereabouts and I started doing a new website through 1&1 or whatever they are called and got a domain.

Just wondered if anyone knew a rough price for getting the website done and how to go about it really?!

Thanks!

Astaroth

There are many ways to go about it and the cost can range from totally free to realistically a couple of grand.

What sort of functionality are you wanting? Do you want it to be simply so people can view the cottage and then contact you by phone/ email/ form to inquire? Do you want an online booking and payment system so visitors can see in real time if it will be free when they want it? Do you want it to be able to "feed" into some of the aggregator websites including the real time availability?

Needless to say the more functionality you want the more cost it will incur but running costs will remain more or less the same.

Also, remember that it is an investment, a 15 year old with an illegal copy of Dreamweaver can probably knock together something that looks ok but design is only part of what you should be paying for, SEO, usability, DDA compliance etc are all other considerations that a "proper" web developer should be considering.

Moneymaker

My friend runs a guest house and he did his own site. He's virtually computer-illiterate so I'm not sure how he managed it! I think he used some on-line "build your own site" software. Knowing him, it didn't cost much!

http://www.edmarlodge.co.uk/

Anyway, feel free to contact him and ask. He's a very helpful bloke. (Note, he may not reply to emails for a few days as he just phoned me to say that all the smoke has come out of his computer. As you know, the manufacturers put smoke into electronic equipment and, if it gets out, the equipment is no use any more).

If you want a really professional job then I can recommend this bloke: http://www.havealook.net/

I don't know him and I'm not on commission. But I know he created this site for another friend of mine:
http://www.coffeebypost.co.uk/

ivavoucher

Hi

There are some very good and easy to use online website builders.

see: http://easywebsitesbuilder.com/index.html

hjb123

Thanks for that guys. I have been trying with online site builders but cant seem to manage it and decided it might look better if someone with a bit more knowledge etc did it! Also our computer is soooooo tempermental most of the time so thought someone with a better computer would have more success which is why we were thinking of paying someone to do it!

The things we would want on the website are:
pictures of the property - inside and out
email form or link through to email us
prices

We wouldnt want an online payment system or even an availability checker - we would let them contact us for that!

to be honest something basic but effective!

Astaroth

For a proper designer you are probably looking at a few hundred quid for a couple of pages and all the proper SEO work. Could probably pick up a cheap and cheerful designer/ teenager for £100 or so but obviously the quality of the design and the "extras" are going to be much more hit or miss... you may strike it luck or may get someone who is terrible.