setting up business website

1more?

im about to embark on a new business venture & need a website

now ive googled make a website & there a so many companies im finding it mind blowing
please can sombody give me the idiots guide
i need a domain
website with a few pages
be able to take sercure payments
& how much should i pay ?

thank you so much

Scho

The design will all depend on how much you want to spend or if you're happy and technically minded enough to do a DIY job.

Domains and hosting shouldn't cost much, £10 for a .co.uk domain reg for 2 yrs but google Nominet and check for if its been taken yet. Hosting packages are variable but all depend on how much traffic and how much content you will have. This would be anything from £50-ish to £100 if it's for a SME really.

Do a web search on local web design companies in your area, check out their portfolios and then ask them for a general quote based on x number of pages with a merchant payment page etc. If you're not tech savvy to update it on your own using applications then having a CMS is always worthwhile if provided by a company (hosting or design company) and will make adding and editing easier later.

1more?

scho i think i can do it myself i just dont know what i need
one company i looked at was offering ssl sercurity as extra ?

& google add words ?
i want to be found online how do i ensure im near the top of the search ?

paddyrg

Honestly, with the questions you're asking, you may find you're not ready to build your own web business site (unless you use something like google sites and stick with that)

Scho

If you're offering online payments then you will need security (SSL) for that stage but it may be simpler to farm this off to another company and let them handle all the gumf and let you deal with the website content etc and just send them the invoice details and amounts to be piad, they do the transaction in a full secure website, and then redirect the user back. You may have seen this on websites yourself.
A relative of mine (well my Godmother's son!) runs a hand-made soap biz with associated website and they use 'RBS Worldpay' for their transactions so may be worth investigating that aspect.

As for the DIY design; try and search for free web design tools though Dreamweaver was always the best I found though not free as well as maybe some do and donts of web design. Flashig images, scrolling text are generally bad. See RyanAir's website for evidence!

1more?

thanks both i wasnt going to do it all alone a friend has set up her own website & i think its great but she doesnt except money its just an info site

Scho

paddyrg wrote: »

Honestly, with the questions you're asking, you may find you're not ready to build your own web business site (unless you use something like google sites and stick with that)

True but we all have to start somewhere otherwise we'd never do anything!

paddyrg

Scho wrote: »

True but we all have to start somewhere otherwise we'd never do anything!

Absolutely! But a site representing ones business is probably not the place to start (or look all 1994!!)

OP - give it a go by all means, just be aware it is harder to do a decent job than you may think, and you want to steer well clear of anything other than straight info on the site as poor interaction is where most security vulnerabilities get built in!