Website Advice

kirst87

Hi,

Looking at setting up a website selling homemade products. Want to build this website myself as haven't got the funds at the moment to pay for an expensive website. When building a website for my partners business we brought a package from mrsite, however i did not rate this and have since read bad reviews on it.

After doing a quick look on the internet people have put good reviews for create, has anyone used this site to build there website? or can anyone recommend me a better one for me to use

Many thanks

InsideInsurance

Most will use an engine like OSCommerce or Magneto and create, download a free or buy a template for it.

Personally I would start by testing the market by using something like Etsy before investing in your own site.

stephent82

Setting up a website is pretty easy for the basics, however, costs can add up. Look around and you can get a good deal.

My cost were:
Domain name £2.99 (for.co.uk I also bought a similar .co.uk in addition)/ year
Hosting: £2.99/ month (this is for the 'basic deal', I will need to upgrade to £9.99 eventually
Dedicated IP: £29 (required for the SSL certificate)/ year
SSL Certificate: £5 (I got a very, very good deal sue to knowing people. could cost £50 for a basic cert)/ year

So I am paying about £76 per year for my site (before advertising). I use Prestashop as my software, it is free however it can be frustrating to set up. Looks good, and is good for customers to use though!

There are other costs involved too, such as photography and design (if you need this).

What many people do tend to do is to pay for an Ebay store, and use a forwarding email address to this. It is very much easier, and all the liability is then with Ebay and not yourself.

If you would like help/ advice about setting up a website PM me (I am no expert, but have been there).

kirst87

Thanks for the help. i will look into everything you said. Looking at getting xmas out the way first then setting it up.

I will PM you stephen if i need some help :beer:

steve1980

You only need an SSL certificate if YOU are taking customers details directly from your website, ie not using a third party checkout like Paypal.

£9.99 per month is alot of money to be paying out. Check out www.hostsphere.co.uk for some cheaper alternatives.

kernewek

I would have to agree with Stephen. Prestashop is very nice to use and has lots of features. Not too tricky to set up although some of the add ons can be quite pricey. It does, however, help if you have a little programming knowledge as some things don't always fit and it helps if you can go into the code to tweak things