Building a website
Latest blog talking about joomla features
We are always happy to give you advice on creating, developing or upgrading your website. It is not as expensive as you may think and a basic Joomla website from us starts at only £100.
If you want to have a chat fill in our work request / enquiry form or give us a call and we can point you in the right direction. We give you what is best for your web presence needs.
To help with the process here are some questions you should ask.
All projects cf10ten ltd over £200 a donation of 10% is given to charities we support in Kenya and Gambia
Starting in the Spring we will be running training courses covering all of the questions below.
Do I need to promote my website?
I have a website and hosting can I up grade my website to something more dynamic?
Do I need a website address?
If you are serious about your business / charity / organisation then the simple answer is Yes. Most people will look for your website as its gives you a 24/7 presence.
£6 - £11 per domain name will cover registration fees for a year but this will cover e-mail address but not normally webspace.
£50 - £75 is required for webspace to host your files that make up your website and will be big enough for small to medium size sites. It will have the ability to host dynamic content management systems like Joomla, Wordpress & Dupal.
£900 is recommended for a large company that may need a dedicated server.
Typically a cost of domain, + webspace would be around £59 a year.
Tip - You can create a free website with Google Sites - Free websites and wikis or http://www.weebly.com/ Though you will quickly out grow it, its worth a look
Do I need branding?
Simple the answer is Yes. If you are serious about putting your business / presence online then branding is important which requires getting a name, logo and colour scheme to make it easy for your web development.
We do not cover branding directly but do work closely with partners who can help and advise.
Also important is your name and if you have not done so, its worth checking with http://namechk.com/ to see if your name has been taken. You will probably see why we went for cf10ten as our company name *smile*
Tip If possible get your own brand google email (gmail) arccount http://mail.google.com/ With the free e-mail you can use these features for free: YouTube, Picasa photo gallery, calendar, documents, maps and stats (google analytics) All of this will integrate into your website and of course save you money.
What do I put on my website?
Basically I always say a website is only as good as its content, so its important you spend some time researching, collating and agreeing what will be your content. To do it well and to keep it current, you need to dedicate time to keeping it updated. Create the content in a word / google document so it can be copied and pasted into your website.
A basic start would have following pages:
Welcome, About us, Contact us,News (or blog), Links, If applicable photo / video gallery.
With photos / video you need to have copyright permission so take your own photos or commission a photographer. Also ensure the image is not subject to copyright or permission of use. You can also use YouTube, Flickr, Picasa to host your creative media and easily add to your website.
Other recommendations are a blog which can be set to automatically post to your twitter / facebook page, a feedback / request form and if appropriate features like a forum, members area or a shop.
There is no better time than now to get a website but make sure you allocate time to keep it updated.
Tip: With systems like Joomla its easy to set up various logins so other people can login in and update their section of the website. This takes the pressure off, and shares the work rather than having just one person keeping the site updated. With Joomla this is achieved front end and is an easy click, edit or paste and save, no technical skills required. Also it can be set up so you just e-mail in your content.
Do I need social networking?
Most definitely- more people follow social network sites like Facebook, twitter, google+, linkedin,YouTube and many more social networking sites ,so its worth the effort in setting up pages, accounts with your brand name.
Tip: With sites like Joomla its easy for the set up to enable updates from your website automatically then post to the social networks. We can help or use http://twitterfeed.com/
Do I need to promote my website?
Of course there is no magic wand and you will be up against a lot of competition so you need to add appropriate links to your site and get others to add your link. A good step forward is to publish details to forums, social networks and blogs where ever you can.
Make sure you add a meta data description to your website of up to 20 words describing your business. This is what will appear in search engines searches under your web title. Also add a list of keywords, phases to help search engines identify your business.
Tip Get your team, partners, friends talking about your site in person or on the web. Word of mouth is one of the best ways to network and communicate your business.
I have a website and hosting can I up grade my website to something more dynamic?
Yes normally no problem most hosting will support system like Joomla, Wordpress, Dupal so no need to switch accounts. What we do is install along side your old site and then switch when the new site is built and approved making the process stress free.
Where do I start?
Hopefully advice on this page has helped. If you need more advice or would like us to give a quote drop us a line, phone 01380 723698 or fill in our work request form.
If you have a question we have not answered please fill our our question form and we send you the answer and add to this page.
