need a website designer

[blueruby7]

I have never had a website before, but I need one as I am just starting out with my business and need customers. What are the costs, how is it designed and put up on the web so as to get the maximum exposure so I can get the maximum hits, etc. I need to know as much as possible before I jump in as I am on a limited budget. Let me know. Thanks.

[Monty]

A basic account here runs $179.40 per year or if you are going to have forums associated with your site, you will need a silver account that runs $299.40 per year. Forum software runs anywhere from free to $160 for a license to run it. Along with that you will need domain name service (DNS) that runs from $8 to $30 per year depending upon your choice of registrars. My personal favorite charges $13.50 per year for that service.

Webmasters charge anywhere from $15.00 per hour upwards to $100 per hour for services and some of the will give you a flat rate price if you have a clear idea of what you want. A simple site can be built in 3-4 hours, more complex ones can take 40 or more hours to complete. Since you mentioned being on a limited budget, you might want to try and learn webmastering on your own. I started off with the "websites that suck" book and "html for dummies". Both are inexpensive and if you read and study them, you can put together a good basic website over a couple of weekends or several evenings.

As for exposure, you should include your website in any current advertising you use, and might consider purchasing advertising space from other websites or web directories. A good first step is to lay your proposed website out on several pieces of paper to try and develop your message there first. It's much the same process as building anything else, you need a plan, work your plan, then the site will follow. I hope that helps and that I see "site owner" status next to your name in future postings.

[Bob]

Hello, :HIYA:

A couple of sites you may wish to investigate in the event you want to try and learn some basics and create your own web site are noted below...
Aota.net has a collection of tutorials covering a number of subjects as well as some utilities you may find useful: http://www.aota.net/
Planning your site: http://www.aota.net/HTML/planning.php4
A great collection of tutorials for learning basic HTML, Dave's Site: http://www.davesite.com/webstation/html/
I am sure others will post recommendations as well, such as Monty's excellent suggestions for books.

-Bob
- Reading and trying are the best teachers. :QTrtfm: -

[Mandi]

Really - if you decide to code it yourself, there are a ton of us here who learned from the ground up, and there are no questions too "silly" to ask . . . if we know *how*, it's because someone somewhere took the time to teach us too :-)!

[Chipmunk]

The best web design book I've ever read was Steve Krug's Don't Make Me Think. It's a very easy read and is suitable for the full range from novice to grizzled pro. It's not an HTML primer (Bob & Monty gave you excellent resources for that). HTML is the easy part of web design. Deciding what and how to present info is the :-) challenging part.

Jakob Nielsen's Designing Web Usability is also excellent, though not as to the point, and perhaps more suited for intermediates and up. His website is chock full of valuable info: http://useit.com/ though it's probably a bit intimidating for a complete novice.

Just to echo Mandi's and everyone's encouragement: learn HTML, throw together some simple pages on your local machine, and once you're feeling comfortable with that, :-) signup at FQ (will save you much stress over dealing with flakey webhosts).

[jasonic]

Hello

I have just started a website that might be of use to you. its called Freelancesolutions (http://www.freelancesolutions.com) . Basically you post a project and people bid on it, you then select which bid you would like and they then do the work for you. Like I said the site is new and because of this reason the service is completely free.

I hope this is of interest to you.

regards

Justin

[Evoir]

Hi,

I guess this is the "contract or be contracted" forum... so it is ok to do some self promotion, right?

I am available to help you with your website. Feel free to check out my website (http://www.dotgarden.com) and see if anything there interests you. I specialize in small business sites and would be happy to talk with you about your business. :)

Best,
Evie

[rainy]

Hi blueruby7,

I can help you with website design as well. I charge $20 per hour, but if you can give me more details about your website I can provide you with a flat rate. Please take a look at my website (http://www.designspice.com) for more information and samples. These are latest two websites that not in my portfolio yet: www.stevenugentskarate.com and www.activeprime.com

What's included in website design and development
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

* Unlimited revisions of design concept at the design/mock-up stage (prior developing HTML).

* Custom error page.

* Site will be checked for main compatibility with different browsers (Internet Explorer, Netscape, Mozilla and Opera) on various platforms - Windows, Mac, Linux.

* Free site maintenance is provided for 30 days from initial upload.

* Satisfaction guarantee: No deposit required. You can terminate the project without any fees after I present you with website design mock-ups. If you feel that the designs are not going to work even after all the unlimited revisions I provide, just let me know about your decision before any revisions are made, and you are free to try your luck somewhere else.

Basic SEO package - one-time fee of $200, excluding fees from paid directories

1. Research of keywords and phrases relevant to your website (based on your goals, industry, audience and location).
2. Meta tags optimization (title, description, keywords and other)
3. Content optimization
4. Alt tags optimization
5. Manual free submissions to major search engines and directories (with optional submission to paid directories)
6. Search engines friendly (no tricks that might ban your website from search engines, no spam)

Please let me know if you are interested in working with me.

Thank you,
Elena

[joxer_daly]

if you want to calculate an instant quote then check out this site http://www.community-network-servcices.com/contact_us.shtml

[joxer_daly]

Sorry, I'll give you that again... if you want to calculate an instant quote then check out this site http://www.community-network-services.com/contact_us.shtml