setting up a web site for a business

[phil dean]

My wife and I are looking at doing B&B from our house. We're not going to be able to get in the brochures produced by the local council for next year, and decided that a website may help in the short term.

 

I've never created a web site and don't know where to start, equally I don't know what I should be paying for someone else to do it for me.

 

Thankfully I know loads of you have loads of info in this area and thought that I'd tap in.

 

(If anyone's interested, the B&B will be in a village called melkridge, 2 miles from Hadrians wall and 100 yards from the south tyne (where so far in the last 4 weeks I've had 5 salmon)tickets are £20 ish per day, I'm 45 minutes drive from the banks of Ulswater and 50 minutes east or west to get to some great coastal fishing)

 

Sorry gratuitous plug, elton, please delete if it's a problem.

 

If you know how much I should spend, or how I could go about learning to do this myself, please say.

 

cheers

[Elton]

Phil,

 

Try here:

 

http://www.anglersnet.co.uk/ubb/ultimatebb...ic;f=6;t=012881

[SandTiger]

Hiya Phil

 

As always it depends what you are after and how much of a learning curve you want to put yourself through - straight html is fine for basic stuff and there are plenty of good generators around as mentioned above but if you are looking for bells and whistles then an understanding of PHP and mySQL is pretty handy. Also make sure you sign up with a hosting service that have a good track record and good *telephone* tech support not an email-only ticketing system. As for cost, again this is going to depend on what you want done.

 

Have a look at some stuff here http://www.the-lounge.org.uk/ and then decide what you want from your site. Money spent on a good and well built website with proper meta tags etc. is a good one-off investment and will probably be viewed more than any brochures - For example if I want a B&B in a particular area then I'll use a search engine not rely on brochures

 

Just a few thoughts.

 

[ 19. October 2005, 05:46 PM: Message edited by: SandTiger ]

[Newt]

Phil - I'm with SandTiger on how I would locate a B&B. Search engine every time.

 

You certainly need an attractive web site but if no one can find it without knowing the URL, you'll be losing lots of potential business.

[SandTiger]

Other considerations - Will you want a secure online booking area, secure online visitors/guest book for genuine entries, a calender to show available dates (again I'm more likely to phone a B&B if I can see that the date I want is not taken then phone a number on the off-chance that there is an available date).

[phil dean]

Hi, yes these are all parts of the design issues which I really need to look at.

 

As always I'm grateful for all this input.

[Chris Goddard]

Phil,

 

Try here:

 

http://www.anglersnet.co.uk/ubb/ultimatebb...ic;f=6;t=012881

 

 

Keep getting re-directed to Microsoft site Elton?? Any good ideas??

[Norrie]

Phil - I'm with SandTiger on how I would locate a B&B. Search engine every time.

 

You certainly need an attractive web site but if no one can find it without knowing the URL, you'll be losing lots of potential business.

 

On another slant,but on the same lines,tonight, I just spent nearly an hour trying to find the website of "Countrywide Estate " agents in Glasgow, as my daughter and her partner, are after one of their houses.....could i find it...could i find it like hell....so, there you go .....

 

reminds me of the time Nick spent looking for an estate agent's website in Nottingham for me.... Took him forever.....but in the end he did find it.....

[Guest NickInTheNorth]

Keep getting re-directed to Microsoft site Elton?? Any good ideas??

 

I suspect it has something to do with the double http://"http bit in the link, and Microsoft anti spyware

 

but I don't know for sure

[Starvinmarvin]

Check out :

 

www.oneandone.co.uk

 

They aren't the cheapest for webspace but they do have a lot of packages for new businesses, they host the AnglersAfloat website and have been excellent, they also supply you with all the necessary software to build your own site using a selection of their designs. Had already started the design on AnglersAfloat before signing up, may use them for an online shop when I get my finger out.

 

SM