website

[mattyevz]

Iv used get british business online its free.its limited to a basic site,ideal if your just looking to get ur name out there for the meantime.

 

[lookatrabbit]

hi just checked that one out are you currently using them still? says free for 2 years do you definatly not get sent any kind of bill?

 

[BLBelfast]

Use them myself and as has been said it is free for two years

 

[mattyevz]

Yer its free mines been up for 6 months no bills nothing. FREE

 

[BluSparx]

I use www.000webhost.com - free hosting with 1.5gb server space and 100gb bandwidth per month - which for me is great.

I bought my domain name from Domain Names, Web Hosting and SSL Certificates - Go Daddy - paid 0.84p for my domain Blu Sparx Electrical Contractor Electrician in Billingham, Norton, Stockton, Middlesbrough, Teesside

Designed my site myself, used Dreamweaver to produce it
SEO completed by myself and works - just try Electrician in Billingham in Google or emerency electrician in billingham and i'm there on the first page.

Doing it yourself is hard work, and you do need to know what your doing but it helped me keep my cost down.

I update my site as and when I need to but it took around 6-8 weeks to start getting higher in google.

Once you have your site up and running add yourself to googleplaces this then puts you on the map when people search in a particular area (i.e. your surrounding areas) and helps you get on the front page of google without having seo at first.

 

[accordfire]

Hi have many of you got your own website just wondering how to host and how much u all pay for the hosting and address? and what do you all use to make the site or get a designer?

We use unlimitedwebhosting.co.uk - less than £3 a month and they throw in a co.uk or .com domain too. I host a good dozen sites on that space, and it truly is unlimited, fast, and tech support is absolutely the best I have come across in over 20 years on the net. The longest I have ever waited for any kind of assistance from them is half an hour - Paul is a gem, and if you get at all stuck, they'll make any needed changes for you - I've yet to see them fail at any help I've needed, even with things they don't natively support....

What can I tell you about them - host unlimited number of domains, or stick with the free one you choose when signing up. As many email addresses as you care to create, forwarding, aliasing, whatever - your email will come from your own domain too.

You get full control of your site, space, email, whatever via an easy to use control panel. And they won't ever try to stop you moving in our out any domain, or the site content on the space.

It's vanilla web space, built on a LAMP server - meaning you can do pretty well anything you need to with it, from the most basic site to the most advanced. There's a number of "apps" available to one click install, such as Wordpress, Drupal, Joomla, WebCalendar, and a ton more.

Having used such wonders as Servage, 1&1, Fasthosts, Demon, Easyspace, and so many more over those years, these are the first company that have met my jaded expectation.

Up until now I've built all my sites myself (Fire Alarm, Intruder Alarm, Security & CCTV Maintenance & Servicing UK) though I've brought in SEO/optimisation help as part of our strategy to build the site into a major sales platform - and as part of that, for the first time, I will be handing over design repsonsibility for the first time, around March/April time - for a ground up rebirth. I just don't have time to develop the site further, or to learn the latest tricks.

I used to develop in Dreamweaver almost exclusively, but built the last few sites in Wordpress, mainly because it is as near plug and play as you can get, and a lot of fun to play with - without breaking stuff. It's also ideal for a beginner to seperate out design from content, and that from SEO tools, and so forth. You can add almost any functionality to Wordpress you want with a simple, usually free, plugin or theme.

 

[BLBelfast]

Another wee question I thought I would add onto the thread. I am a sole trader and as such my website quite clearly states I am. Is this a bad idea or should I go the route alot of people do and give the impression the company is larger than it is? IE a team rather than me on my lonesome

And is it wise to have a section on the website detailing terms and conditions?

 

[accordfire]

Another wee question I thought I would add onto the thread. I am a sole trader and as such my website quite clearly states I am. Is this a bad idea or should I go the route alot of people do and give the impression the company is larger than it is? IE a team rather than me on my lonesome

And is it wise to have a section on the website detailing terms and conditions?

There are advantages to appearing bigger than you are - ask any guy who's ever tried to impress a woman

Seriously, the one thing that holds true for most customers, in any market is honesty. Whilst it's ok to be vague about things, don't claim outright you're something you're not.

In real terms, something along the lines of "small enough to give personal attention, large enough to cope" is probably best in terms of size impressions.

Terms and conditions on a web site are only required for limited companies, although, having such on your website will often clear up any ambiguity further down the line - for me, it shows intent and that you're serious about what you do. Certainly, it is a good idea to have a privacy and data use policy on any web site, stating clearly whether any information is captured (if you have any sort of contact form it is, and you may need to be DPA registered too), and what you do with that information - and how you store it.

 

[BLBelfast]

Thanks again for your opinion Bill. Your advice is well appreciated and one of the reasons I am enjoying this forum is to be able to pick the brains of those with experiance.

heres my site here if anybody has any thoughts on it all advice and critisism is welcome.

TDH Electrical - Belfast Electrician - 07708520588 - 24 hour call out

 

[leolec]

The only advice I would give is something I've learn't from bitter experience - put a backup on cd just incase.

 

[Octopus]

Thanks again for your opinion Bill. Your advice is well appreciated and one of the reasons I am enjoying this forum is to be able to pick the brains of those with experiance.

heres my site here if anybody has any thoughts on it all advice and critisism is welcome.

TDH Electrical - Belfast Electrician - 07708520588 - 24 hour call out

I'd add a landline contact number and home/work address - people like to know where you are.

 

[accordfire]

Thanks again for your opinion Bill. Your advice is well appreciated and one of the reasons I am enjoying this forum is to be able to pick the brains of those with experiance.

heres my site here if anybody has any thoughts on it all advice and critisism is welcome.

TDH Electrical - Belfast Electrician - 07708520588 - 24 hour call out

Good site - well laid out, nice and clear.

One wee hint....your "portfolio" page - not a good idea to put "under construction" on it - for a number of reasons. One is that people might think you're brand new, or that you're not good enough to get recommends. The other is that google when indexing may excerpt that page, and you'll list with a description of "under construction"....

Best practice - put some decent images on the page, without any text - divide your page roughly into quarters. Edit the "alt text" and description tags to (a) something meaningful about the picture - e.g. 8 way 27th edition consumer unit installed by TDH Electrical (this will also pop up when you hover over it), and use "keyword rich" terms for all images too.

Also, it's a good idea to change "how to contact" on the tab header to "contact us" - one of the basic things Google looks for.

Okay - so you got two hints, I'll have to double the bill now

Decent site mate - now you get to work it on Google Simplest way is to refer to your site on as many others as you can, and hopefully, some of them will start linking back to you (mentioning you)....get on twitter too if you can, and promote the site in between other "offerings of wisdom"...

 

[lookatrabbit]

Hi i had a go at using the gbbo free site but finding its very hard to make it look anything with the tools on there is there any other way of using another website builder but through them as ive already signed up

 

[mattyevz]

No there isit, you can only use the tools provided it takes ages to figure it out and will never look "great" as its only basic