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Website Options....Any Feedback gratefully received!

Carlene01

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Nov 5, 2019
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Hi all,

I've joined the forum to get some advice on which route to take with the Website for our new Business Venture. We need a 'Directory Website' for our business which will put Motorhome Owners in touch with people who would like to hire them.

Do we pay someone/a company to design it for us or do we put the time and effort in to learning how to do it ourselves from scratch? The company i've been looking at using is called 'brilliant directories'

Were based in the UK and our Business will be Nationwide.

Thanks in advance!

Carlene & Nathan
 
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MJ DeMarco

I followed the science; all I found was money.
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Depends, is there an off-the-shelf solution that will get you started and meet all your application needs? Have you verified the idea already with consumer use?
 

inputchip

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To MJ's point, I would recommend getting an off the shelf solution to test the need first. This way you can test the market with less than $50 and a weekend of work.

Don't get caught up on the little things like name, logo, colors, etc. Just get something up and running as quickly as you can, with minimum resources, that meets all the basic functions of your idea. Drive traffic to the site and study the user behavior.
 

Nez24

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Oct 14, 2019
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Hi all,

I've joined the forum to get some advice on which route to take with the Website for our new Business Venture. We need a 'Directory Website' for our business which will put Motorhome Owners in touch with people who would like to hire them.

Do we pay someone/a company to design it for us or do we put the time and effort in to learning how to do it ourselves from scratch? The company i've been looking at using is called 'brilliant directories'

Were based in the UK and our Business will be Nationwide.

Thanks in advance!

Carlene & Nathan
Hey , have you thought about learning to do it yourself? It really not as hard as you think to build our own website. Wordpress is a great tool to use and the plugins that can be used with it.
 
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Johnny boy

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Right now it's all about looks. That's what the customer sees and it helps improve conversion rates.

The hard part is the backend. That's how you have a website that does all the matchmaking happen and does all the confusing stuff.

When you have grown a little you will need to invest in creating a sophisticated back end to the website. This takes a good developer or a team of them most likely.

The front end can be done in a day on wordpress by someone with a good eye for design, some copywriting skills, and a good understanding of user experience / landing page optimization.

Since you are small, you should only focus on the front end and then use that to test the market and advertising to see how profitable it can be.

Take care of the backend manually at first. Collect leads, talk to them on the phone. Make it "customized". Once you start making some money, invest in a backend developer. Being small and having time is an asset. Use it.

But, try the brilliant directories. If it works it works. It doesn't seem like too much money to try it out. Spend your nights drinking coffee and building your own site on their platform. If it doesn't work that's okay.

Who knows? It might actually work permanently for you. That would be great.
 

Carlene01

New Contributor
User Power
Value/Post Ratio
18%
Nov 5, 2019
11
2
Depends, is there an off-the-shelf solution that will get you started and meet all your application needs? Have you verified the idea already with consumer use?

Hiya,

Yes I believe Brilliant Directories is our off the shelf solution, and the idea itself is something that we tried to find when we wanted to take a holiday and although there are companies out there - we couldn't find exactly what we needed and so thought we'd create it instead :)
 

Carlene01

New Contributor
User Power
Value/Post Ratio
18%
Nov 5, 2019
11
2
To MJ's point, I would recommend getting an off the shelf solution to test the need first. This way you can test the market with less than $50 and a weekend of work.

Don't get caught up on the little things like name, logo, colors, etc. Just get something up and running as quickly as you can, with minimum resources, that meets all the basic functions of your idea. Drive traffic to the site and study the user behavior.

Thanks for that - we're going to go ahead with Brilliant Directories today and get the Website built with them for as little as possible to test it out and then build on it.
 
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Carlene01

New Contributor
User Power
Value/Post Ratio
18%
Nov 5, 2019
11
2
Hey , have you thought about learning to do it yourself? It really not as hard as you think to build our own website. Wordpress is a great tool to use and the plugins that can be used with it.

Hiya - Thanks for your input. We're definitely going to learn as much as we can and get as much done ourselves as possible.
Nathan & Carlene
 

Carlene01

New Contributor
User Power
Value/Post Ratio
18%
Nov 5, 2019
11
2
Right now it's all about looks. That's what the customer sees and it helps improve conversion rates.

The hard part is the backend. That's how you have a website that does all the matchmaking happen and does all the confusing stuff.

When you have grown a little you will need to invest in creating a sophisticated back end to the website. This takes a good developer or a team of them most likely.

The front end can be done in a day on wordpress by someone with a good eye for design, some copywriting skills, and a good understanding of user experience / landing page optimization.

Since you are small, you should only focus on the front end and then use that to test the market and advertising to see how profitable it can be.

Take care of the backend manually at first. Collect leads, talk to them on the phone. Make it "customized". Once you start making some money, invest in a backend developer. Being small and having time is an asset. Use it.

But, try the brilliant directories. If it works it works. It doesn't seem like too much money to try it out. Spend your nights drinking coffee and building your own site on their platform. If it doesn't work that's okay.

Who knows? It might actually work permanently for you. That would be great.

Hiya - Thanks for all of that info. Lots to think about and take on board and we will definitely be taking your advice and possibly some help in the future!
We'll let you know how we get on with the build.
Many thanks,
Carlene & Nathan
 

Carlene01

New Contributor
User Power
Value/Post Ratio
18%
Nov 5, 2019
11
2
Evening all,

It seems that Brilliant Directories aren't able to build the type of Website we would need without customising it and costing thousands to start (to do with the calendar and booking system) I even looked at Wordpress and they wanted £240 for me to start. Can any of you recommend where to go from here? I was only wanting to pay around £100 per month to start this.

Many thanks,

Carlene
 
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broswoodwork

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Evening all,

It seems that Brilliant Directories aren't able to build the type of Website we would need without customising it and costing thousands to start (to do with the calendar and booking system) I even looked at Wordpress and they wanted £240 for me to start. Can any of you recommend where to go from here? I was only wanting to pay around £100 per month to start this.

Many thanks,

Carlene
Can you do like @Johnny boy advised, and just get the front end up and running while handling all of the rest manually?
 

Carlene01

New Contributor
User Power
Value/Post Ratio
18%
Nov 5, 2019
11
2
Yes that's what i'm looking to do - I was going to use wordpress but they want £240 upfront for the business option, so i'm also looking at other website builders
Have you used any before that you could recommend?
 

Carlene01

New Contributor
User Power
Value/Post Ratio
18%
Nov 5, 2019
11
2
I need to find somewhere where I can build the front end of my website for free/up to £100 and then build on it as the company expands by taking bookings and payments etc through the site. I've looked at Brilliant Directories, Wix and wordpress and none of these seem to offer what i'm looking for. I have websites which i've had designed for me for previous businesses by freelancers and yell.com so have some experience but am pretty much a newbie to this - Any help and suggestions on which sites to use would be great.
 
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broswoodwork

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Oct 16, 2015
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Have you used any before that you could recommend?
I just use a squarespace site as sort of a digital cash register. I don't actually bring people in to it directly; I just send them to it when they're ready to buy. I'm not sure if they'd have an option that fits your needs (I'm modestly tech illiterate), but they are very affordable to get started with.
 

Johnny boy

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May 9, 2017
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I need to find somewhere where I can build the front end of my website for free/up to £100 and then build on it as the company expands by taking bookings and payments etc through the site. I've looked at Brilliant Directories, Wix and wordpress and none of these seem to offer what i'm looking for. I have websites which i've had designed for me for previous businesses by freelancers and yell.com so have some experience but am pretty much a newbie to this - Any help and suggestions on which sites to use would be great.

WordPress.org. not WordPress.com

Go to bluehost.com

Get a site

Install WordPress on it with one click

Buy “divi” from elegant themes and install the theme onto your wordpress site

Start editing it and making pages.

It will cost like $200 for the entire year
 

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