Registering a Domain Name

Marjorie

CGF, Certified Grumble Framer
Joined
Mar 18, 2004
Posts
106
Loc
Kennett Square, PA
I'm purchasing an existing art gallery and bringing in custom framing. I'd like to have a web site in the not too distant future and was wondering if anyone has any suggestions as to what site is best to use for both registering a domain name and using for web hosting? Any and all suggestions appreciated. Thanks!
 
Wow! That is a really open-ended question!

There are sites on the web that will register your domain name for as little as $10 and there are so many web site hosts that it has become a major e-business. I would check locally in your area first for a website author and host site. The reason is that you will have periodic changes to make to your site and updates and it is much easier to make them through a local website host than deal with somebody at the opposite end of the country. They will also get to know you better and get a grasp of how you want your site to evolve.

I found a local web-authoring company that will build my site for $300, host it for $20/month, and allow me as many changes, updates, and photos as I desire, I get as many pages as I need, I get a secure page to conduct e-payments on, and he interlinks all his developed sites to his own site which gets an average of 2 million hits a year. He also includes domain name search and registration, and glitzy stuff like Flash intros, and animated GIFS, etc.

I built my last site and have built 6 other sites for others and I know the work involved in laying out, developing, and maintaining a website. I would rather pay this guy to build my site and host it than take on the headache of doing it myself at this point in time. Plus, the positioning of his site with my site linked to him (this part I don't quite understand) will ensure me a high ranking on a search engine. I understand how search engines rank sites, but I don't see how HIS ranking will affect MY site.

Anyway, I would suggest that you deal locally with a reputable website author and maybe you can find one that will also host your site for a reasonable fee. You can then work with the site author to build exactly what you want and be able to make changes based on personal communication with your site author.

Good luck.

Framerguy
 
Hi Marjorie,

The above advice is great. Laying out and designing the page content, and then hiring someone to turn it into a reality are the hardest parts. I've had good luck with www.elance.com for freelance work.

GODADDY.COM is a great place to register your domain. It presently costs $6.95 to register your .com domain there for a year, and they have great support.

Hosting providers will range from FREE for the fairly unreliable ones with ads to $29.95 for the best ones. The price really depends on the quality of the company and what your storage space and bandwidth(usage traffic) requirements are. Most art related web sites fall into the lowest categories offered, so it's not necessary to spend a lot. $13.95/mo will get you a great ISP.

I have used HOSTWAY.COM in the recent past and found their uptime to be excellent, although the tech support is a bit lacking. (I believe it's farmed out to India)

We moved to another company 5 weeks ago, and I pool resources to get a better price. My family has 8 domains for various businesses and it was more economical to sign up as a reseller and pay a flat fee to have as many domains as we want. (paying instead by how much space and bandwidth we use for all domains combined)

I'm toying with the idea of opening this up to other framers, if interested. (as a service, not for profit) If so, it'll be about $3.95/month for the average sized page. (with every known bell and whistle you can think of, including: CPANEL, pop & webmail Accounts, MySQL, stats, SpamAssassin, auto responders, Fantastico scripts, FreeBSD based, frontpage extensions, etc) Is there any interest in this?

Mike

PS: This should probably be in the techie forum
 
Thanks Framerguy and Mike for the great info. And yes, Mike, I'd definitely be interested in signing up! Let me know if and when you decide to go ahead with it.
 
I would also be interested Mike. I would like to put together a site but haven't been able to take on the task of doing the homework yet.

Wouldn't it be great to see Web Site Development as one of the courses we could take at the PPFA conf. - in Chicago?! hint hint. Or has it already been offered and I just missed it?

Thanks again Mike; keep us posted if you decide to move ahead with your idea.

Amy McCray
Hickory Hollow Framery
 
You might want to also check out www.mysmartmarketing.com They are focused on the art and framing industry, they have templates to use and/or charge $250 to build. Not sure about the hosting fees but Dave Beckers is a good computer/marketing person to know.
Good luck with your new venture.
 
You can also checkout .
<a href="https://secure.directnic.com/" target="_blank">web page this is a very do it all yourself site but quite affordable.
</a>

Jill Hennes CPF
 
Marjorie and Amy,

If you're looking for a developer of websites...not templates, and would like to work with someone who already knows our industry, another option is to contact Merrill Grayson...

His website: CFWebdesigns.com

Regards,

John
 
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