Help....Website Advice!!

fraggle79

Folks,
We currently have a buisness in the "Beauty" market and am thinking of getting a website created to promote the service.
However, one revenue stream that is popular is the sale of vouchers. Can a facility wherby the customer can purchase a vouchers in units of say €5 and pay be incorporated in such a website??How much would this cost?
Also, as new products become available at different times of the year can these be uploaded on the website also. Can this be done myself? How much would it cost. We already have the dopmain registered and am paying a monthly fee to lets host. We currently dont have a website.
I need as much help as possible as. Also are there any other revenue streams that can be utilised from the website?
We are a small business in a small town so maybe I should just scrap this idea?
Looking forward to your thoughts.

flash harry

fraggle79 wrote: »

Folks,
We currently have a buisness in the "Beauty" market and am thinking of getting a website created to promote the service.
However, one revenue stream that is popular is the sale of vouchers. Can a facility wherby the customer can purchase a vouchers in units of say €5 and pay be incorporated in such a website??How much would this cost?
Also, as new products become available at different times of the year can these be uploaded on the website also. Can this be done myself? How much would it cost. We already have the dopmain registered and am paying a monthly fee to lets host. We currently dont have a website.
I need as much help as possible as. Also are there any other revenue streams that can be utilised from the website?
We are a small business in a small town so maybe I should just scrap this idea?
Looking forward to your thoughts.

Fraggle

Vouchers are part of most online shopping carts so thats not a problem. Most of these shopping carts will allow you to add/remove products, upload photos, link related products e.g. recommend a complimentary product etc with very little computer knowledge.

An IT company I know did a site for me for a very resonable €750 with all these features.

FH

Pixelcraft

Hi Fraggle, the best thing I can say to you is know exactly what you want & will want in the future, or consult with a web company before any work is done. Beware of companies being able to give you a cost estimate with few details, it will most likely be some sort of template solution (which may or may not be what you're after)

Once your site is built it should be easy enough for you to add & update products. Personally I wouldn't hire an IT company to design a website no sooner than I'd hire a web co to maintain my it infrastructure. Best of luck.

Heisenberg.

This post has been deleted.

fraggle79

Thanks folks, any idea on how much it would cost. We are only a small sole trader buisness. We would be unable to sell products on the site cause delivery costs will erode margins. How much would say a five or six page site cost?? I have a colour scheme that we currently use for our voucher and woudl be looking to incorporate that scheme in the website however we dont have any soft copies of the scheme. Will that be a problem?

Pixelcraft

cost really depends on exactly what you need, the experience of the person or people doing it, and the speed in which it is required. As I hinted at earlier, you still need to give more details for an estimate. Many companies have questionnaires that can help you out, feel free to use the one on my website as a starting point.

Liam Byrne

fraggle79 wrote: »

Thanks folks, any idea on how much it would cost. We are only a small sole trader buisness. We would be unable to sell products on the site cause delivery costs will erode margins. How much would say a five or six page site cost?? I have a colour scheme that we currently use for our voucher and woudl be looking to incorporate that scheme in the website however we dont have any soft copies of the scheme. Will that be a problem?

What does "a five or six page site" entail ? Does each page have a photo + product description / product options / extras ?

Are those items editable by an admin (some form of CMS) ? Do prices change often enough to warrant the facility to change them quickly and easily ?

Do the extra seasonal items that you mentioned above appear as products, or as a "latest news" item, or what ?

Does your site need to respond well to search engines ?

What design do you want for the site, and do you have an existing branding / colour scheme / logo that someone could base it on ?

Think of your request - at the moment - as the equivalent of "what would a five or six door car cost ?"

If the Gift Voucher is the only item that can be purchased, that's the least of the work - the spec and development of the site is a much bigger job.

As stated above, you'll need to provide a full spec of what you expect from the site before someone can give you a proper, accurate quote.

tricky D

Hmmmmm. Sole trader, small business, small town, delivery costs eat into margins. I'm thinking you should make the first step small and cheap. It's no good spending, say e800, on developing a site which mightn't even make that in sales nevermind profit. You've a large risk to negative cost/benefit taking that line. At the moment, you've already got hosting from letshost and they have blogs like WordPress available. As a first step, you could put a simple page or a few pages on the blog with details of your products and services and contact info, after choosing a template to suit your needs and branding colours. This would cost your time only though if you have logo you'll probably need a little help (less than 1 hour) to incorporate it into a graphic and tweak the colour scheme. Let that run for a while and see how it works out. If there's enough demand, then think of getting the voucher selling together. Again letshost have a few eComm carts you could use. Again you might need a bit of help (an hour or 2). After that if the business starts really rolling enough to justify it, you can look at the more comprehensive and costly options.

One other piece of advice, don't rely on one single person's opinion, including your own. Not all 2 cents are worth 2 cent.

/my 2c
hth