Anyone on here a web designer?

[mixster]

Cheeky, I know - but always worth asking on here first as you never know what peeps do for a living.

I'm self employed (motor trade) but have been offered a partnership in a shop. It used to do great business through national ads etc, but they've let it run down so it's only really ticking over at the moment. I think what it needs is an internet presence, as the stuff will sell all over the world by mail order (it sells parts for Land Rovers - which are pretty ubiquitous Worldwide). Therefore I need to set up a website, the kind where people can order shizz using a 'shopping cart' set-up, and pay for it on-line using a credit card.

Can someone point me in the right direction please? Just because I'm able to compose an email and buy a few bits of tat on eBay I have become the defacto 'bloke who knows about computers' down at the garage. (Kingdom of the blind and all that...:$ ) I'd like to sort it out but need some ideas of costs and how to go about it. I'm in the process of setting up an eBay shop, but ideally would like to link from that to our own site. Need to know about getting on search engines etc too.

Any pointers greatly appreciated

 

[Sheikh Yerbouti]

mate... seriously... it's not rocket science...
i've had a few people come to me for stuff like that in the past, and my answer is always the same...

In the first instance, don't go down the road of shopping carts & secure payment online & all that bollocks. Too much complexity/cost/maintenance required.

Especially if the website is a new venture, you may well be wasting time/effort/money getting all that up and running until you know it's a goer.
just use email links for people to make enquiries about parts they want, then you can contact them & take orders through "normal channels". Much less hassle for all concerned.

The best websites aren't the flashy ones. The best websites are the ones that are simple & fast to load but which have been well thought out. HTML for dummies will go a long way. You can have something basic in place very quickly that will do the job. Not only that but you'll acquire a valuable skill in the process. A bit of time invested up front on your part will pay dividends.

Get to that stage, then you'll know the basics, and will be able to link in your ebay shop, and worry about search engines and stuff.

This isn't a facetious answer by the way, having someone (or paying someone) invest loads of time and effort in creating an all-singing-all-dancing site for a new 'e-venture' may well be money wasted. Start small and basic like I've said... get yerself on the search engines and see if it flies. If you start being inundated with orders via the site you then have a sound business case for making more investment in a bells and whistles website.

On a tangent, fingers crossed for ya, I love old Landies (got a hankering to own one one day) & I think you could be on to a winner here

 

[mixster]

Thanks for that mate It pretty much echoes what I've been thinking, keep it simple (and cheap) in the short term at least. I just know he's going to ask about the possibility of setting up something like what I've described, and wanted to be armed with some knowledge about prices etc and the feasability of an automated system. For now I'm just going to set up a basic few pages - I did it before to boost record sales when I was thinning out my collection and it worked quite well - link it from my eBay sales and see where we go from there.

The beauty of selling bits for Land Rovers is that people tend to go out off-roading and break them at the weekend! It's also a well known statistic that 65% of all Land Rovers built are still in use - which over 50-odd years is quite an impressive achievement...

 

[Sheikh Yerbouti]

The beauty of selling bits for Land Rovers is that people tend to go out off-roading and break them at the weekend! It's also a well known statistic that 65% of all Land Rovers built are still in use - which over 50-odd years is quite an impressive achievement...

Yeah... I've got a few mates who run em as toys... cheap as chips and mucho fun (if you can afford the fuel like).
The allure of a short wheelbase series 3 with fat tyres and a nasty V8 is strong

 

[Amelie]

It's also a well known statistic that 65% of all Land Rovers built are still in use - which over 50-odd years is quite an impressive achievement...

Rubbish! Like 77% of the population i think statistics are a load of crap! With numbers like that you can't argue.

 

[simzzzz]

i'm a complete novice too, but i set my own website up using dreamweaver software, ( torrent download ) it has lots of web page templates that are useful and you can change them around to suit what you need. not that difficult just time consuming, at first the language used is a pain to get your head around but after a while its ok.

mine is very very basic though as thats all I needed, think you may want something a bit more sofisticated.

like sheik said keep it simple and easy to navigate

 

[mixster]

i'm a complete novice too, but i set my own website up using dreamweaver software, ( torrent download ) it has lots of web page templates that are useful and you can change them around to suit what you need. not that difficult just time consuming, at first the language used is a pain to get your head around but after a while its ok.

mine is very very basic though as thats all I needed, think you may want something a bit more sofisticated.

like sheik said keep it simple and easy to navigate

Cheers mate, something like the site you have made would be ideal I reckon - I could add the other stuff later once things start picking up (hopefully!) Don't think the artwork on my site will be as impressive though

As for that Series 3 you're after Sheikh, I know someone with the ultimate one of those - it's a bright yellow swb truck cab known as 'The Beast' with a huge lift kit, massive dock off mud tyres on chrome alloys, and the obligatory 3.9 V8 with straight-through pipes so it sounds awesome It's for sale but she wants too much for it so I'm hanging back for a bit until the price drops!

Thanks to all for your suggestions and advice