Beginning Your Work Experience
On this page, you will find help with domain registering, picking a host, design tips, and my personal opinions.
Choosing A Domain Name
Before you can do anything, you should think of a domain name you wish to use. This can be a trying experience since most names have been gobbled up, it's not impossible, but can be frustrating. I recommend you start at GoDaddy's whois page. You can go directly to it by clicking here. I recommend GoDaddy as a registrar, simply because of the registrars respected name throughout the community and for the services they provide. I do not recommend their hosting services. However, they are limited and you can find better representation in a different host.
I recommend that you not purchase your domain name from your host. Many times they offer this as an incentive to purchase hosting from them and you receive this service free. Just because it's free does not mean you own it, please don't be fooled. If you leave that host, there is every chance you'll end up changing your domain name, or having to outright purchase the domain name from them. It can cost thousands of dollars to have to do so, please register your domain name with a registrar such as GoDaddy or Network Solutions.
Consider the .com before choosing .net, .biz, .us. .Com is the most widely recognized of the domain names and is the first thought of most people typing an address in their address bar. .Net I believe is probably the second most used.
Hosting
There are many good hosts, and many bad hosts. Ask around, while I can give you recommended hosting solutions, the end result is you have the final say.
The biggest problem with finding good hosting is there are more resellers than actual hosting solutions.
A Reseller is someone who sells space for the main hosting solution. Many "resellers" lead you to believe they are the actual host when this is simply not the case. Resellers sell hosting solutions at vastly different amounts of storage space, bandwidth, and other services at a higher cost than the actual host does. While there are very good resellers who provide exceptional service, too often resellers do not offer the service you expect to get for a hosting solution and some do not even have the answers you need, so you wait longer while they get the answers to help you with your needs. I have often been told resellers are better because of the customer service, but I won't pay 35.00 a month for service when I don't use the customer service often enough to pay that kind of price for it and frankly, I don't believe you should have to pay for the customer service, I fully believe you pay for the whole package, and this is my number one reason for not being a reseller or offering hosting as a developer.
Things to look for in a host
The best way to tell a reseller from a host, is by seeing how much they offer in space, bandwidth amounts, and cost. Many resellers offer as little as 200meg and as much as 2gigs of storage space, with bandwidth from 1gig to 10 gigs of bandwidth space. They will charge in the neighborhood of 10.00 to 35.00 per month. They will charge extra when you go over your bandwidth limits and this can add up fast. Remember, bandwidth is gobbled up for every single page that your customers load on your site, whether it is heavy in graphics or not.
If you are going to be offering eGoods on your site (Downloadable products), you will want a hosting solution that offers plenty of storage space and bandwidth.
Design of Site
With the development of any site, it's important to know what you want in a layout. Keeping track of layout and design on a site you do like and don't like is important for any developer to understand before helping you with a layout that will suit your needs. As a developer myself, I have asked this of many clients, because I need to know what your looking for and can get a sense of your wants by simply looking at those sites.
Shopping Carts
With a shopping cart, while you can create different looks, the actual layout and design are heavily integrated into the actual script for the cart. You're almost always going to have the option of a two column or three column site. By two column, I mean that there is a left or right side area which usually shows boxes offering categories, important areas of interest for your site, best sellers, etc... and the main text is all to the right or left side. With a three column layout, the boxes are spread out between the left and right sides, with the main text coming in the middle area. It doesn't matter what type of design you choose, you're always going to have a specific type of layout to choose from in terms of two, or three columns. All sites will have a logo at the top, and a bottom area with copyright and credit info listed.
If your wanting an inexpensive solution for a cart, my personal preference is Zen-Cart, you can't get a better cart for the money, it is free. While the developers ask you to contribute if you like it, and while I'd encourage you to do so, you never have to give them a penny, and yet they offer a forum with wide support for the product, as well as many really nice addons.
osCommerce is another solution, Zen-Cart was built off the original osCommerce script, but it's integration makes Zen-Cart the better choice in my personal opinion. However, osCommerce is still a good cart for the money as well. It is also free.
There are paid solutions as well, while I like CubeCart, I have built one on my own site, but have never placed it on anyone else's site. It is a nice solution over Option Cart, which is also a nice cart, but the payment integration needs to go thru a third party before it ever gets to Paypal for instance and this is the biggest reason I prefer not to use Option Cart.
X-Cart and Cart32 are more expensive options, while they don't offer anything really that different than what you can get for the free carts, they offer add-ons that simply don't even come close to comparing the free carts to the paid carts and that alone is the real power behind these two cart solutions.
Color Choices
As a quilter, I have always considered myself good with color and coordinating them. People look at me strangely when I've told them my favorite color is black, but the reason I like it so much is it goes with everything. Most of the quilts I've made have black in them, and I'll probably never stray from that, however, if I had to choose a color that wasn't black, I'd go with either forest green or purple of any shade.
When you are building a site, color is just as important to the eye as it is to the making of a quilt.
My preference has always been to start with an image you like or have chosen to go on your site and coordinate your colors from from that picture using software such as Color Schemer, or CoffeeCup's Website Color Schemer software. Both of these software packages allow you the ability to coordinate striking color schemes to work well with each other. However, at Color Schemer's website, they offer pages and pages of coordinating schemes that you can get a good grasp of coordinating color schemes so I ask that you visit this site, and look carefully at the schemes to choose one or two that you like best.
However, if you already have something in mind, I can take the color, and put together a nice scheme as well, working together with you to present the coordinating colors for your site.
Text and Wording
Too often, I find people have no clue what they wish to say on their site. This is a common problem, and one you should give good thought to. Your opening words on your main page are going to keep people there or drive them away. Be sure to welcome them, show them what's new, on sale, and direct them straight to your products that are new and on sale.
When I am building your site, it's also important for me to know how you want your site worded, fonts you wish to use, colors, and sizing.
If you are building a cart, product descriptions are also extremely important. While I can help on some level, I don't always have the easy words to add. It's better for you to put these to text and make sure I have a copy.
So, You've Decided To Hire Me, What's Next
What Will I Need From You
Trust! That's number one for me. You will have to trust me with your passwords for your control panel access at your host, FrontPage, ftp and database access. I can not work on your site without these key things and would not even consider walking you thru the process. Once I am finished, I will walk you thru the process of changing your passwords, as there is no need for me to need them.
HTML Knowledge
I will also need to know your html knowledge, have you ever done any type of web work for instance. Perhaps you have done some, or know enough to build your own site, but have never added a cart, or blog, forum, or any other type of service that requires installations from the browser or working in a browser versus a html editor or notepad.
Chat Facilities
Chat ID's that you use. I cover this below, but if we work together it will be very helpful if you use some type of chat software.
When working with you, it is best if you use some type of chat software. Yahoo, AOL, ICQ, even MSN, I use Trillian software which allows me to be online with all the previously mentioned services at the same time simultaneously without having their software installed. I am available on Yahoo, AIM, ICQ, and MSN chat services. When I am online and that is usually 24/5, I will answer any questions you pose. At the same time, it's extremely helpful if you are online and available so we can work together to get your site done.
Software
It will also be important for me to know your browser type, software you use for HTML purposes, graphic software, etc.. For instance, AOL browser has an entirely different look than Firefox or Internet Explorer does.
Design and Colors
Type of layout, design ideas and what you expect your site to look like. What are you wanting on your site, a site with tips, tricks and projects, perhaps a blog, perhaps just show your family off or forum where you can help others, even a cart. These are all important for me to know.
Once you have a basic idea of your needs, please feel free to contact me here.