The Wholesale Forums

[winny]

Okay, I've just registered the domain name that I want to use for my website. Between now and around March time (that's when I've penciled in launch time) I've got to learn everything I need to know about setting up and running a website; who to go to for the hosting/design etc and what all these weird and mysterious phrases mean...zencart???? I'm not after a freebie, I just want to know what I should know before I go and sit down with a pro? I need to have the right questions, so that I can make informed decisions! Cheers guys, and please be gentle!

[anotheruser]

Whoa! winny! Don't panic. you've got 5 months. All you need is 5 or 10 years!

Seriously, though, you should be able to get a ahndle on how to do most of it yourself in that time.

The first thing to do if you have no experience whatever, is to go and get yourself some free web space and have a little play around. Leave your own domain name alone. You could have winny.yahooblogs.com or something like that. Everyone's got their favourite and you'll doubtless get loads of folk on here saying This one NO! That one and so forth. But just get the first one yuo can get access to.

Make a site of you, your family, your hobby, silly jokes, anything that comes to mind, just to get the hang of it. The first thing you need to do is to get a handle on some basic html for one thing and how web sites work in general for another. Like what's an ftp client? Will I have email facilities with my web site? What happens as my business grows? plus a thousand and one others you'll think of and others will remind us of. Different hosts offer different levels of help to those very new to teh web. If yoours doesn't offer help, come back here and between us we'll give you a few too many pointers.

Have fun!

[Pete]

Other than the design of your site, there is little need of a pro. There are many free and low cost online stores available that need virtually no actual website experience to operate an online shopping cart.

It will help to have a few html goodies in your head, but they are simple and easy to remember. <b> and </b> before and after a phrase you want to make bold. Then there is i for italic, u for underline and <font size and color> for changing sizes and colors. See, now you're an expert.

And some carts, such as CubeCart come with built in html editors, so you just highlight what you want to change and click the icon, just like MS Word.

As I've said other places, the main thing with a cart is setting it up the first time, and that is basically answering questions. What is you address, what is your tax rate, what is your currency, etc. None of this requires knowing anything axcept the answers, which you type in or choose from a list.

I've started many a neophyte (newbie) off with a shopping cart that they have had ready to go within a day or two. Virtually everything is done for you. There is no "building a website", it's already done.

The only place you may want a "pro" is in the look of the site. The out of the box choices are pretty limited, but there are any number of free or paid for templates (or skins) available and there are some folks who will design one from scratch, just for you.

Many people do want a distinct look for their shopping carts, others don't really care. My attituce has always been - when is the last time you left a site because you recognized they were using a default site template? People come to your site because you managed to get them there, they come to buy, not judge your template. I'm not saying it is not a good idea to have something unique, but it is not the be all end all of online stores. Many large companies sell from basic free shopping cart sites.

So, be getting your products together. Gather your images, you'll need them. Spend some time on the net at the various sites devoted to learning web ways. But in the back of your mind keep the thought that "I've got it handled." because you really can have a cart online with little or no web knowledge. What little you need to know you'll pick up in short order.

As an example, here is a sample CubeCart store I use for people like you to check out. Click the link and check it out. The user name is admin and the password is (get ready for this) password. http://smallbusinesshoster.com/cubec...dmin/index.php

You'll see it's not so complicated at all.

[MustHaveMobiles]

I disagree with the free web space advice, not that it isn't worthwhile advice but I personally work to the principle of getting a page up immediately.... read Content is King. The advice is good because it allows you to play however so will your own space (from as little as £1 a month from betterwebspace as you will not need anymore bandwidth etc for a while anyway).

My advice would be play to get comfortable, your main page only needs to be an article page (keyword rich) which is basically as simple as typing into WORD if you use a html WYSIWYG editor (plenty of free ones about). Upload it and then drop a link into say here to see what people think and the spiders will hit it and start the indexing and also allowing the climb from the sandbox to start.

Then wherever you want to play any further just use a sub page that you haven't linked to anywhere and continue to learn...

[winny]

Thanks guys, I've put off long enough!

eBay are seriously annoying me, and my business is fast approaching the stage where I don't trust my income to a fickle host! I'm gonna have to bite the bullet and get hands on!

anotheruser, I might've known you'd have a giggle! Back at you! But seriously, thanks to the 3 of you you've pointed me in the right direction!

I'm off reading & exploring and will be back with questions as and when they pop up...suffice to say, I might be sometime....