Keeping in mind your target audience, determine if you want a static informational website, or a dynamic interactive site.
Static informational website
A static website is mostly informational. You write the content of the pages, and the site visitor reads them. New content can be added as little or as often as you want.
Dynamic interactive website
Dynamic websites bring the visitor in and let them control their experience. Usually these websites involve having a user log in and let them customize the look and feel of the website. They may be able to easily add content to the website, or participate in discussion forums. These websites change minute by minute with the visitors.
Dynamic websites will always have back-end scripts to power them, and so will cost more.
Ongoing Maintenance A static website is fairly simple to maintain after the design is complete. You have a few options:
Content changes through us
Any changes you want made, you simply send to us. We will type them up (if received in a non-electronic format), do some copy editing on them (running any suggested changed by you before finalizing), and then put the changes on the website. We charge a nominal hourly fee for these services.
You handle content changes
If you have someone with the right skill-set, you very well may be able to handle the content changes. You will need a basic understanding of HTML and how to use FTP. If you don't have someone with the skill-set, we are willing to train someone for a nominal fee.
Use a dynamic website
Even if you have mostly non-changing content, a dynamic website may still be right for you. Setting up a Content Management System (CMS) will allow site changes to be made very easily -- it's as easy as using a word processor. This is also useful if you need fine-grained access controls, where only certain people should be able to make changes to certain pages. Skip down to Dynamic Websites for more information.
You may also want to add some dynamic elements to your static site. Custom forms, such as a Contact Form, are easily added to a static site. Let us know what you need, as we will create it for you!
Now that you have determined your needs, continue on to Step 3: Hosting.
Dynamic websites provide a vast array of options - your website can be made to do almost anything! Please review some of the available pre-made scripts that we can install and customize on your website:
Content Management System (CMS)
A CMS will allow you to easily make changes to your website. You have fine-grained control over who can access what on the site, and who can edit what on the site. Everything on the site is easily search-able from within the website. Features such as polls, blogs, newsletters, and events are easily integrated.
Image/Photo Gallery
If you like to share photos or images, an image gallery will be a good fit for you. We can customize it in any way you want to make it fit with your site. You can control who has access to view or upload photos.
Discussion Forum
A discussion forums is a good way to keep visitors coming back to your website. These are easily themable and a great addition to any website that wants to build a community. However, not all forums succeed just by existing. You will have to nurture it and encourage discussion for it to grow to the point where it's self-sustaining.
Blogging Software
Similar to a CMS, but designed more for news, updates, and ongoing information, rather then pages that don't change much. With a blog you can allow multiple authors to make entries and posts to the front page of your website. With a blog it's easy to keep a community informed as to what is happening. Blogs are a good choice for grass-roots organizations and community groups.
E-commerce
If you want to sell something, then you will probably want a shopping cart. Note that shopping carts are generally difficult to theme to your website and require a lot of maintenance, and so will be quite expensive.
Looking for something more?
We are able to write custom software to do what you need. Discuss with us what you need, and we'll give you a quote.
Now that you have determined your needs, continue on to Step 3: Hosting.