Need Ideas For Website

Decorating By frog80 Updated 1 Jun 2007 , 1:52pm by frog80

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frog80 Posted 1 Jun 2007 , 1:16pm
post #1 of 3

I've just recently purchased my domain name and am trying to get a website up and going for my customers (and potential customers) icon_lol.gif, and was wondering if any of you would mind sharing your sites, ideas, advice, anything. I don't know the first thing about building a website. I purchased my domain name from godaddy.com, and they offer a free web site builder, but I don't really like the templates they have to choose from and am having some trouble with the photo gallery and things. Any help will be very much appreciated. TIA!

2 replies
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indydebi Posted 1 Jun 2007 , 1:40pm
post #2 of 3

Some basics:

Brides who are looking for cakes want to see pictures and pricing information. If you're not putting prices on your site, I would recommend some kind of price range for them, ("Our cakes start at $x.xx per serving for basic buttercream...."). They want to know if you are in the $2-3 range or the $15-18 dollar range per serving. Just as some FYI, brides have told me the reason they like my site is because my prices are front and center. They tell me if they see a website with no pricing, they just move on. The attitude is "WHy are you afraid to put your pricing up there? What are you hiding? Why are you afraid to show it to me?"

A "contact us" page. When I first set mine up, I had "contact us" links on various pages but my computer geek son said I needed a page dedicated to this because that's what people look for.

Avoid the "send me YOUR Info and I'll get back to you" set up. Brides want info now .... it's the internet age of instant information. They don't want to wait for the info and they are leary of companies that want their name/phone etc right up front.... it triggers a fear of the pushy salesman who will become a pest once they have the name/phone. Just a simple email or phone contact is great. (They don't mind giving their name and phone number by CHOICE (via email), but they will run from the place that FORCES them to hand over their contact info before they can receive cake info.)

If you're not putting your full address on there, at least put your city or area that you service. (I've seen some w/o even a city so I've no idea if they are next door to me or in California!).

If the site is limited on how many photos you can upload, I suggest getting a Flickr site (see my link below). You can get a basic Flickr for free, but I paid the $25 annual fee for unlimited uploads. I have a link on my catering site that takes brides to my flickr site so they can see ALL of my photos and not be limited by the few I can put on my catering site.

Watch your backgrounds and fonts. A background that may look pretty on screen may not print well when the bride prints off your page for her wedding planning book. (I've run into those.) So print a page and see how it looks.

Make sure fonts are legible and not "pretty". If the customer has a hard time reading a fancy font, it may as well be written in a foreign language.

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frog80 Posted 1 Jun 2007 , 1:52pm
post #3 of 3

Thanks soo much for the info. I will definately take your advice on this.

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