Building a website

[Clevy]

Hey guys.

I own a construction company. I haven't had any need for a website nor advertising at all actually however new construction had basically died in my local area however due to interests rates being fairly low demolition permits and thus building permits for renovations on older homes are on the upswing so I am working with a marketing group to get us out there in the public sector. So it all starts with a website so I'm asking here.
Who has the best hosting service and are they sold in packages as far as bandwidth/memory/whatever? What should I be looking for in a package?
I've got lots of project pictures,like thousands. Is volume important or just a few of the best? I'm thinking I focus on the less high end stuff. I don't want people to think I'm unaffordable. Maybe a mix?

So what kind of memory would I need for say a couple hundred pics and a few pages of text?
And is Google still king? And I should get into that keyword stuff?

I'm a carpenter but evolving into a business man in a hurry,re-learning how to bid now that a customer acquisition cost looms.

So anything you can tell me about building a decent website. I'm all ears

 

[OVERKILL]

Given your lack of experience in this realm I would suggest just getting in touch with somebody who does this sort of thing for a living. There are firms that specialize in exactly what you are looking to accomplish and very good at it.

Send me a PM and I can point you in the right direction.

 

[raytseng]

I think if you want to be more hands off, you just go with a hosted web-building site, where they provide you with a toolset to get a site up and running very fast based on a templates rather than something "custom" and specific to what you need.

You may have to make some concessions of flexibility to fit into their template.


Type into google, "build your own website", and you'll get a whole list that fall into this category. Unfortunately, I don't know which one works best for your needs.

If you're not the most tech savvy, but don't want to pay big bucks, you may want to find a college-aged relative looking for an internship who might want a short term summer job to get this done for you.


SEO Keywords and google adwords is a different beast as that goes into advertising and marketting. When was the last time you bought something from clicking on an internet ad. Be careful, there's plenty of small shops who thought google ads were the way to go, and ended up with no new business except for a monthly bill.

 

[Y_K]

As always: it depends. If you want to be a hands-on person, prepare for a lot of time lost with no ROI to show for. If you are looking for a turnkey solution, prepare yourself for a lot of money lost with some ROI at first. In one of my past lives I used to be a software person, a UNIX network security spec, etc so in my towncar Co the skills came in handy later. I sell all my entities within 7-year window regardless of the results, so I can talk freely about my experience. This way I am never stuck with a loss for one, and have some new fun challenges while being retired early. Anyway, I am still taking care of 50+ sites under the continued service contracts on some of those. Read a ton of SEO dissertations every month.. but, the most stupid discoveries come from observing your customers and talking to them in person. With all the complex algos out there, stat massives, heat maps of the eye movements and such, a short conversation with a secretary and the wife of a guy who makes decisions may be an eye opener. Women gave me more in business than anything else. We are locked into our Male Structural Thinking. Sometimes you need a speck of fuzzy logic they provide.

Anyway, good luck with that.

As of now, I am very content with pair.com as a hoster and several CDN services, e.g. Amazon, Google, CloudFlare

 

[uc50ic4more]

I am web developer and have done a few web sites for contractors. I have learned that residential and commercial clients need to be addressed a little differently: Residential clients are more apt to want to see flashy, pretty pictures and read testimonials; where commercial clients - being a bit more experienced, knowledgeable and savvy - are much less impressed by these things and may view a lot of whiz-bang photos as novelty.

As far as hosting is concerned - If you intend to get something up and running yourself I have to suggest that you look at either a hosted Wordpress or Blogger (Google) site. Yes, I understand that technically both of these services are for blogs; but:

1) In the case of having a nice-looking site for residential clients, having a regularly-updated site is better, anyhow. This will give you the opportunity to make use of all of those photos you have.

2) Both of these technologies allow you to create "pages" rather than blog posts. The difference is subtle: A web page will remain in the navigation area statically where a blog post gets supplanted by new ones as new ones are posted. These "pages" could act as, for example, RESIDENTIAL WORK, COMMERCIAL WORK, CONTACT US, ABOUT US, etc., etc.

3) Both of these services will allow you to upload a (limited) number of photos. I do not have much experience with Wordpress-hosted sites; but Google allows 15GB (!) of storage PLUS they'll store unlimited amounts of photos and videos if the sizes are not ridiculous (yours likely aren't ridiculous). Google also makes it pretty darn easy to embed Google-hosted photos and YouTube videos and even documents you might store on Google Drive (if, for example, you had example or template contracts, checklists, or downloads you'd like for clients to be able to access).

I have set up a few folks with Blogger (Google) and am reasonably familiar with setting it up, pointing a domain name to it, setting up navigation and pages, and posting. With both I would presume SEO to be trivial; but I know with Google you can set up Google Analytics and other things. Let me know here or via PM is there is anything further I can do to help.

I would certainly suggest getting a domain name. This both makes your web site easy to remember and communicate (yourname.com instead of yourname.blogger.com, for example) and de-couples you from any hosting provider: If you ever decide to switch a hosting provider you simply point the domain name to the new location. If you went with yourname.blogger.com and then moved elsewhere, that name you've been putting on business cards and billboards and the backs of napkins will be obsolete.

As far as design and layout are concerned, this is where having a professional on board helps a lot; although both Wordpress and Blogger offer different themes and layouts for sites (I think Wordpress really outshines Blogger in this arena) and you can find some really nice ones out there. If all you need to do is get some information to a prospective client once (it's not like people are going to be checking your web site weekly for the latest local contractor news! They're going to hire you or not and move on with their lives...) then a quick, easy site that gets people their info FAST FAST FAST is probably going to serve you best.

EDIT: And for Pete's sake, make sure that whatever you do, you remain consistent with your "branding": Use the exact same logo, typeface, colours, slogans, etc. as you use on business cards, print ads, etc.

 

[demarpaint]

Originally Posted By: Clevy
Hey guys.

I own a construction company. I haven't had any need for a website nor advertising at all actually however new construction had basically died in my local area however due to interests rates being fairly low demolition permits and thus building permits for renovations on older homes are on the upswing so I am working with a marketing group to get us out there in the public sector. So it all starts with a website so I'm asking here.
Who has the best hosting service and are they sold in packages as far as bandwidth/memory/whatever? What should I be looking for in a package?
I've got lots of project pictures,like thousands. Is volume important or just a few of the best? I'm thinking I focus on the less high end stuff. I don't want people to think I'm unaffordable. Maybe a mix?

So what kind of memory would I need for say a couple hundred pics and a few pages of text?
And is Google still king? And I should get into that keyword stuff?

I'm a carpenter but evolving into a business man in a hurry,re-learning how to bid now that a customer acquisition cost looms.

So anything you can tell me about building a decent website. I'm all ears



Good luck with it buddy. After 2 years I took mine down, it was a total waste of money. The hits I got were from people looking for cheap work. I had it set up showing high end work, in exclusive areas, hoping it would discourage people looking for cheap work, it didn't help. I didn't have the patience for people looking for low-ball bids. I do better with word of mouth since we're on the higher end of the pricing spectrum. I had to satisfy my curiosity though. OTOH my paper hanger friend does OK with his.

Try direct mailing old clients, it works very well for me.

 

[Pop_Rivit]

Originally Posted By: Clevy

So anything you can tell me about building a decent website. I'm all ears


Find a reputable company that can design and host a professional website. Otherwise it looks like a contractor with no web design experienced designed it.

 

[DuckRyder]

I agree for a business website let a professional do it, I'd probably try to stay away from "trendy" myself... though.

As far as what content to include, as someone who has occasionally looked at contractor websites, I think you should organize it into types of project (for example: Kitchens, bathrooms, whole house) and include a nice selection of varied projects...

For example: If I want to remodel a bathroom, I don't want to go through a bunch of kitchen photos. What I do want is to be able to quickly find an example that is at least similar to what I want to do or have in mind.

That is my opinion anyway...

Good luck (have you thought about a niche or specialty?)

 

[Garak]

My view, Clevy, would to be keep it simple. You want to avoid demarpaint's experience, but you still want yourself to be out there, versus just in the Yellow Pages. Some of the web constructors in this province are a little expensive, so something that doesn't require a lot of upkeep, but does show customers how to contact you by postal mail, email, fax, and telephone is quite helpful.

 

[Benito]

Originally Posted By: demarpaint
Good luck with it buddy. After 2 years I took mine down, it was a total waste of money. The hits I got were from people looking for cheap work. I had it set up showing high end work, in exclusive areas, hoping it would discourage people looking for cheap work, it didn't help. I didn't have the patience for people looking for low-ball bids. I do better with word of mouth since we're on the higher end of the pricing spectrum. I had to satisfy my curiosity though. OTOH my paper hanger friend does OK with his.

Try direct mailing old clients, it works very well for me.


I agree with this. How did the OP come to the conclusion that a website is the appropriate strategy for customer acquisition for his line of work?

There are some simple things you can do to figure out the right marketing strategy for your own particular business and service area prior to spending too much money trying some things out.

 

[Y_K]

Originally Posted By: Benito
..the appropriate strategy for customer acquisition for his line of work?

the key

 

[rjundi]

Don't focus on the provider much unless you buy on with a template to fill in.

A KEY thing is making sure you get a developer who can write a responsive(looks decent on smartphone and browser) website or template that can produce one. If site is not responsive your ranking in search goes down with Google.

On pictures trim it to the 10-20 best ones to represent your work within site and if you feel like sharing lots more use another site like google picassa or something.

I am Web Development lead for business applications and also do work for a major media company and have had sites win Emmy & Webby awards.

 

[eljefino]

Find someone to manage your online presence... maybe a wife of one of your employees or college kid or stay at home mom. Pick them how they'd pick you... previous experience and references. Set it up so YOU own the

*domain
*passwords
*pay the hosting rental

so you don't get jerked around at renewal time.

Have them also manage facebook, twitter, yelp, google, BBB, Angies List, and any other way your name can get positively or negatively nicked. You don't have to "push" all those outlets, but beware of if you're being picked on without knowing it, or if in your city, for whatever reason, your competition is all over.

 

[uc50ic4more]

Originally Posted By: rjundi
If site is not responsive your ranking in search goes down with Google.


Blogger, the Google site which I had mentioned in my first post in this thread, auto-formats your sites for mobile. I forgot to mention that!