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How Should I Build Simple Local Sites?

by windfall_results
23 replies
I have a number of local businesses interested in having me design and implement a unique marketing strategy I developed.

This involves the use of fairly simple minisites. The problem is, I have no site building skills whatsoever.

I am going to have a template designed for me and I would simply make minor changes to it for each business (header, footer, images, and content). I do not want to have to do any coding, just copy and paste type work (and yes, this work for the concept).

Would Wordpress suit my needs or should I go the route of a basic HTML site and use Kompozer? I like to have control and do not really want to outsource this basic work...or should I? Perhaps I could use XsitePro...but then that would not allow my clients to make changes to their sites (which may not be such a bad idea)

I am seriously at a loss here as to how to proceed. I have business available, I just need to figure out how I can develop template sites that I can easily make changes too.

Any suggestions on a simple way for me to build the kind of sites I want too?

Paul
#build #local #simple #sites
  • Profile picture of the author TheShark
    Yes - wordpress and pick a free theme you like. It's worth spending a day learning wordpress and how to use themes. A lot of free tutorials online for you.

    Less than a year ago, put up my first wordpress site and theme in about 3 hours, now can do a super fast basic in less than an hour - maps and all.

    Good luck!

    TheShark
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    • Profile picture of the author AndrewCavanagh
      Yes wordpress will work very well with what you're doing.

      Using wordpress means you can also let your prospects choose from a wide range of themes that you've prechosen as easy for you to install and use.

      Wordpress also has the advantage of millions of plugins which can give you all kinds of potential functions that a client might ask for.

      Kindest regards,
      Andrew Cavanagh
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  • Profile picture of the author Nic Lynn
    Wordpress for the win! Though, I don't use free ones anymore, there are several free business centric themes that you can customize very, very easily that should fit the bill and get you started. Here is my favorite for these type of quick mini business sites... Notepad Theme Demo

    Frankly, you don't need to customize anything with this one. Just drop in a relevant picture and text and you are good.
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    • Profile picture of the author SeanFromSoCal
      If you think you are going to be doing business with them in the long haul and can see them asking you to build them a blog and help you promote it...or the client wanting to update the website on their own...then definitely do Wordpress.

      Otherwise...its overkill for a bunch of minisites. Those are probably easier to do in HTML.

      There are other slick methods of doing this with PHP that will make it really easy for you to do updates. I did one for a client that ran off of 1 PHP file with the template, 1 PHP file that drew the menu on all pages, and 1 HTML file with just the body of each page.

      PM me your e-mail when you have template done and I'll see how difficult it would be to tie in with my simple PHP system.
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  • Profile picture of the author Dennis Gaskill
    Do you folks really think a guy that doesn't want to learn any coding will be able to customize a Wordpress header graphic for each client?
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    Just when you think you've got it all figured out, someone changes the rules.

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    • Profile picture of the author Marty S
      Elance, brother.

      Don't even waste your time with it. Get the details and send it out to people who love doing that sh!t. You obviously are not going to be efficient at it anytime soon, so save yourself some grief and start using some talented, cheap designers - be the CONTRACTOR, not the LABORER.

      Further, having done enough websites for small businesses myself, I REALLY do KNOW there is little profit (and surplus headache) in setting up the website initially, so you want to be as hands off as possible there. Just set up due dates with your suppliers.

      The real money comes 3 months down the road when the website owner says, "Well I don't have any traffic, what do I do now?"

      Then you sell them a much more lucrative SEO plan for 3 - 6 months, and charge them way more than what you did for the website - and the bonus is they are incapable of nitpicking or waffling back and forth on backgrounds colors and other crap, because they have NO CLUE about SEO.

      You just show them each month in a 1 page report the increase in traffic, keyword targets, and backlinks, and you go cash the check.

      Since you already seem to have a marketing strategy in mind, I say - just skip to that instead of losing your hair over WP installations or CSS techniques. You can get bogged down for weeks, instead of getting more clients to a higher pay grade in a shorter amount of time.
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    • Profile picture of the author Nic Lynn
      Originally Posted by Dennis Gaskill View Post

      Do you folks really think a guy that doesn't want to learn any coding will be able to customize a Wordpress header graphic for each client?
      I don't see a single person who said that he should customize the headers graphic. In fact, I see the exact opposite... specific theme suggestions where no header customizations would required at all.
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      • Profile picture of the author Dennis Gaskill
        Originally Posted by Nic Lynn View Post

        I don't see a single person who said that he should customize the headers graphic. In fact, I see the exact opposite... specific theme suggestions where no header customizations would required at all.
        I refer you to the original post:
        I am going to have a template designed for me and I would simply make minor changes to it for each business (header, footer, images, and content). I do not want to have to do any coding, just copy and paste type work (and yes, this work for the concept).
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        • Profile picture of the author Nic Lynn
          Originally Posted by Dennis Gaskill View Post

          I refer you to the original post:
          I am going to have a template designed for me and I would simply make minor changes to it for each business (header, footer, images, and content). I do not want to have to do any coding, just copy and paste type work (and yes, this work for the concept).
          Gotcha, I thought you were referring to the advice of the other posters. However, I don't get your parallel between coding and header graphics? I don't know a thing about code, but I can use photoshop just fine. So, to answer your question now that I understand it, yes, i think that a guy who doesn't want to code can handle graphic tweaks... especially since he specifically said he would.
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          • Profile picture of the author Dennis Gaskill
            Originally Posted by Nic Lynn View Post

            Gotcha, I thought you were referring to the advice of the other posters. However, I don't get your parallel between coding and header graphics? I don't know a thing about code, but I can use photoshop just fine. So, to answer your question now that I understand it, yes, i think that a guy who doesn't want to code can handle graphic tweaks... especially since he specifically said he would.
            Nic, Wordpress Blogs are usually far more complicated than static sites. I've seen static site coders with lots of experience struggle initially with customizing Wordpress.

            If a fellow doesn't want to learn code I think he'll have a hard time even finding the header within the Wordpress file structure to upload a replacement. You have to know what to look for and where to look. I'm not saying it can't be done, just that it doesn't sound like it's the simple solution the OP is asking for.
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            • Profile picture of the author Nic Lynn
              Originally Posted by Dennis Gaskill View Post

              Nic, Wordpress Blogs are usually far more complicated than static sites. I've seen static site coders with lots of experience struggle initially with customizing Wordpress.

              If a fellow doesn't want to learn code I think he'll have a hard time even finding the header within the Wordpress file structure to upload a replacement. You have to know what to look for and where to look. I'm not saying it can't be done, just that it doesn't sound like it's the simple solution the OP is asking for.
              Wow, I couldn't disagree more! The header graphic can simply be a jpg (or equivalent) file. Just tweak the header to your heart's content in Photoshop or GIMP (or equivalent) and reupload the file under the original file's name to the original directory. There is zero code involved unless you are changing image sizes and/or playing around with a CSS style header. I do this with wordpress everyday and I can barely use an electric toothbrush!
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              • Profile picture of the author Andyhenry
                Originally Posted by Nic Lynn View Post

                Wow, I couldn't disagree more! The header graphic can simply be a jpg (or equivalent) file. Just tweak the header to your heart's content in Photoshop or GIMP (or equivalent) and reupload the file under the original file's name to the original directory. There is zero code involved unless you are changing image sizes and/or playing around with a CSS style header. I do this with wordpress everyday and I can barely use an electric toothbrush!
                Hehe....

                That's funny.

                I'm on the other side.

                I find it easier to build a static site than get wordpress looking how I want.
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                • Profile picture of the author windfall_results
                  Hey everyone,

                  Thanks for all the great advice (and sorry for the delayed response).

                  Building a website is small component of the complete marketing strategy I will be implementing for local businesses, so perhaps I am overthinking this. The special offline promotion system will be the driving force in the overall strategy.

                  I am going to test three methods over the next month or two...

                  XsitePro - static sites
                  Artisteer - build Wordpress sites
                  Outsource - template building and installation

                  I will report back in a month or two to let those in a similar situation know how I managed.

                  Thanks again for all your help. I definitely see the benefits in each argument, but to each his own I suppose. I just need to take action and find which method best suits both my clients and myself.
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  • Profile picture of the author ausslite
    wordpress is very customizable. there are many templates that you just upload jpg files and you have sweet custom looking header.
    i would go with that.
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  • Profile picture of the author Andyhenry
    Hey Paul,

    I'm with Marty on this.

    If you don't have these skills (which seems weird considering you've developed a business that relies on them) then outsource.

    If I was intending to build sites for people regularly then I'd definitely outsource them all.

    I usually send them to other people for the site as it's not worth my time building them myself, but I have friends who specialise in providing websites and just have a team who do them.

    You can charge much more for your services than the site in most cases, especially since you don't have the skills to do them easily yourself.

    Just find a good provider you can work with that charges a price that makes sense for your business and just keep giving the sites to them. You can get them to do all the on page seo for you too, so you just get a site which needs no modifications.

    Andy
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    • Profile picture of the author jan roos
      I use Xsitepro 2 and it's great for this type of thing. I have a few outsourcers that build custom sites for me in XSP for around $100 - $200. The quality is good, Then I just add some SEO optimization to the site and publish. XSP is so easy to learn how to make changes etc to the site, plus from experience I don't have many requests to change the sites at all.

      If I was you, I'd just outsource it all and concentrate on getting more clients.

      Cheers
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  • Profile picture of the author Mao Flynn
    Wordpress or Instant Site Launcher are the best options. If you have no experience whatsoever then the latter.
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    • Profile picture of the author Andyhenry
      Originally Posted by Mao Flynn View Post

      Wordpress or Instant Site Launcher are the best options. If you have no experience whatsoever then the latter.
      I noticed the second one is yours. Do you have any examples of the instant site launcher sites?
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      nothing to see here.

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  • Profile picture of the author DC Marketing
    Hey Windfall.

    The fastest and easiest way to go is through a wordpress blog.
    I use the free flexiblity2 theme and it covers almost anything you need to do.

    If your hosting account has fantastico you will be able to install a blog in underv 10 minutes and that's if your system is running slow.

    If you are interested in hiring the install process out, I would be happy to help you out. Just PM me and I'll set something up for you very affordable.

    Pick up a hosting account through hostgater or bluehost and 95% of your battle will be done.

    Good luck in your business,
    Douglas J Gregory
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  • Profile picture of the author Vis
    If time is critical, Wordpress is the way to go. With it, you can snap up a new minisite or make quick changes to the appearance or structure by the use of themes. To avoid the post style look, you could set up a static page for the home page. With the right template, you don't have to edit directly into the code and could just upload a header image, banners, a footer image or advertisement.

    However for flexibility and ease, you could go with HTML and CSS and develop with a html editor. Word of caution, it may be more difficult to make quick changes to appearance unless you have various CSS templates to switch from style to style. You could switch headers, footers too. But you have more than one page, it takes more work to update content.

    As for the template, you need to research for the right template for your business. Again if time is critical, you may need to outsource this. With Wordpress, it takes a deeper learning curve to develop one yourself. With HTML and CSS, it takes less learning time to make a blank template with a html editor and make a few CSS stylesheets with it.
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  • Profile picture of the author goharnett
    Just real simple in a box, no html, easy set up, yeah wordpress, but also something like Weebly.
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  • Profile picture of the author Dennis Pippin
    If you don't know code and want a simple way to reach your goal I only have three words for you....outsource, outsource, outsource. There are plenty of members here that can setup the sites for a reasonable cost. This will give you less headaches and you can spend more time building your business.
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    • Profile picture of the author IMGuruUsher
      For affiliate websites I recommend XSitePro as it has been developed with affiliates in mind but it does require a fair amount of work and experience to create professional sites. WordPress is good for most forms of sites. But it also has a learning curve.

      My personal favorite is Fast Income Systems with Instant Site Launcher software. Launch Your Own Professionally Designed, Income Producing Websites in Minutes With Only a Few Clicks of Your Mouse...AND Discover All The Traffic Generation Techniques You'll Ever Need to Earn a Full Time Living Online. For further details on Instant Site Launcher do visit Golden Business Success and Solutions.
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