Viewing 13 posts - 1 through 13 (of 13 total)
  • Talk to me about building a website etc
  • JohnClimber
    Free Member

    I’ve an idea to try and sell some of my better photos on line but need a bit of advise from those in the know.

    1) I’ve found that the website name I fancy is avalable in both .com & .co.uk forms.
    2) I need somewhere to host it.
    3) I need to build the site where I can take payments (if I’m lucky)

    So please can you advise me on who is best (on a budget) to host it for me?
    And which program is the best looking and whoch is easy to work with?

    Cheers

    John

    tinribz
    Free Member

    For a first simple site you could just do some HTML and paste in some PayPal buttons. There are also cart plugins for joomla and WordPress you can get up and running for free.

    Big-Dave
    Free Member

    I used Itseeze for my company website. The basic package was only £200 to build it and £20 odd a month hosting. There will likely be a rep local to you who can give you a quote etc. Quite happy with how my site turned out.

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    coolhandluke
    Free Member

    For my first web site I bought a template and spent hours and hours trying to put my photos and words into it using a snide copy of Dreamwraver.

    I probably spent 100 hours doing it and couldn’t do the email bit so paid someone to do that for me.

    The site was well lovely, flash based. Old hat these days probably though.

    No bad I thought considering I had no idea about flash or much about HTML for that matter. That was about 10 years ago. I’m sure templates are easier these days and HTML is certainly easier than flash, I think.

    You could go down the template route, I would if I wanted a web site again.

    Template monster would be a good starting place I guess.

    Chew
    Free Member

    Any need for your own website?

    You can just change your settings in Flickr so you can sell them via Getty Images.

    pacemaker
    Free Member

    I use zenfolio and it’s been great, use the trial and if you like it you can use this code for 10% off

    Y8Y-42A-E2R

    I have the unlimited storage and use there printing and mailing services.

    http://Www.zenfolio.com

    JohnClimber
    Free Member

    Thanks all.

    If you think of anything else please let me know.

    leffeboy
    Full Member

    I’m a big fan of SmugMug and they can now use a UK print lab. SEO seems good in that if you spend time keywording your photos they do seem to appear in image searches after a while. It’s relatively easy to set up as well. I think there is a one month free trial so give it a go.

    The benefit of using something like Smugmug (and probably Zenfolio as well) is that they use a content distribution service to make your site run faster wherever in the world you are visiting from.

    If you aren’t going to promote your own site name in some way then you may have better luck selling your images through something like Flickr as their images tend to rank quite highly is searches

    johndoh
    Free Member

    +1 chew. You build a site but no-one will find it. Use existing sites, give them commission and you ‘ll sell more. If it works out, then you invest in a decent site of your own.

    rone
    Full Member

    Plenty of established sites that sell pictures on your behalf such as istock.

    Maybe build a simpler site about you as an artist that then links to them?

    JohnClimber
    Free Member

    When I get in front of my laptop I’ll look into the Flickr/Getty and Istock options.

    Cheers all

    Drac
    Full Member

    Hosting with WordPress, always loads of plugins for that and it’s very easy to use.

    For example:

    WP iSell Photo – Easily Sell Photos From Your WordPress Site

    elliott-20
    Free Member

    No point in trying to create something yourself, there’s plenty of tools out there to sell prints etc. without the need to build and host a website yourself.

    Photoshelter, etsy, Zenfolio, SmugMug, Shopify to name but a few. Most of these allow the options to point a domain name to your ‘store’ IIRC.

Viewing 13 posts - 1 through 13 (of 13 total)

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