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eCommerce and Internet retailing will see growth of over 25% in 2009. Online purchasing is predicted to grow at 27.8% capturing 8.5% of consumer spend. (1.5% increase over 2008). 53% of UK adults intend to increase their online purchasing for Christmas 2009.
What Webdesign Technologies Are You Offering? - CMS Websites - Joomla CMS, Drupal CMS
- Online Shops - Magento, VirtueMart
- Product or content photography
- WebDesign - Graphics/Logos/Photoshop/
- Search Engine Optimisation - SEO, SEP.
- Consultancy - advice, opinion, risks.
 Drupal: A Content Management System Product.
Please note: Magento the shop software is new and the most professional software framework yet available as Open Source. If you require a shop on a limited budget, please email.
Prices - a guide:
- Simple site - content management- 5 pages - £350 (does not include words, pictures, hosting or SEO). The webdesign can be selected from a portfolio of templates - with some tweaking.
- Medium site - content management - <15 pages - £750 (does not include words, pictures, hosting or SEO). The webdesign can be selected from a portfolio of templates - with some tweaking.
- Large site - content management - >15 pages - from £950 (does not include words, pictures, hosting or SEO). The webdesign can be bespoke, but the more complex the design, the higher the cost.
Each site comes with 2 weeks support while you familiarise yourself with the content management system.
Hosting - is provided by a third party and is approximately £7 per month.
Add Hoc development work/changes to sites/small jobs are billed at £20 per hour.
SEO - from £99 - Keywords, Tagging, XML Sitemap and manual submission.
Although there are cheaper brochure sites (using HTML) - usually starting at £150 for a single page, they cannot be updated by the owner without using the developer, which inevitably incurs further costs. As well as looking cheap and amateurish, the fact that they rarely change their content, significantly affects their ranking in Google and other search engines. Paper Tiger's CMS Webdesign approach is about offering the highest chance of success, for the most competitve fee.
Who Am I?I am an industry professional (graduate) with 15
years of IT experience, both as a developer and project manager. Based
in the City as a technical consultant - the majority of my work has
been for FTSE250 organisations. My background has been web-based since
1998 and I have considerable experience with customer facing and
delivering to meet [high] expectations. You will find me honest,
friendly, professional and succinct.
What's Open Source - In Simple Terminology?Open
Source software is free to use, unlike commercial products (e.g.
Windows - which is approximately £100 per licence OEM). This means that
the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) for the system is substantially
lower. The downside to this - is it's complex to understand and
somewhat difficult to configure, but this is improving all the time.
What's a CMS - In a Sentence or Two?Content Management Systems are complex sites with a database holding all the words, pictures (and anything else). Consequently the content (words, pictures, video, etc.) is easy to change and can be performed by the non-technical owner of the site (with some training). Since 80% of the lifetime cost of a system is in the maintenance - the owner's costs are substantially reduced.
How Much Will it Cost?That is dependent on what you are seeking. I will assemble a specification after discussions - explaining what can be achieved at what price. If it needs to be revisited and re-priced/simplified, then that would be the norm. In IT, using products allows a much more rapid build cycle, than bespoke development - therefore the costs are far lower. The pay-off is in customisation. I want this page to do this and that page to do something else, is a more expensive approach. Unsurprisingly, compromise will result in the lowest cost for a project. Content Management Systems are hugely extensible - it would be my job to steer you towards all the low-cost benefits and correspondingly warn where the costs will mount rapidly. In short - my job is to manage your expectations. If I get embroiled in a piece of work that is not generating revenue, then it's counter-productive to my profitability. Unlikely as it may sound - we want the same result. The maximum benefit, for the shortest (and therefore, cheapest) delivery cycle.
I am particularly interested in using Magento to build shops and since it is so new, am prepared to discount time expended on such developments. If you are a small to medium retail business, wanting to expand onto the Web, then discuss it with me. Even if the project is taken no further - I can certainly draw your attention to the risks and mitigations required, to be successful in this field.
I'm Interested in Finding Out More - What Do I Do Now?Please contact me via email, giving me a rough indication of what you are seeking. I removed my phone number - it was a personal mobile and I was being spammed. I cannot stress enough how little I am interested in pressurised selling.
:: Contact Paper Tiger Web development (via email, through this site - select the 'Contact Paper Tiger' option in menu on the left) for a tailored estimate or to book an initial meeting - London based. :: |
