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clum111
regular
Reg'd: Wed
Posts: 436
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Hi All,
I run my own little personalized gifts web site on a free web space (Wanadoo (Freeserve)). I don't do a lot through out the year until Christmas time, although I am planning to introduce other products that people will want through out the year.
I have managed to get my web site listed with search engines for free after some time, which means I'm getting more hits. I'm considering trying a paid host, but I am wondering about the pit falls.
1. Cost of it when you don't get a lot of orders coming in through out the year due to the nature of the products?
2. Because my site is listed with search engines and people have discovered my site for a later date, what would happen if I change to a paid site and got a domain, would I lose my hard work for getting listed and all those visitors?
3. Is there any benefit of having a paid site?
Please can anyone put me on the right tracks?
Thanks
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putasolutions
regular
Reg'd: Tue
Posts: 12155
Loc: Infinity and beyond
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You could use a re-direct script on your old site to send them to your new domain, so that's not a major issue. The advantage of having your own domain name is that it looks a bit more professional
Domains can cost as little as £10 for registration and hosting for as little as £15 for a year. I'm sure you can get cheaper as I'm sure other members will tell you, though you may have to increase to a moreexpensive package if your monthly bandwidth is exceeded, though if you were getting those sort of hits, and converting them into sales, then that wouldn't be a issue either
Please post your query to the boards, so that others can learn
Remember there is no such thing as a simple question, just a question you don't know the answer to, though they are the easiest to answer 
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IG88
regular
Reg'd: Wed
Posts: 99
Loc: London, UK
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Hey- paid hosting is great! use http://webcentre.lycos.co.uk, you get all kinds of scripting, no ads great ftp, cool .com or others for only £2.49/month.
you can just use a javascript redirect script on your old website-
put in your body tag <body onload="c_url()">
and in your head tags
<script language="javascript">
function c_url()
{
location.href = "http://www.YOUR NEW DOMAIN NAME GOES HERE.com"
}
</script>
hope this helps
mohiga
Edited by TheFatControlleR on 14/01/2005 01:56 (server time).
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gollum
regular
Reg'd: Wed
Posts: 278
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Also, dont forget to put a manual HTML link to your new site..
<a href="http://yournewsite.com">Click here to be taken to new site</a>
As the searchengines have already indexed your old site, they will index the new one if there is a HTML link. Search engine bots aint the brightest of creatures and cant normally interpret javascript or frames.
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longplay
regular
Reg'd: Mon
Posts: 266
Loc: UK
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There are numerous benefits to having your own hosting, not least better support, faster access (for people browsing), greater control, more tools and other things.
A domain name from someone like 123-Reg will set you back about £6 for a .uk domain for two years. Hosting starts at about £10 a year.
Candohosting (http://www.candohosting.co.uk) offer their basic package at just £15 a year, I host one of my sites with them and they're great. Helpful, friendly, etc.
Or you could try Meirhosting(http://www.meirhosting.net) who I haven't personally used, but who have an account for just £10 per year.
The Digerati Peninsula
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webby
regular
Reg'd: Mon
Posts: 151
Loc: UK
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I've just done the very thing you are asking although I completely redesigned the entire site as well (100+ pages). I moved from free to paid hosting and to a new domain. Firstly I found a good registrar where you have full control over the domain regarding pointing and redirection. Incl.vat it works out at £7.05 total for two years for a uk domain name: http://www.telivo.com
I've left my original site where it is for now with an announcement of the new site with a link to it. I have emailed all the webmasters who link to the site to ask them to change the url and also emailed all visitors who had posted in my guestbook or had emailed me privately. (I did each one as a separate email to avoid it getting thrown out by anti-spam programs) I resubmitted the site on the new url to Google and DMOZ? (I forget the correct doodah) with a note telling them it is a change of url.
I also kept as close as possible to the original url, i.e. it was http://www.aquamoonlight.uku.co.uk
and is now:
http://www.aquamoonlight.co.uk
so the webmasters only have to remove the uku part of the original.
The original site gets about 30,000 visitors a month, so doing all this was very important and although it was time-consuming, it is worth it. Some of the webmasters have changed their links already and yet I only notified them this morning.
You only have one chance in life - take it while you can
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webby
regular
Reg'd: Mon
Posts: 151
Loc: UK
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I just had to post this as a follow up to my previous post. I only uploaded the new site at about 6:30pm on Friday. As I said above, I resubmitted to Google with a note that it was a change of URL, about 8:30pm.
I've just checked and Google picked up the new site later the same day. They also reindexed the original home page with the announcement of the new site. They've already picked up one of the changed URLs for it on another site, for which I only notified the webmaster yesterday morning.
Absolutely fantastic - I am amazed
You only have one chance in life - take it while you can
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