Great info, thanks Mr. Ed!!

No forced adverts on any Yola website. However, on the free sites they place a (tiny tiny tiny) backlink to them on the bottom but it is barely noticeable. If you want to have it removed it costs a one time fee of twenty bucks. I have the advanced version and all my sites have the backlink removed.

The vast majority of free site builders out there have some kind of forced ads that they place on your website. Yola has never and promises to never do that to those who use their service.

Still a great free site builder and tons of tech support in the forums. I should know because I gave out 10 months of it as their first Champion site builder. ;) They do have dozens of company reps answering in the forums 24/7 if you run into a problem…

They make money through second party widgets, pro versions of the site builder and domain name purchases.

I have been pleasantly surprised since I started with that first blank page. ;) If you want to build your own free site you can find none better in my opinion.

Good luck and happy site building

Julie,

I think I want a website as a way to start a business, so that I have a business e-mail and so I am taking seriously by my business contacts. I am open to any suggestions – what doyu all think? oh and eventually I hope to sell something on the web-site…

Mr. Ed, that sounds great! Thank for the pointers. How does Yola afford to have free webisites like that? Are there advertisements on your web-sites or something?

Thanks again guys!

Oh no Yola didn’t do any of my graphics. I bought some of those images and found others free online with various services and used Windows Publisher myself to combine the images into what you see.

I believe the banner alone on top was 60+ individual images that I placed in various locations to try and get an appealing look. Or so I think ;)

I shared many of the locations to find free graphics on my Yola tips thread and there are some great sites on my links page that you can purchase professional ones as well. My current fav is Dreamtime

If you need to take an clipart from Dreamtime that you need to place on top of another but can’t due to the colored or white background simply use this online free editor http://www.online-image-editor.com/index.cfm This only works well with clipart and not most images.

1) Hover over “File” then click on “Open”
2) Browse for the image on your computer that you want to make the background transparent
3) Tick the box for “Convert during upload to: PNG”
4) Click “Upload”
5)Hover over “Edit” then hover over “Gif only” and click on “Add transparency”
6) Click once on the background color you want to turn transparent and the background should turn clear.
7) Hover over “File” then click on “Save” to save to your compute.

With a clip art with a transparent background you can layer it on top of another image to create a cool banner, logo or image to use on your website or sell sheet.

http://www.clker.com/ is a great free resource to find free clipart with the background already set to transparent so you don’t have to convert yourself.

Some additional resources:
http://www.honeybearplayhomes.com/links.php

Alice, I have 5 websites and none of them are through GoDaddy; however, I have 22 domain names and they were all from GoDaddy.

I guess I am still not sure why anyone would want a website if they aren’t selling something. I would be interested in reading comments from y’all…..

Thanks for the info guys,

Mr.Ed. To have the professional graphics done on Yola – is that a one time fee or monthly fee? Was it a big expense? Your web-site looks very cool, great job with it!

Julie thanks for the pointers. I was wondering if you had experience with GoDaddy web-site and if you did, would you mind sharing why you recommend it? Thanks!

Hey Alice…

I created my sites with Yola for free. Other than some professional graphics that I bought to make my banner and footer the only thing that I paid for was the domain name.

While I have used a great deal of custom javascript and imagemaps the free browser based site builder has everything that you will need to get a great site up and running.

One of my sites:
http://www.honeybearplayhomes.com/

Link to the thread I started for another reason but with info on the free site builder:
http://www.edisonnation.com/forums/other/topics...

It really isn’t as hard as it appears to build a website. Within the month you will be able to do things that you won’t believe. Of that I have no doubt…

Alice, check out www.InTuiT.com .

I believe a website and a host of other tools is a good idea, it cost nothing maybe and prompts you to learn more about marketing. Depending on what you find, might look into Publisher Pro it creates webpages super easy, and for your needs it should do fine. Plan on spending some time with it, and it will be a good a source for a professional webdesigner to get a feel for what you want or need.

100% free a great start and easy to use…..until you really need a professional website setup. http://www.blackapplehost.com/

Just thought of something: it doesn’t cost much to purchase a domain name (pertinent to what you think is a good name for your product): I suggest using only GoDaddy.

After you get that name, you can use it as your e-mail address and that might carry some weight when corresponding by e-mail. Be sure to put that address on your new business card.

I found the flannel I use on-line after doing a lot of research. This flannel cannot be purchased in a retail store as it has different characteristics. I requested a sample card of all the colors and 1 yd. of the white. I did this with about 3 or 4 manufacturers of different fabrics and the rest I purchased in either retail stores or stores dedicated to designers. I have no idea why any company would ask for your website if you tell them you are in the early stages of working on an idea and all you want are samples (which you will pay for) and some information. Whatever you use, be sure to get the content of each fabric: 100% cotton? 50/50 poly/cotton? etc.

To further Paul’s idea: for now, why don’t you come up with a business card you can produce yourself – just so you have something. You can always change the name as you go along if you aren’t committed to a corporate name. If you don’t know whether or not your product will be successful, I wouldn’t do too many things which cost too much.

Good luck….

Julie,
I am planning to have most parts made by other companies and I will assemble and do some sewing myself. So what I am looking for is fabric and other materials mostly.

Paul, good point. There are so many choices of starting a business – Corporation, partnership, etc. I have to look into all that. There are sure a lot of things to figure out.

Alice

What are your goals for your invention? Invent it? License it? Sell it? Manufacture it? Create a business around your invention? Just some thoughts to help establish a road map.

After careful consideration I decided I wanted to manufacture and sell my invention to the general public. So, for people or companies that I was starting to deal with to take me seriously and do business with me I decided to get a business license and business cards. I felt this gave me and my product more legitimacy when doing business with other companies. You don’t want to plough money into something ( business cards, web site, hosting, LLC etc.) without deciding what your goals are for yourself and your invention.

Hope this helps, Paul

What are you trying to accomplish? Why do you want a manufacturer to take you seriously? At first, I thought you were looking for a manufacturer to make your product but at the end you state you are trying to inquire about the manufacturer’s product.