Kerry Website Design Ireland

Another New Starter Website For Feet First Hits The Road!

The second of FOUR sites that Starter Websites is developing for Feet First Ltd is now live. The Kingdom Series provides details and booking facilities for The Eclipse (Blackwater) and The Navigator (Fenit) races later this year.

Feet First wanted to go with a s’plit options’ home page that provides the core dates information for the events and enables users to go direct to the race they are most interested in. Feet First wanted to keep the layout uncluttered but provide all the information with an easy to use navigation.

The ‘internal’ page banner graphic highlights the triathlon activities with images of swimming, cycling and running. Other images in the site show where the events will be held with a combination of photographs, dynamic route maps and static maps of the areas.

Visitors can book their place for each run online by clicking the ‘Active Network’ online entry booking button and submitting the form on the Active Network secure server.

Two More Website In The Starter Blocks For Feet First

It was great to work with Feet First again and two more projects are already in the ’starting blocks’, both of which will be built on the popular, powerful and easy to use WordPress content management system platform, so stay tuned for future updates!

Are You Ready To Join The Online Race?

It has never been so important to have a web strategy integrated into your business model. Make that vital first step to securing leads, new business and promoting your offers online.

Contact Starter Websites today to discuss your new website.

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Tags: Feet First, FeetFirst.ie, Irish Web Design, starter websites, The Eclipse Race, The Navigator, WordPress content management system

New Self-catering Website For Nora’s Cottage in Cork

‘www.NorasCottageCork.com‘ is the latest 4 page brochure website from Starter Websites. Nora’s cottage is a self-catering accommodation in Knocknagree, Cork, run by the O’Leary family. The cosy 100 year old cottage has been updated with modern comforts but retains the old Irish cottage feel.

It was a pleasure to work with Jerry O’Leary on this project. He supplied all the text and images early on which enabled me to focus on the website build and design and getting the project completed on time.

Jerry provided excellent direction details so visitors can easily locate the cottage. He also supplied an extensive list of testimonials from previous tenants, which is an excellent idea.

The cottage is deceptively large, with three bedrooms and private outdoor garden seating, perfect for evening barbecues after a day of fishing the local Blackwater and Araglen rivers, or day trips around the Ring Of Kerry, Blarney, Kenmare, the Ring of Beara and West Cork. And while Nora’s cottage has central heating, you’ll also enjoy chatting late into the evening in front of the open fire.

Promote Your Accommodation

A website is the most cost effective way to promote your business online all year round. That’s particularly true of a Starter Website low-cost package. It also makes sense if you want to promote to an international market to have a website that is accessible around the clock and around the world.

Don’t let another tourist season pass you by! It can take a month or more for Google to ‘position’ your website for your local accommodation search results. That means the sooner your website is live the better positioned you can be for this years online booking enquiries. Order your accommodation website today and it could be live within 10 working days!

Contact Peter With Your Enquiry and Details

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Tags: accommodation website design, website designers

New Website Live For Kilkenny Based Tarmacadam Business

I’m delighted to announce one of Starter Websites latest creations, www.TownAndCountryTarmacadam.com. This is a four page brochure website designed for Pat Dooley, Kilkenny Tarmacadam Services.

This site was a lot of fun to design! I mean who doesn’t love big yellow steamrollers?

Pat was a pleasure to work with, he provided his content very quickly, which enabled me to really get a feel for the service he offers. This is important for design, so thanks to Pat’s proactive involvement I was able to quickly get a feel for this project.

Pat’s main market area is in Kilkenny so the colour scheme reflects this. Pat provided a lot of images of projects he recently completed and we decided just to add them as two columns of photos on the services page. Using images like this really help to give potential customers an idea of the high quality service Pat is known for.

Pat will include his website and email addresses in all his print promotional material. Potential clients will be able to see his work and this will certainly have an impact on Pat’s sales conversation rate.

Thanks to my SEO efforts and a little bit of link building www.TownAndCountryTarmacadam.com is now #1 AND #7 in Google page one for keyword search “Kilkenny Tarmacadam”.

What About You?

Do you offer local services but still don’t have a website to help you sell more?

For less than €500 you can have a website like Pat’s, working for you day and night and adding value to your business cards, adverts and flyers. What other form of promotion offers value for money like a Starter Website?

Don’t let another customer slip away, contact me right now to discuss your new website.

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Tags: Irish tarmac, Kilkenny web design, simple web deisgn, town and country

New Online Portfolio Website For Kerry Illustrator Dómhnal Ó Bric

Dómhnal Ó Bric is a leading illustrator based in Baile an Fheirtéaraigh, County Kerry. Dómhnal wanted to present his stunning illustrations online with an online portfolio management website. The gallery had to be easy for Dómhnal to manage and easy for visitors to navigate. Check out Dómhnals gallery now at http://DomhnalOBric.com.

Easy To Use Gallery Features

With just a few clicks Dómhnal can create gallery albums and upload images. Each album and image can have a title and description added and this can be edited easily and at any time. No HTML or programming knowledge is required to manage the gallery, making it easy for anyone to manage.

There is also an option in the gallery to link to other pages. Dómhnal links back to a static web page that has his contact details so that publishers can contact him direct. We could just as easily linked this his Twitter account profile, LinkedIn, Facebook and so on. This link can be changed at any time via the admin control panel.

The online portfolio is built using the free open-source ”Gallery“, and set-up, customised and hosted with Starter Websites. This means clients get a highly sophisticated, tested and proven online portfolio gallery solution at the fraction of the cost of building one from scratch!

Validated Gallery

“Gallery” galleries are valid XHTML and CSS. This means it looks good in all major browsers and will continue to do so for future browsers.

Another High Value Web Package From Starter Websites

Having been and illustrator for some years I can relate to how difficult and frustrating it can be trying to get an online portfolio. Either the price is way too much, or the so called ‘easy to mange instant gallery’ really is not that easy or that instant.

This gallery website package is the sort of gallery I wanted back in the day. And it’s not just suitable for illustrators only, but for artists, photographers and models who want to be able to display and manage images online.

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Are You Looking For Real Value?

What difference would having your portfolio online make to your business? Starter Websites provide high value, affordable online portfolio galleries from only €200 including a .com for 12 months and 6 months Free web hosting. You will be pleasantly surprised at just how easy it is to get your portfolio online.

Promote your portfolio online this year. Give me a call to discuss your project at Peter – 087 9767812.

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Tags: Add new tag, create gallery albums and upload images, Dómhnal Ó Bric, gallery, gallery website package, illustration, illustrator, Online Portfolio, online portfolio management, Online Portfolio Website, stunning illustrations online

Hi all,

I was prompted to write this short post after seeing Pauline Dennigans wedding photograph in a recent edition of the Kerryman. Actually my wife brought it to my attention when she commented on how beautiful the image was. I don’t have a copy to post here but you’ll see plenty more like it at Paulines’ Kerry Wedding Photographer website.

Great Publicity

Besides the photograph being stunning, so is the publicity. In the past I had several web related articles published in a free local magazine. It’s amazing how many people reported to me that they had read my articles, some of whom had become (or were about to become) clients of mine. Done consistently over time this type of free publicity can have a positive impact on your business.

Get Published Whenever You Want!

One other way to compete online is to blog (just as I’m doing now).  Blogging is an easy way to build links to your site (higher ranking site), make your footprint on the internet bigger (more traffic) and keep in touch with your clients and future clients (more orders).

Blogging is one of the easiest and least expensive ways to promote your business online. Do it consistently for long enough and it will bring it’s rewards. By the way, Pauline is ahead of the curve again with this, check out Paulines new wedding photography blog.

Spontaneous Promotion:

Contact me and tell me you read this post and I’ll build you a WordPress blog website for €750. You have to mention this post to get the special price (usually €995 or more!). I’ll also include a bonus 125 social bookmarking links to your website for free (great for higher ranking).

Obviously I won’t leave this offer up for too long, but since it’s Friday I’m feeling generous.

Order Now!

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Tags: blogging, blogging for your business, free local publicity, wordpress promotion

When it comes to painting, illustration or photography or modelling galleries, you know exactly what you’re looking for. But for many creatives it can be difficult to know what to include in your gallery websites.

The three tips below will help you present your online portfolio in the best way:

1. Keep your gallery simple and uncluttered. Most artist end up opting for a mainly black or white gallery website layout. These colours help frame your images allowing them to be the main focus of the website. I recommend against gaudy colour schemes, flashing images and background looped sound effects that compete with your image for the visitor’s attention.
2. Now the second point is very important. In order for your online art gallery to be useful and successful, it must be easy for you to manage. Adding, editing or deleting images, albums and text descriptions should take only a couple of clicks.

   If your gallery is too complex to use, you will neglect to update it as often as you should. Publishers and potential clients might visit your site regularly and if the images never change they may think you couldn’t be bothered to update your work. This can have a very negative impact on you potential to get work from them. So ensure your gallery website is easy to manage and update it regularly!

3. Yep, I’ve seen it a thousand times; a gallery with beautiful artwork but it’s just a nightmare to navigate the site. Keep your artwork grouped in relevant albums and make sure it’s easy to navigate from one image to the next, and from one album to the next.

   Again, if publishers or potential customers get frustrated trying to view your portfolio gallery they will leave your website and they probably will not come back.

I hope you can see how important these three elements are for the success of your website and ultimately your chances for generating more interest in your work and more orders.

Now you know the secrets to managing a successful online portfolio website, it’s time to get your work online.

Gallery Folio provide affordable, easy to manage and easy to navigate online galleries perfect for illustrators, photographers, painters and models. To find out more check out http://GalleryFolio.com.

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Tags: Gallery Folio, gallery websites, online art gallery, Online Portfolio Website, portfolio gallery

Artist Portfolio Websites Tips – Fast Loading Optimised Gallery Images

Theres nothing more frustrating than waiting for what seems and eternity for a website or online image to load.

No doubt you have experienced this yourself, whether because the image that is loading is several megabytes bigger than it needs to be or because your Internet connection is too slow.

Whatever the reason, you will do your online portfolio a great service to remember that people just will not wait all day for your images to load. This can result in lost customers and lost work or sales.

Well, there is a way to minimise the load time problem, and it’s not that hard to do.

Optimise Your Images

Compressing and resizing images will dramatically reduce their size and load time. Don’t be concerned about reduced image display quality either, if you select the correct compression settings this need not suffer.

How To Optimise Images For The Web

So how do you go about compressing your images for the web?

Lets start with your image resolution. The following may seem a little technical but bare with me, you don’t need to understand it, you just have to do it. So briefly I’ll explain about image resolution.

1. Images for print are usually saved as 300 dpi resolution but images for the web are saved as 72 dpi resolution. When you change down your images resolution to 72 dpi you immediately and dramatically reduce the byte size of the image. This can result a difference of several megabytes and that will have a huge impact on image load time.
2. Okay, that’s image resolution discussed, now we want to talk about the actual print size of an image (it’s scale if printed out).Many digital cameras and scanners default settings will produce and image that is far bigger (in scale) than is required for use on the web. We want to ensure that the visitor viewing your gallery will not have to scroll an image to see it in its entirety. Most peoples PC monitor screen resolution is set to 1024 X 768 pixels. You’re image should be smaller than this size so that it’s visible without the need for scrolling. I usually save images for the web at around 600 X 400 pixels.
3. The file type format that you save your image as will also affect the download speed. Artwork and photographs are usually best saved as Jpeg format. Save simple images that have little colour mixing or gradients as Gif. Most graphics software will give you a number of options to further compress the image. It’s worth experimenting with these tools. You will quickly become adapt at optimising images for the web once you are familiar with the process.

Other file formats for saving images include PNG, TIFF, PSD, BITMAP and many more but Jpeg and Gif are the standard and viewable on all PC’s.

Popular Graphics Software For Optimising Images

So now you know how to compress and optimise your images for your website gallery, what software applications can you use?

PhotoShop is the leading graphics software and using the “save for web” options makes compressing images easy. Other popular graphics software you can use includes Paintshop Pro and the free and extremely powerful open-source software “Gimp” (free to download, install and use).

So when compressing and optimising images to ensure the fastest load times for your portfolio gallery remember to change dpi to 72 resolution; reduce the actual print size of the image; and save the image as Jpeg or Gif file format.

Now that you can compress and optimise your images for the web, ensure you have an easy to manage portfolio gallery online to display your work. Check out GalleryFolio.com who offer complete and affordable set-up of excellent, easy to manage and easy to navigate online photo galleries, http://GalleryFolio.com

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Tags: Compressing and resizing images, compression settings, How To Optimise Images For The Web, image resolution, online photo galleries, online photo gallery, Online Portfolio, Optimise Your Images

Happy New Year everyone!

The first of January always gets me thinking of the past and the future, so I decided to grab a few moments to write a little about my beloved business – Starter Websites.

Starter Websites History

Starter Websites started life in 2008 as a ‘side project’ for a company I was previously a partner in. I was enthusiastic about Starter Websites from the start and constantly strived to improve value for customers and develop the suite of web solutions on offer.

Starter Websites was different as it was one of the first web design sites in Ireland to advertise website products (web packages) with their prices. The purpose of this was to provide potential clients with enough information to make an educated decision on whether the service was right for them and their budgets.

Up to this point people were being quoted wildly different prices from web design firms. This pricing strategy led to confusion and mistrust, something Starter Websites was to avoid.

In December 2008 I finished with my previous company and took over Starter Websites as a separate business and commenced trading from March 2009. My goal for the year was to revamp the website, improve it’s offers and establish a solid base from which to build a sustainable business. The later being the most difficult to achieve as the recession deepened and the already competitive web industry went into overdrive.

By keeping my ‘vision statement’ in mind (see below), Starter Websites survived 2009 and prospects for 2010 look promising.

The goals for Starter Websites in 2010 are simple:

1. Add more value for clients
2. Turn a profit
3. Fine-tune existing packages and develop additional packages
4. Keep it simple

1st January is my favourite day of the year. It’s a time to reflect on the previous twelve months and to start planning for the year ahead. It’s like starting with a clean slate but with the added advantage of another 12 months experience – and what an experience the last 12 months was! .

I wish you and yours good health and success for 2010.

Vision Statement

“Starter Websites vision is to be Ireland’s leading high value low-cost web solutions provider. This will be achieved by providing a suite of niche web solutions at extremely competitive prices and by constantly seeking ways to add more value for clients.”

Mission Statement

“Starter Websites mission is to provide high standard affordable web solutions to small businesses and individuals in Ireland.”

Regards,
Peter.

Kerry’s Leading DJ Hire and Event Services Website Is Live!

DeeJay OB has been tearing up the dance floors of Kerry for years. His style is unique and his approach to each event is flexible, resulting in music that gets the crowd on their feet and keeps them dancing!

Check out just some of his Testimonials:

“Your set sounded excellent to me and Sean we were praising your selection majorly. We have very different and varied taste and you managed to please both of us so it’s all good”
~ Katrina and Seán

“Thanks alot James, much appreciated! It was a nice setup at The River of Shadows Festival”
~ Keith from Vesta Varro

“Thank you for providing this service for us I think the music really helped build the atmosphere on the day and we were very happy with the event”
~ Tracey Mckeown – RNLI lifeboats organiser for the Christmas Reindeer fun run in Killarney.

“The gig was great and you did you brilliant job as DJOB”
~ Pat and Viv, Melbourne, Australia

Need A DJ Hire For Weddings, Birthday Parties, Corporate Events?

Don’t risk the disappointment of your party being a flop, make sure you have a top DJ that will play for the crowd a subtle mix of classic and modern music mix that will have even the ‘two left feet’ people busting crazy moves on the floor all night. DeeJay OB will not only get them moving, he’ll keep them moving until their feet hurt.

And if planning the event is getting too stressful or you just can’t spare the resources, why not let DeeJay OB manage that for your too. He’s in high demand and his schedule for 2010 is already filling up fast so don’t waste any time. Give me a call or drop him an email today.

Contact DeeJay OB DJ Hire And Event Services Kerry.

About The Site

I had a lot of fun working on this site. It’s a custom WordPress website, making it easy for DeeJay OB to update and manage the pages, posts, text, images and video himself. The site comes with photo gallery, blog, contact form, SEO features and lots more goodies.

I first saw DeeJay OB in action when he played to a capacity crowd at the River Of Shadows Music Festival that I was involved in organising and promoting. James played after the ‘Delorentos’ and it was a great finish to the event as the floor was packed for his entire set. So when he asked me to work with him on this new site I was delighted to do so.

Check his website regularly for updates and if you are looking for a DJ in Kerry, he is the guy to talk to!

Are You Ready For 2010?

Ready to get your business online and start 2010 off on the right foot? Don’t wait another day; contact me to discuss your project now. Contact Starter Websites.

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Tags: Custom WordPress Website Ireland, DJ Web Design, DJ Website Designers, WordPress, WordPress Ireland

Just Launched, First Of Four New Websites For ‘Feet First’

TheGoodFridayRun.ie is the first of 4 new websites being developed by Starter Websites for Killarney and Tralee based Feet First.

A little About ‘Feet First’

“At Feet First we are dedicated to improving the comfort and performance of your feet by offering you a number of services and stocking a large range of both stylish and comfortable footwear. We can help you identify common foot disorders and let you know what you can do for immediate relief. We use high tech in-store technologies such as the “iStep” and offer FREE instore Video Gait Analysis to determine your foot type and help you choose the correct footwear from our vast range of running and walking brands. We can also recommend a number of effective, state-of-the-art footcare products.”

Feet First wanted ‘The Good Friday Run’ up and running on short notice. As usual Starter Websites were quick off the starting blocks and raced home to complete the website on time and on budget. What a winning performance! Run along now and check out The Good Friday Run.

Tags: affordable website design, Feet First, starter website, starter websites, The Good Friday Run, Video Gait Analysis