As the world continues to embrace the trend of technology, we must accept to live by that and also push our businesses in whatever category to that level as well.
In the modern business today, businesses ought to connect to far clients across the continents to showcase and or offer a service. The ability to conceal this opportunity must be powered by a computing medium called a Website.
Your business website is an integral part of a larger marketing plan. It is therefore important to understand the role it must play. Your website is usually the cornerstone of any online marketing plan, providing a presence for your business. It’s the online equivalent of owning a high street shop or prominent office.
Also see:
Why you need a Business/Company/Personal Website
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It’s where potential customers, clients, and associates can find and contact you. A company with its domain makes an e-mail more credible and trustworthy rather than generic google addresses.
Websites give businesses their own unique online identity.
Without giving so many boring details, most customers always ask what do I need to have a website for my business? This question is easy for the service provider to explain to a client but the explanation gets confusing to most of the clients.
In this article, I explain the requirements one must meet to have a business or personal or NGO and whatever website.
At a glance, I highlight the key requirements and later break each one down in detail.
- Domain Name (i.e. www.yourname.com, www.yourbusinessname.com or www.yourNGO.org etc…)
- Hosting space
- Web content
- Web Design & Development Cost
- Maintenance and Sustainability costs
Now, I am going to explain each of the above requirements step by step.
In this article, I will refer to web services offered by Interlet Limited an ICT company found in Uganda. Well, they are building a very good reputation in web services as well as media-related services.
Cool, let us push on and get started with the details.
Domain Name
A domain name is mainly the unique name given to your website on the world of the internet. Domain names are sold at an affordable cost and renewable every after a year or 12 months from the time you paid for it.
Domain names can look like this www.yourname.com, www.yourbusinessname.com or www.yourNGO.org or in reality, we can look at www.interletug.com, www.cyclonetimes.com, www.google.com/ etc.
In Ugandan currency, these can range between Shs 30,000 ($8)– Shs 200,000 ($54) or even more depending on the service provider you get.
Interlet Limited sales domain names through their web hosting partner Webnet International.
Web Hosting
Web hosting is a service that allows your website files to be stored online and be accessed by the people searching for it through the domain name.
Without going deeper into details, there are just a key few things you must know and ask your service provider about before paying for this service. These include; web hosting package bandwidth measured in GBs/MBs, disk space also measured in GBs/MBs, email accounts assigned to your website account where you can create custom business email like mvicent@interletug.com (an example), uptime guarantee and customer support in the period of the website failure.
Well, like domain names, web hosting is also paid for annually or every after 12 months from the time you make the first payment.
Note: Failure to commit to this your website will automatically shut down or become inaccessible.
Well, service providers normally send you reminders to pay towards the expiration of the service.
Hosting can go for as low as 50,000Ugx ($14) to millions of shillings or some affordable dollars depending on the resources your website may require to run efficiently.
Note: It is also essential to think about security when paying for web hosting. You need to ask about the SSL certificates and how much they cost per year for your website to be secure and trusted by users.
A website with SSL certificates installed is more secure for browsing than the one without.
How do you tell the website is secure or has SSL certificates installed?
Primarily, a website runs on http:// protocol i.e. (http://www.google.com) this means that this website has no SSL certificates installed and https://www.google.com means it has the SSL certificate fully installed. Please take note of the (s) on the http:// (http:// vs https://). The (s) signifies that the website is secure.
Interlet Limited sales web hosting space through their web hosting partner Webnet international. Contact the company at info@interletug.com .
Web Content:
Web content is the information that goes on the website and given the fact that the client knows their business better than the developer/designer, it is always upon them to provide this information. This information can be in the format of text, images, video, and audio.
Most web development companies will always recommend that a client sends in this information early enough to guide in the process of designing User Interfaces – UI and to plan for the User Experience – UX.
Normally, ‘some’ clients don’t know which information to compile for their website(s), worry not, Interlet Limited guides a client on how to go about this.
Web Design & Development Labor Cost
For your website to be designed, developed and hosted, you will need technical workforces from experienced web designer(s) or developer(s).
Clients need to know that this is the most tedious stage in making a website as it requires skilled labor to make the functionality, look, and great user experience. This is why it is charged highly compared to other requirements.
Developers/Companies can charge depending on the amount of information, complexity of the layout design and functionality/features of the website. Some websites can at times require the developer to separately buy some services to support your website features and functionality. So, the cost will highly depend on the scope of the work and what MUST be achieved.
Choose a website design package from our list with very affordable prices for your website to be developed. Choose now!!!
In reference to the Ugandan ICT industry, designers/developers can charge starting from Ugx 500,000 for a very basic design to millions of shillings. Of course, clients vary in demands, ability to pay and the complexity of work.
Interlet Limited offers this service with their highly experienced and award-winning team.
Read more about Interlet Limited website design and development services
Note: Don’t just pay for the cheapest package rather pay for the package that fits your demands. Preferring cheaper packages may become extra expensive in the future when your website can’t do what your business demands.
Most companies/designers will deliver what exactly you pay for, so be aware.
When the website is done being developed, the developer or design will have to host or put it online for it to be accessed by other people online.
Maintenance and Sustainability costs
When the website is now online, that is not the end of it all. A website is a living thing and it must grow with your business. Some clients have a tendency of acquiring websites and once it goes online, they forget about it. They don’t check whether it is still active, don’t read emails, they don’t update it at all with new business information and software update. This is very bad. You find a website with the content of 2013 (7 years back) still trending on the home page. This makes your business lose credibility from your clients and associates who search about you or it online.
That being said, once you get a website you must get personnel to take care of it or you can still get in agreement with the web designer/developer to maintain your website and you keep paying him a monthly or annual affordable fee.
Interlet Limited offers a web service maintenance and sustainability plan payable per year or half or quarterly and even per month.
You can always contact them through their support department on Email: support@interletug.com or main email address: info@interletug.com .
Lastly, you must be aware that the development and hosting costs will vary from the type of the website you want for your business i.e. an e-commerce website, won’t cost the same as a personal website, an NGO website may not cost the same as a video streaming site or news portal and so on.
Interlet offers a web consultancy service, you can reach them for guidance before you take a step. Visit their website www.interletug.com.
Let me hope that makes sense, feel free to give feedback in the comment section to help the writer improve this content.
You can also request writes or guidelines about a given topic through the above-provided email or in the comment section.
Happy to see you get your business website today, let your business thrive digitally.
The writer is a Lead Web Developer at Kyambogo University, Senior ICT Consultant and ICT Author at Interlet Limited and News Writer at Cyclone Times. Mukisa Vicent
