My new web development business
Token Internet Marketing launched today. I haven't even perfected the website to the point where I can show it... but after a few weeks of startup work, we launched.
The concept is cheap websites for neighborhood businesses, because the time is now for them to do this, for various reasons.
My biz partner was able to do 1.5 hours of sales work today and the first report is that it will be very successful. The next month will tell us just how successful.
Cellar.org is on the portfolio so I thank you for that.
No, I think you'll find it is we that thank you for that!
And the Best of British luck to youse, by the way!
Now I'm thinking about pizza.
I guess it works.
When the website is ready, make a note in this thread, because I find it highly irritating when local businesses don't have a web presence, and I'd like to encourage them your way if I can.
Good Luck with this UT !!!
Thanks. I figured it should have its own thread, and I figured this (Cellar meta) was as good a place as any for it... ah, maybe a little inappropriate... ah but the Cellar server shares physical and network space with the server for this venture, so there ya have it.
It is SO encouraging to see the first round of sales turn up so well. My biz partner is doing all the sales, and we are wagering whether he can sell more sites than I can produce, with both of us going full-time. If yesterday's result turns up work at the same rate per hour, he wins -- and the business probably succeeds, we then just work on ironing out little glitches in the model.
we are wagering whether he can sell more sites than I can produce
Just like that beer commercial! (Or maybe it was for a credit card)
Congrats and good luck on this new adventure.
I think it was a commercial for a credit card about brothers starting a beer company, right?
I think it is wonderful news, UT. I would be happy to pass your website around to those who need sites.
Eh, I typed adventure when I meant venture, but who knows maybe this will lead to one.
Where's that blog about crazy web designer clients?
Good luck!
After 2.5 days of sales, Token Internet Marketing has 1 completed sale and 20 very qualified leads requesting return visits, out of which half will be sold websites by the end of next week.
"Candy from a baby," said my biz partner.
"Coffee is for closers only," said I.
Great news UT. I hope you make a killing on it. You deserve it.
Token Internet website launch
I'm very proud of my branding work.
We have 8 sales so far, things are proceeding a little slower than I'd hoped, but they are proceeding enough to be optimistic.
Congrats! Here's to your first 100 sales, and another 100 after that.
Awesome! Break sales records in the future! :D
It looks great, though I'm not sure I'd tout the Cellar banner as an example of "tasteful design." (Fabulous, yes, very appropriate, yes, tasteful....?)
Where's that blog about crazy web designer clients?
Here's one. Best of luck!
My buddy's pawn shop site, preliminary:
http://tokeninternet.com/olneypawn.com/
Five Cellar Points to the first person to give the specific name of the color of the background. Not enough to say where you saw that color... you must NAME it
Man if you had told me, 25 years ago, that I would be doing graphic design half the time for a living... I never ever ever EVER would have believed it.
BTW I submitted one to Clients From Hell from my previous web dev business. It goes a little something like this:
Me: "Well, here's your completed site. You know, you got a great deal. From all the changes you requested, we've done about twice the amount of hours of work that we originally estimated."
Client (cheerfully): "Oh! Well that's okay, we underpaid you, but we overpay other vendors too, so it all kind of works out in the end!"
Wait, Sundae Girl's a pron star?
Color is cellar-monkey blue
She doesn't realize there's a whole Philadelphia neighborhood named after her!! Fame in our midst and all that!
She should get free flights there just for that! She could do celeb appearances and open envelopes and things.
My buddy's pawn shop site, preliminary:
http://tokeninternet.com/olneypawn.com/
Five Cellar Points to the first person to give the specific name of the color of the background. Not enough to say where you saw that color... you must NAME it
.
It's either 6-ball green, Master's Jacket green, Bluegrass green or Really Tasty Weed green.
You know, I thought I could sneak it out of "source" but I didn't see any numbers corresponding to colors. I know very little about that sort of stuff though. Also, there needs to be a website where you copy a bit of color and insert it into the website and get back the closest color to what you entered. I sure looked for one.
Oh, and also...looks good UT!
Hee hee that's some really good thinking Shaw, but it's in the CSS source!
But I'll just give you the number: it's RGB #004953. (Also known as Pantone 316.)
I found the css thing and saw on a website I needed that. HOld on I'll be right back!
Midnight (eagle) green? Or Sherpa Blue?
I'm so confused.
Where have I seen it before?
Midnight (eagle) green
Correct! And the eagle is...
I have always been enamored of the Eagles' choice of color. But I didn't use silver and black on the pawn site, because that would be too obvious...
Almost, but not quite Rich Black?
D'OH! :facepalm:
I also ran across an Islamic Green and was all like WTF? :lol:
Very cool!
Well if you make the outer background the same color, the context of the site doesn't stand out, so I decided to go "10 darker".
Almost, but not quite Rich Black?
He prefers to be called Rick.
I've built 12 smallbiz websites at this point, a number I'd hoped would be much larger but hey! We will see how the cookies crumble, or whatever. My design skills improve over time and these sites are on the order of two hours design per page. They could look better with eight hours... ah but this is how it goes. Anyway they look better than the competition for these types of business, which is the point.
http://tokeninternet.com/ccsteaks
http://ginasbestnailsalon.com
http://tokeninternet.com/bridal2000shop.com
http://cadwaladerservicecentre.com
http://tokeninternet.com/hairconnection
http://poinsettiadrycleaners.com
http://santillisauto.com
http://wilkinsonstire.comThey all look very nice. Do some of them not have domain names, so they have to be on yours? (Is that even what it's called?) Does this cost you, or them?
Thanks! They are "in the process" if they are under my domain name... usually waiting for the customer to review it and accept the domain name they want.
In Gina's Best Nails - I've never seen those kind of chairs before. Is that what the French call a bidet?
In Gina's Best Nails - I've never seen those kind of chairs before. Is that what the French call a bidet?
They'd get mad if you peed (or worse) in them.
They're for pedicures, you philistine. (I've never had a pedicure. I have monkey toes.)
I thought a bidet was for washing your feet.
First time I saw a bidet, I peed in it. Didn't know any better. I thought it was what a urinal looked like in Europe.
New user title.
You got Dances With Wolves, Stands With Fist, and Pees In Bidets.
UT, do you get compensated for a click?
I thought a bidet was for washing your feet.
You should know that takes a whore[Mary Magdalene]
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You should know that takes a whore[Mary Magdalene]
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I think this was the first song I ever learned from start to finish. Great parenting, mom. (no, I didn't call her mom)
[YOUTUBE]18GTVeXNWfg[/YOUTUBE]
I still sing it in the shower sometimes :rolleyes:
Going to client review today is the place where I et those clams:
http://tokeninternet.com/trevi
This one is weird, because I attempted to set the menu up with the same font that they used for the print menu. This involved a state-of-the-art practice known as font embedding; before showing the website, the browser downloads the font it's set in.
But that means it doesn't work in IE, because Microsoft set out to make embedded fonts work in a different way from the rest of the world.
Fuck Microsoft!
Tony, he fucking LOVED IT!!! I wish I had a tape recorder so you could hear all the nice things he gushed. More than twice he said he wasn't expecting it to be as great as it was. He's already gearing up for more work, and I quoted prices from our new carte. I literally laughed all the way to the bank, where his check is now safely deposited. Yay.
Adding icing to that sweet, sweet cake was the Yellowbook guy standing over our shoulders as I demoed. He had, no surprise, nothing to say. In fact, the guy slapped him down at one point, saying "Don’t even try. You can't match this, or the price they're charging." I overheard that the YB guy’s charging Trev $7K for a YB ad, so I added my own dig, "And it won't cost you $7K." Sinful.
Hey UT, do you guys have like a little flyer or business card or something? I keep going to various retail places and thinking about you guys, but I don't know what to tell them other than to go to the website, and I'm sure they forget right after I leave.
We do have this but right now it's completely focused on presenting a "leave behind" after a salesperson visits. Let me get back to you, I will be developing a shorter piece. And thanks!
May I suggest, as part of your "mission statement," you adopt the
Union Plumbers Guarantee.
What the competition did for them
My alpha version, to replace it
Sometimes ya gotta just tell somebody, and you're convenient, dwellars...
You kicked their ass plenty.
It's not great, it's a little mussy. I only allot so much time per design.
That picture of everyone posing with their equipment in front of the house just cinches it for me. I'd call them for my plumbing needs. (If I weren't such a cheap SOB DIY.)
you totally rodded their drains :lol:
With that sexy new website, they can unclog my drain anytime!
That picture of everyone posing with their equipment in front of the house just cinches it for me. I'd call them for my plumbing needs. (If I weren't such a cheap SOB DIY.)
That's what does it for me too. Who did the photography? It's a neat shot.
My biness partner, with my borrowed camera!
We have to eBay a nice camera for him STAT!
He did a nice job! It's friendly. :) Get that man a great camera.
What the competition did for them
My alpha version, to replace it
Sometimes ya gotta just tell somebody, and you're convenient, dwellars...
Next time, post both, without telling which is yours, and then ask which we think is better.
Except UT's version is hosted under his own domain, so we'd still know which was which. And once the new one was up and running under the company's domain, the old site wouldn't be there anymore.
Blacksmiths have terrible websites. Here's one of the
less garish. It might be an avenue to explore.
The sites they need might be a little more complex than what you're doing now, especially sites for blade and architectural blacksmiths. A WordPress setup with a good gallery theme would probably cover most of them.
It's also a good excuse to go to knife shows.
Rat Hole Forge is now Fontanini Anvil and tool.
Sounds like he's raised his prices. :lol:
Sounds like he's raised his prices. :lol:
I'll probably meet Steve this weekend at the Northern Rockies Blacksmith Association spring conference. I'll ask him about his motivations.
Mo' money, mo' money, mo' moneeeeey.
I'll probably meet Steve this weekend at the Northern Rockies Blacksmith Association spring conference. I'll ask him about his motivations.
Mo' money, mo' money, mo' moneeeeey.
We will be needing a full report with pics!
Oh and tell him to update his site - It's been three years!
He cannot be THAT busy.
[SIZE="1"](Last Update August 1 2008)[/SIZE]
We will be needing a full report with pics!
I didn't take any pictures. I can't focus on learning and take photos at the same time.
I'll post the official pics when they're up.
Steve is a really cool dude. Go by and get a demo if you're ever in Jackson, WY. And yes, the name change was a marketing move.
Prices are going up all over the metalworking world. One reason is that the cost to operate foundries has risen sharply. Another is that foundries are shutting down regularly.
(Back to your regularly scheduled website business thread...)