Rates

Payments are accepted through by credit/debit card, check, cash, or money order. If you pay with your credit card, the charge will appear on your statement as "Heather's Web Design."

• Web Hosting for business sites for only $15 a month with NO Setup Fee
• Web Hosting for personal websites are only $10
• FREE Domain Registration (Get www.yourdomain.com) when you sign up for hosting for a year (billed monthly.) This applies to one free domain only, not multiple domains. This also pays for the first year of registration only. Each year afterwards, you will be charged $20 to renew your domain name.
• You will be provided with all the help you need in setting up your new site and your email account (email comes with hosting).
• If you purchase your site from Heather's Web Design (see web design rates below), I set the site up for you.

All websites need regular updating and maintenance to keep visitors coming back. This includes adding fresh content to your existing site, adding or removing pictures, text, links, etc. If you want monthly maintenance, you can pay a monthly fee of $35 or more each month. The price will depend on the size of your site, and how much information you need updated each month. Maintenance fees are in addition to hosting fees. They are separate, but will be billed with your hosting fee if you choose the monthly option. Maintenance does not include adding new pages - it only includes making changes to your existing site. New pages cost $75 each.

If you have a basic "brochure site" and you don't think you will need it updated often, then you can choose to pay $5 - $50 per update, instead of having a monthly plan. That also depends on what you need done and the amount of time it will take.

Web site Optimization

Web site optimization (search engine optimization) involves many different things.

If you want complete web site optimization (the kind I would do if I were building a site for myself), it will cost you extra. If you want to see what other companies are charging for web site optimization, check out my link exchange page for the companies that specialize in marketing and optimization. I can promise you my rates are much lower. I do not submit sites to search engines. What I do is get many links TO your site and that will automatically get you into the most of the popular search engines, such as Google, AOL, Netscape, Yahoo, iWon, BBC, and so many others. Many search engines charge you just to "consider" your site for inclusion. Yahoo charges $299 just to consider adding you to their directory. But the fact is, Yahoo search is powered by Google, and if you are in Google, you are also in Yahoo, so why pay? (I recently learned that Yahoo may not be using Google anymore to provide search results.) Once you are in a few of these search engines and are linked to by other sites, the other search engines, such as ones powered by LookSmart (MSN, Lycos, etc.) will eventually pick you up and put you in their search engines also. I haven't found a search engine yet that I'm not in, and I have never paid to be in one. You don't need banner ads, or "pay-per-click" ads, although if you REALLY want fast business, it may be something to consider, but they are too expensive for the average web site owner.

If your site is optimized in the best way possible, which I know how to do (but it takes a lot of time) the search engines will pick your site up regardless of whether you pay them. I cannot say that with absolute certainty for ALL search engines because some of them insist that you pay to be included. Google is the most popular search engine at this time, and it is completely free. It works by link popularity, which means that you need a "Link Exchange" page. You want to exchange links with sites that are similar to yours in some way (I exchange links only with sites that are about web design, web site optimization, and web resources) I also have a "Miscellaneous" links page that I will add you to if you do not fall into those categories.

There are many aspects to web site optimization. If you want complete web site optimization for your site, including a link exchange page, I will charge you around $400 extra for that. Otherwise, you will receive the basic optimization that I give to all sites for free. That kind of optimization will still get you into the search engines - just being on my Portfolio and Misc. Links page will get you in - but complete optimization will get you closer to the top of the search engines for your keywords. Don't expect to be at the top for the word "dog" or "vacation", but if your keywords are "boston terrier dogs" or "exotic adult vacations" then that can be accomplished with more success. I cannot get you to the top of the engines with a keyword such as "computers". If you don't understand that, then just think about how many web sites use the word "computers" and maybe you'll understand better. Do you think you'll come up above Microsoft? I really doubt it. But if you want to come up first for "cleveland tn computer repair" that is much more feasible.

I'm sure you're getting the idea. If you consult me for a website, I can explain it in more detail, or when I get my tutorial pages up, you can simply read those. There are many different ways of getting to the top. Most of them are completely free (but you still have to pay someone to do it for you if you don't know how to do it yourself.) It takes a lot of time and thought. It's not a free service. But like I've said, there are websites that specialize in website optimization. They do basically the same thing I do, except they charge you $1000 - $2000 for it and change the way your site looks in the process.

Heather Landry