Free templates, graphics, web design articles and more. » Online Site Builders

Top 10 Shopify eCommerce templates of 2011

suz — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 03:52:44 +0000

If you are wanting to open an online store it is hard to beat Shopify. Shopify was designed to make the task of starting an internet store easy (and much cheaper then hiring a designer) with their online shop builder and many pre-designed e-commerce templates. Not only does it take care of the shop’s design but they also provide analytics, the ability to create special promotions, and they also offer tools to accept incoming payments and to track your orders. In this post I will showcase a few of my favourite free and premium Shopify themes.

How to create a mobile version of your site

suz — Fri, 22 Jul 2011 02:38:43 +0000

The web has gone mobile. Users no longer just sit at their computers looking up information, they are using the internet on the go, on their mobile devices. This means that site owners should address a mobile strategy and consider creating mobile optimized websites giving all visitors optimal browsing experience.

A mobile website does not have to be a headache or cost a lot of money to create. Many sites have popped up in the last few years to help the average webmaster create a mobile version of their site with graphical user interfaces and copy-and-paste code blocks to make things easier.

Here are a few of them to help you get started.

OctoMobi
Octomobi has a lot of great features including GPS, maps, QR codes and more. They have a free plan which is very usable and includes unlimited bandwidth and hosting.

Mobilova
Mobilova allows users to create and monetize the mobile versions of their websites in under 60 seconds. They do have a free trial for 60 days.

Mobify.me
Free for simple web sites or $249/month if your site needs Mobile E-Commerce with Mobify Enterprise.

WireNode
Has a free plan with lots of features and a reasonably priced premium plan. Intuitive, easy to use mobile website creator.

Onbile
Create a mobile site using customizable templates as a starting point. Receive and paste code in the index page of your site and visitors to your website will be automatically redirected to the mobile version if they are on a mobile device. Free to use.

Phone image thanks to SmashingMagazine

How to create a social networking or dating site

suz — Thu, 21 Jul 2011 03:48:23 +0000

Social networking is huge and is only getting bigger. Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook and now Google+ as well as dating sites like PlentyOfFish are very successful – users spend hours of their time on them on a daily basis. As well as these social networking giants of the internet there are thousands of smaller, specialized networking sites connecting people with similar interests together.

There may not be much point in taking on and competing with the bigger networking giants like FB – but starting a smaller, specialized social network, dating site or niche networking site can still be worthwhile. So how do you go about doing this? There are many ways and many tools online to help. Sites like Socialgo allow you to create a social network with a few clicks. This is great for the beginner and those who don’t already have their own web hosting. They do have a free option but if you want your own domain name and extra features it does cost $25/month. This is a reasonable price if you are not already paying for hosting elsewhere but if you do already run other websites then you might want to look at the option of installing a php dating script or community site script on your own server.

Using your own hosted community software gives you some extra freedom and there is also no chance of the provider network shutting down and taking your dating site with it.

One such script is the free dating software provided by Boonex. Their open source script is not just dating software, you can use it to create other types of social networks as well. If you want to customize your site but you are no designer, their marketplace of ready made social networking templates and dating templates should help (see below for some examples of templates on offer).

Build a free restaurant site

suz — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 02:45:50 +0000

Bistro Square is a brand new online web site builder to build restaurant and food related sites. You can create a fantastic looking site for your restaurant or bistro with added features such as an online menu creator, coupon generator and guestbook, all for free. BistroSquare does offer advanced options which cost money but the free plan is definitely usable and has enough features to get by on so there is no need to upgrade unless you want to. If you are just testing the waters and don’t want to pay for web hosting, software or a designer this is a great way to get started.

17 free online website creators

suz — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 02:57:04 +0000

Browser based editors that allow you to create a web site for free and without needing much (or any really) design or HTML knowledge.

Wix – A Flash web site creator.
BistroSquare – Create a free site for your restaurant
Yola – Easy to use, lots of templates.
Synthasite – An Ajax based drag and drop webpage editor.
Google Pages – Ajax based simple WYSIWYG web editor.
Sprout – A browser-based tool for creating interactive widgets and web sites in Flash
Jimdo – Another easy to use AJAX site editor. Has a feature for copying other sites’ designs.
Sampa, Babyjellybeans and MyFamily.com – All family oriented, create a personal website, family website or baby website.
Letseat.at – Create a free web site for your restaurant.
SnapPages – Drag and drop text boxes, widgets, photos, calendars and more with an easy to use web page builder.
Pagii – Aims to craft highly stylized personal web pages with drag and drop resizeable widgets. Has social network qualities.
Edicy – An elegant and simple solution to creating web sites.
Sauropol – Create blogs, text pages, image galleries, news lists, document folders, bulletin boards and more.
DoodleKit – Some of these features are available for free, but many will require that you pay
SiteKreator – The free version is a little limited with only 5 design choices.

Starting a web site for free

suz — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 03:06:36 +0000

(List updated September 2011) I am often asked “How can I start my own web site without any web design knowledge and without any money whatsoever?”
I know it can be hard to get started sometimes and not everyone wants to put money down just to get a simple site. So I have listed a few resources to help you get started.

Option 1) Get a free blog

Probably the most well known of the lot is Google’s Blogger.com. Starting your own site (blog) there is very easy. No mucking around with designs (unless you want to that is) it’s just a matter of a few clicks of your mouse button and away you go.

Thoughts.com Forums – Click on “blogs” in the navbar to open a free blog account.
Xanga – Another blog and photo sharing site.
i.ph – This blog provider boasts of very refined privacy settings with many options.
You can start a free WordPress blog on WordPress.com

Option 2) Use a free site builder
Wix – Flash web site creator.
Yola – Easy to use, lots of templates.
You can create a website or online store with Webs.com.
Other:
With FaceItPages you can easily create a great-looking, lead-generating, cost-effective Facebook Business Page.

If you know of more good services please let us know in the comments.

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