Name of your website?Easy House Painting Tips
Your name?
James Covell
Your Location (city, etc)
London
Please give us a short summary of your website?
House Painting Tips. Here you'll find easy and helpful tips and information about painting rooms, ceilings, trim, as well as all exterior painting tasks.
What inspired you to launch your own website?
Not only as a business choice to have a presense on the internet, I also wanted to have an avenue to share my knowledge with everyone. I do receive a number of questions from my clients about painting tips and techniques and decided that I could organize everything through a website.
When did you launch your first website, and what was it?
Actually, this is my first website. I launched it in August, 2007.
How did you decide on a name for your website?
I wanted to convey not only the main topic of house painting, but also that it was easy - described in layman's terms.
What makes it different from other, similar offerings?
Well, I hoped that I would be able to create a well organized website that is full of interesting content that people are looking for. I'm currently working on offering a newsletter that will be published for my subscribers once a month that will share some painting tips, new products and share some of my experiences - which may lighten the reading :)
What is your eventual goal? (To sell it, keep it for income, secure a book or other mainstream media deal?)
My current goal is to keep adding more content to my website. I feel that this is very important for anyone that is looking for and finds a website for house painting information. Painting is my work and also my enjoyment - believe it or not. I actually find great satisfaction on creating my website and keeping my readers informed.
How does your investment of time and money balance against your success?
Initially, as with any new venture, the time that I spend creating the website is quite extensive. Often working into the wee hours some nights. I don't want to really put a monetary value on it at this point - I'd rather see it as time well spent for something I love to do. This website is something that I'm proud of making and will be proud of promoting to share my knowledge in the future.
If you had an unlimited development budget for development, how would you change your site?
Interesting question indeed. I started with little or no knowledge of website design or development abilities. I came across an excellent product called Site Build It! from SiteSell.com. I must say that they go way beyond the call of duty for providing the necessary tools to someone to create their own website. They include hosting, automatic search engine submissions, an extremely powerful keyword brainstorming and search tool, and many, many more items.
After using Site Build It!, I would not put money into any other website development tools or SEO programs out there.
If your site got really big, really quickly, would you be able to keep up with the demand?
Yes, and that is my hope.
What unexpected costs and headaches have you had to deal with?
Actually, I ran into very few unexpected costs at this point. SiteSell is an annual fee and nothing more. I focused on building my website using their tools and guidance (also has a fabulous forum that we all share ideas) and tried to stay away from the many get-rich-quick schemes out there.
What has been your biggest challenge?
My biggest challenge was finding the time to put into building the content for my website while still working full-time.
What method has been most successful for promoting your website?
Word-of-mouth goes a long way in my business and it has certainly helped promote my website as well. Also, I belong to a few painting forums on the net and as such, readers will be able to link to my website from my signature or author links.
How has running your website differed from your expectations?
Well, it's certainly a lot more work than what I first anticipated. If anyone was thinking about creating their own website, I'd say that they have to have the same love and dedication for their topic. Otherwise, the websites won't get finished, or if they do, they won't be updated at all.
How long have you run the site already, and how long will you continue to keep it up if you don't enjoy big gains in traffic, income or popularity?
My Easy-House-Painting-Tips.com website has been up since Aug, 2007 and it's my intention and hopes that it will continue to grow, both with my content as well as in it's popularity for years to come.
What is your website address?
Easy House Painting Tips
