Posts Tagged ‘essentials of a startup’

Essentials of a Website – Part 1

Thursday, October 16th, 2008

We are starting a series of write ups on what has become one of the most important manifestation’s of a company’s identity – its website. In today’s virtual world, your website has become your visiting card that is up for view 24X7.

Many prospective clients and investors are forming their first impressions about you and your company by that. Just as you would like to look good before meeting anyone, the same applies for your website. We decided to put down our learnings from creating our website and we hope this will help you when you get down to making yours.

1.  Hosting your site

Hosting basically means parking your site on a server. So whenever someone types your site address, that person is taken to that place. So, as the term suggests, your first step would be to buy hosting space for your website.

There are several Indian (Ours was Webwerks) and International vendors available from where you can buy out space. But we have noticed that buying from American vendors directly turns out to be far cheaper. The disadvantage being that you may not get the prompt service levels that your neighbourhood vendor would be able to provide.

There are also several packages available depending upon the amount and duration for which the space is required. It would be safe option to initially go for one year option and if satisfied with the vendor services, you could then extend it for whatever period of like. Know what you would want to put on site first as that will allow you to estimate the amount of space you will require for it. Accordingly, you can select a package from the vendor.

The most critical aspect is to understand the terms and conditions of all the packages of the vendors. Do not rush into this.

2.    Domain registration of website

If you are a startup, then don’t be surprised if the name of your firm is dictated by what domain names are available for registration. Your hosting vendor will tell you whether the name you require is available or not. Thankfully there are alternate domain name extensions available besides ‘.com’ – you also have ‘.net’ or you are from India then ‘.co.in’ or ‘.in’

Registration costs of ‘.com’ are marginally higher than ‘.co.in’ or ‘.in’ Buy your domain name for longer period irrespective of whether you continue to use the same hosting vendor.

3.    Email Ids

Once you have registered your domain name, you can start creating your email IDs. Your email ids will read like ‘yourname@yourcompanyname.com’ There can be restrictions on the number of IDs that a vendor might provide depending on the package you select. Again, estimate your requirement before signing the deal.

4.  Website SiteMap

Sitemap is the most critical document of a website. It’s the blue print which highlights to the search engine about the pages that are available for crawling on your site. It is more like a tree – you start off with root which is the landing page and then move on to the branches which would be other pages that you direct your users to. Prepare a sitemap yourself as you would best have an idea of what you would like to host on your site.

Don’t be surprised if you have make several revisions. We made 6 drafts before we eventually zeroed on the current structure. After you have listed out everything, go through it with your website designer – as that person will definitely be able to value add from a technical perspective.

Hope you are with us till this stage. Move on the next part of Essentials of a Website. Remember website development is very different from that of a blog!!

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Posted in Essential Series, Website 1.0 & 2.0 | 14 Comments »

Essentials of a startup

Friday, September 26th, 2008

Windchimes is as startup as it gets. So we decided to chronicle our journey and give budding entrepreneurs a little flavor of what entails starting off on your own. So pick and choose what works for you and enjoy the rest. We are always on hand for a quick chat if you need any help. You can contact us here.

Today’s post is about Office Space. If you are two people starting out, like in our case, it is always better to have an office of your own. Working out of individual homes just does not work. You need to spend the initial phase getting attuned to each other’s working styles, swapping ideas and thriving off each other’s energy.

When we started looking for office space, between us we looked at least 40 offices! We struck paydirt when we finally found a lovely little office at Bandra Kurla Complex (incidentally one of the poshest business addresses to flaunt in Mumbai!).

So what should you look for in a office?

  • Accessibility to public transport – close to a railway station if in Mumbai
  • Proximity to your clients – so you don’t end up wasting half a day just travelling to your client’s office
  • Flexible timings – there are times you might want to do all nighters
  • Low Deposits – you are a startup, you can’t be blocking your capital in deposit.
  • Basic furniture – since you don’t want to be spending too much money doing up your office
  • Not too big, not too small – you want to factor in future expansion
  • A place you instinctively feel good about – you are going to be spending long hours here

Some other pointers:

  • Make sure you thoroughly check the place and give the owner a list of repairs/changes to be done before you move in
  • Make sure you have good chairs since you are going to be spending an awful lot of time in them

Coming back to our office, we have a lovely little garden that you can sit in and work out of. More often than not there is a lovely breeze. And the best part – we feel good coming in here everyday. So here are some pics of our office. Do drop in if you are in this part of town by getting in touch with us here.

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Posted in Blogs, Essential Series, Windchimes Comm | 10 Comments »