Getting Dublin Business Online
Dublin city provides some great help and information for new start companies on how to setup a new business in Dublin.
Unfortunately there is a lack of support and help on getting your Dublin business online with a cracking good website that you can be proud of and that customers will love.
There is the Getting Irish Business Online initiative which offers Irish businesses a free website for one year. But you generally get what you pay for.
Yes you get a free website for one year and some training, however, the advice is very general and the templates are butt-ugly.
We know that Dublin businesses still have lots of questions about setting up an online website as we receive enquires every day.
So we have put together this handy article to answer your questions.
How to get your Dublin business online
Here are the questions from Dublin businesses that we regularly receive along with our answers and additional information.
One will have to be the primary domain that will be displayed in the web browser URL address bar.
You should choose whichever Top Level Domain (TLD) your target audience is most likely to use.
Irish people will likely choose a .ie domain as their first choice, UK people the .co.uk domain, USA people .com and so on.
Although the .com address is meant for North American businesses, it has become almost a universal domain, meaning that you could quite happily use that for your Dublin business.
Other TLD’s may be more appropriate to your business branding. For example using the .tv domain if you are in broadcasting or multimedia.
To register a .ie domain, you will need to provide your Company Number or Registered Business Name Number and possibly an accompanying signed letter stating your reason for acquiring the .ie domain name.
Get your business registration sorted out first.
Information on setting up a business in Ireland can be found at on the Companies Registration Office website www.cro.ie
You will need to check if your domain name is available. Most Internet Service Providers (ISPs) will allow you to search for available domain names.
Blacknight is one of the more popular Irish ISPs and they have a domain name checker on their home page.
Domain name costs are dependant on the type of Top Level Domain (TLD) you choose; .ie .com .co.uk.
A typical .ie domain will cost approximately €20 excluding VAT every year.
You can reduce the cost a little if registering a domain in a block of a years e.g. 10 years registration.
Domain names can be purchased without a hosting package which can be added on later.
Video – Finding a .ie domain name
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUmys_Je9OA
In simple terms, it is rented space on an Internet server where your website files and databases are stored.
For most business websites you will need to purchase a web hosting package.
The only time you will not need a web hosting package is when the type of website you are using states that it is a “Hosted Service” e.g. Shopify
It is best to hold off on purchasing a hosting package until you have some idea of how your website is going to be implemented.
There are many different types of hosting packages available with different features, limitations and costs.
Your web designer/developer will likely recommend a hosting package that is suitable for your website.
A typical web hosting package for a small business website will be a Linux (non-Windows) shared server with MySQL database support and enough space to store your website data for the next few years.
Costs are very dependant on the functionality that your website is to provide, how much data you need to store and the expected amount of visitors and data transfer (bandwidth) per month.
The smallest hosting packages are called shared hosting where your website is one of many on a single server, so yo don’t get a server all to yourself and have to share resources.
These typically start around €50 excluding VAT per year and increase in price as you add more space and allow for greater traffic and bandwidth.
This data can be web pages, documents, PDF files, audio MP3s or video and is usually measures in megabytes (MB) or gigabytes (1GB = 1000 MB).
Most hosting packages have a bandwidth limit attached to them and if you go over this, you will pay an additional cost per MB.
This works in a similar way to mobile phone tariffs when you get X amount of free minutes per month.
It is important to understand the amount of data being transferred by your website so that you can purchase the correct web hosting package.
A web site that has simple text-based web pages and a low number of visitors will not have a high bandwidth.
A web site that has video and audio on web pages will use a high about of bandwidth.
e.g. if 1 of your web page videos is 100MB in size, then every time a person watches that video the website bandwith increases by at least 100MB. If 10 people watched the same video then your bandwidth would increase by at lease 1GB.
An eCommerce website may only have a few core pages, but the number of products can be in the 1000s and these all need to be created and checked.
The web hosting infrastructure will also cost more as generally for performance and security you will want your own dedicated Internet server, not a shared one.
With money transactions involved, testing and security is paramount.
There are also third-party merchant bank accounts, payment gateways and possibly shipping carriers to setup and configure.
Legal expenses may also be required to draft Privacy Statements and Terms & Conditions of use to ensure that you are trading within the law.
An architect/builder would ask you how many rooms you need, what is the purpose of those rooms, what types of units and white goods will the kitchen have, which fittings you want to use, etc.
Before we can give you a quote, we need to find out what type of website you are looking for, how many pages, what sort of content/functionality is needed and who will be visiting the website.
Without knowing the basics, we can’t estimate on how much time and effort would be needed to implement this.
For most website projects, once the design, development and testing has been signed off, the finished website can be uploaded to the hosting package and will be live in 24 hours across the Internet.
That leaves design, development and testing to consider.
Of course these are all going to be dependant on the size and functionality of your website.
We have found from experience that the design and review process can take longer than most new customer’s initial expectations.
Getting your business logo, identity and brand designed is important.
It’s not unreasonable to spend a few weeks just on this and to a certain extent this will drive the design and layout of the website itself.
We develop within the browser so you can interact with and see the design evolve on our customer review server.
Some designers and developers prefer to work with image files that are reviewed then translated into a working website.
For a small 20 page website, creating everything from the logo to the final website would take around 8 calendar weeks.
You should let your designer and developer know of any important dates and deadlines that you need too meet at the start of the project.
For tight deadline dates, it may be necessary to break the project into phases, delivering a core set of functionality for each project milestone.
Email address are linked to your domain name and web hosting space.
You can either setup new email address to forward to your current GMail address or add the new email accounts into the GMail settings.
Either way you can brand your email addresses as name@mydomain.ie and still manage them from your GMail account.
A web developers primary skillset is usually programming and development. They may not be as talented in the graphics design area.
However, the term “web designer” has become recognised as an almost universal term for anyone who delivers a website to a customer, so it’s best not to make assumptions. Just ask.
Both web designers and web developers should be able to deliver you a complete website solution.
If you have the budget, you should hire both.
You will notice that the http:// part of a web addresses changes to https:// when using a website and SSL.
Having an SSL certificate is essential if you are selling items and services online and need customers to send you personal details such as address and billing information.
SSL certificates are usually bought from your Internet Service Provider (ISP) and installed into your web hosting package.
There are different levels of SSL certificate. Costs, security and indemnity rise according to the higher level of certificate you purchase.
Read more about the different levels and costs of SSL certificates.
For limited companies you will need to display the following information on your website and email communications:
- Company Registration Name
- Registration Office
- Company Registration Number
For all other Irish business websites you are required to have a privacy statement if the site collects any information such a contact form or if it uses cookies. This covers pretty much every business website.
For more information see the ODCE website and the Data Protection Commissioner website
If a web designer or developer asks for all the money up-front in advance of giving you anything you should smack them on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper.
It is common business practice for a designer or developer to ask for an initial deposit at the start of a project or to spread payments across important milestone dates for larger projects.
- anon, Rathmines
Your online website is an extension of your business in the same way as your phones and office equipment.
You have a higher chance of ranking on google.ie if you have a .ie website with the relevant search keywords.
This does not mean that your website will not be indexed by other country-based search engines.
If the content on your website is relevant, your site could appear in other search engines, regardless of your country.
A written and signed agreement will cary more legal weight than certain electronic communications; email, fax.
Email confirmations are acceptable under EU law and in some countries such as Scotland a verbal agreement can be held legally binding.
If you are working with a sole trader, then it is quite common not to exchange a written contract for a project to get started. An email acceptance is usually sufficient.
For larger projects and where commercial confidentiality is key, you should obtain a written contract and perhaps a non disclosure agreement.
In most cases when you hire a company to design your website, they should ensure that all the materials they use are royalty free.
When the website is delivered to you, it should be no different to any other product you buy. It is yours.
There are some cases where you may use an online service to provide some or all of your website functionality. In this case, the hosted service may have copyright on all the data entered into its systems. e.g. Shopify
If you mostly work from home but would like the appearance of having a presence in the city, Virtual Offices are a good choice. e.g.
They usally offer a variety of packages and facilies such as mail forwarding, call forwarding and meeting room hire.
If you’re looking for physical desk space and are on a budget, hot desking is a good option. e.g.
The next notch up is renting a small office space in a shared environment. Some examples are:
Dealing with web design jargon
Read our guide to those secret web design buzz words that other web design agencies don’t want you know.
Did we miss anything out?
Is there a particular question about setting up your Dublin business online that we haven’t answered?
Ask us and not only will we send you the answer, we will post it up here along with your business name.
