Do you need a website?

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So you are going to advertise your property on a number of holiday rental websites but do you need your own website for the property?

The answer is that it is not essential but it is a fantastic way to showcase your property.

Having your own website can be a great way of providing additional information to prospective customers that you may not be able to include on other companies websites. Another bonus is that any bookings that come through directly don't incur commission fees.

Things to include on your website

  • Information about your property.
  • Information about the features and attractions in the local area.
  • The location of the property including a map (you can embed a google map or the like within your website).
  • A calendar that shows the current availability and an estimate of the tariff of your property. A lot of the holiday rental websites will allow you to embed their availability calendar within your website. (some do and some don't charge for bookings that come from people clicking on the calendar).
  • An image gallery that showcases your properties features.
  • Your contact details and information on how to make a booking.

How to setup a website

You have two options available to you for setting up a website; pay somebody to do it for you or do it yourself.

Paying somebody

There are many companies that can organise the domain name, create your website and setup the hosting for you. The prices can vary greatly depending on the company you choose and the number of pages you want. To give you an idea of pricing check out the packages provided by theartistree: http://www.theartistree.com.au Clinton from theartistree will be more than happy to discuss your website needs with you and create a great looking website for you. 

theartistree

 

Doing it yourself

If you decide to go it on your own, there are many companies both in Australia and overseas that can host your website and register your domain name. The table below shows a brief comparison of the base plan of 5 web hosting companies. The quality of the customer support and the speed and availability of your website may vary between providers.

 

Crazy Domain

Go Daddy

Hosting Bay

Web Central

Melbourne IT

Cost for 12 months

$30

$35.88

$28.80

$133.10

$285.45

Server space

 

25 GB

100 GB

200 MB

5 GB

5 GB

Data transfer

 

Unlimited

Unlimited

500 MB p/m

80 GB

200 GB p/m

Email

Unlimited accounts

100 Email accounts

5 email accounts

10 email accounts

100 email accounts

Database

 

5 x MySQL

10 x MySQL

No

MySQL

MySQL