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Free Web Development @ J&D Studios

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Free Web Development @ J&D Studios
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Associateddeanylev on 31/01/2017 - 19:25 jdstudios.design (2345 clicks)
Last edited 01/03/2017 - 22:33 by 1 other user

Update: The company has ceased operations however they will be fulfilling all requests.

To celebrate the launch of J&D Studios, we'll be building websites for free for orders placed between 10:00am and 11:00pm tomorrow!

There are some conditions to this deal, please view these by clicking the "Free Websites Day!" box on our homepage

We're a web development firm that creates truly custom sites. No WordPress, no templates, no software. Just blood, sweat, tears, and lots of caffeine.

Note - the first 20 sites get guaranteed spots, and after that, we'll try our best to get as many of them as possible done.

How this promotion is going to work:

1. You place an order using our order form.

2. We reach out to you via email (generally within 24 hours) to discuss the specifics of your website.

3. We build your website and email you to notify you of this. You email back with any changes you'd like. We do this up and down, until you are 100% happy.

4. We email you your site's files (or optionally invite you to its Bitbucket Git Repo).

5. If you choose to go with our awesome free hosting, you point your domain to nameservers we provide, and voila, your site is on the internet!

If you're looking to modernize your current site, want a cool portfolio site to show potential employers, or simply want to see if we're any good at what we do, order away! You have nothing to lose, except a bit of time :)

If you have any questions or constructive feedback, feel free to leave it in the comments!

EDIT - Wow, thanks for all the comments everyone! Here's a mass response to the more negative comments:

Looks like we'll be abandoning our plans for a custom CMS, as everyone seems to hate that. Fair enough, we'll go with a more appropriate solution.

For all the people saying our our designs are amateur, that's your opinion, but we ask that you don't write us off from the get-go. I'd appreciate if you told me specifically what you don't like, not just that you don't like them. Always time, and room, for improvement.

We're offering a free service, people can just try us out, and who knows, maybe we'll surprise you :P

Also, to the people placing orders, please play by the rules. Your orders will not be counted towards the first 20 and will not be fulfilled, please place them tomorrow.

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closed Comments

  • am274 on 01/02/2017 - 01:22
    +1

    All the best. I am sure you guys will do great if can stay committed for some time.

  • am274 on 01/02/2017 - 01:26
    +1

    Another advise is to be careful with your promotion/order wording, hoping some sort of contract even for these free websites. You dont want to be maintaining someone's website for years to come because they are not "100% happy".

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 01/02/2017 - 14:11

      Great advice. People seem to agree the unlimited revisions is wayyy too much. We'll definitely change that ASAP.

  • cerealJay on 01/02/2017 - 05:15
    +2

    Here's my 2 cents…

    Get a designer. You don't have one currently because your homepage tells me that. The statement "gorgeous modern websites" contradicts the very page it sits on! That red and black monstrosity, what the hell is that! The vast space between elements is awful. You may blame the template for that spacing but it's worth fixing.

    Where in the world do we ever see burning red and black together? People want familiar design, not an impression of the pits of hell. Get yourself a book about colour, or bookmark these links for starters…

    www.colourpod.com
    colrd.com

    Learn how to use colour, contrast, and understand the moods associated with use of colour.

    Just adding a framework and filling in the blanks is barely web development. You don't need to use a frontend framework. If you have an HTML guy then why not make your own responsive template? CSS is not hard. Not every website needs to look like that typical stretched out look that centers everything way too much and spaces it out across the screen in a series of rows down the page. You shouldn't follow those formulas if you really want to make "gorgeous websites".

    Finally, I've never liked it when designers call their own work "gorgeous". Let the work speak for itself rather than sticking your own label on there hoping everyone believes it. I know businesses are always going on about how good they are when they advertise, but not all businesses do that. Make a bunch of cool stuff and then maybe talk yourselves up, but not before. Good luck.

    • [Deactivated] on 01/02/2017 - 07:55

      The only modern practice about his design IS the parallax with centered content for better responsiveness across resolutions. I was with you up until that. Hey OP, don't be sad, all the comments here are constructive, They point out your vulnerabilities that might drive custom away and are giving you very good roadmaps to improvement. I hope you guys do well, but quality over quantity is my advice. Even 3 GOOD sites in your portfolio would be better than 20 low-grade ones. People are paying for your focus and attention, not for speed and quantity.

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 01/02/2017 - 14:37

      Any good UX/UI courses? Totally down to build my own framework, it's just very time consuming. I definitely get what you're saying. Maybe after all this, our website needs a redesign? I'd like to switch to AngularJS and Angular Material, and build a truly beautiful Material Design website.

  • Piquay on 01/02/2017 - 07:18
    +1

    I'm no web designer but I manage a medium sized business and have a very strong IT background, and recently went through the process of selecting a new web developer to create a new website, I never really found a developer who offered what I wanted so ended up compromising on it. The people in my organisation have very little IT knowledge so if I was to move on I wanted to make sure the website would be well looked after.

    What I think is the ideal offering is as follows:
    - a completely packaged offering inc hosting and ongoing minor maintenance and support. For small changes to existing pages (like minor layout changes or photo updates) and assistance with content changes (as long as they continue with your hosting and maintenance offering)
    - upfront cost like you're offering on your packages but may be 3 business packages including 3-5 pages, 10 pages & 20 pages with the $49 for additional pages. Eg up to 10 pages for $500
    - Wordpress cms, I ended up going for a more expensive option because the cheaper guy used a custom CMS. It's all about worst case scenario for businesses, what happens if you guys a hit by a bus how can another organisation take over the website
    - charge $15-20 a month for the ongoing maintenance, including hosting for businesses. It makes good financial sense as decent hosting on its own will cost just as much (thinking panther or net virtue) and is effectively free maintenance for the business.
    - make it easy to package up the website and leave to another provider, 99% will stay with you as long as you are responsive and helpful, business don't like the idea of being locked in

    In the end I wanted an end to end solutions that was cost effective and easy to manage that didn't lock me into the provider.

    Good luck guys

  • lockmc on 01/02/2017 - 07:35

    What back-end system will you be using for your e-Commerce sites?

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 01/02/2017 - 14:38

      Custom solution with Stripe for payment processing.

  • [Deactivated] on 01/02/2017 - 08:01
    +1

    Try Adobe Color CC Website for picking colour schemes from photos. I have always found that a good cheat. Pick a beautifully composed pic for your sites that suits the mood and grab a palette from that.

  • hogwarts on 01/02/2017 - 08:02

    Hi

    I am making a cloud service and will take this advantage! One question though, can you make a price list for the prices of the service and stuff. If I email you after the order, can I send you the logo? See you at 10!

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 01/02/2017 - 14:39

      Pricing is on our site. Please use the order form to submit the order, if you haven't done so already :)

      • hogwarts on 01/02/2017 - 16:06

        Is the free promotion still going submitted at 10:01am.

  • shazm on 01/02/2017 - 09:08

    Ballsy offer, and I wish you the best of luck!

    I think you guys are pretty young, and you've had a few comments from folks who work in the industry - and I'll try to be a bit more constructive:

    • Doing everything is hard. Incredibly hard. Pick what you enjoy and stick with it, but don't branch too far. If you like designing, immerse yourself in it, learn as much as you can etc - and let your partner worry about the programming side. And vice versa, play to each others skills and talents.
    • Read up on various UX / accessibility guidelines provided by Apple (iOS, Safari), Google, and follow them.
    • Read up on type rhythm, colour picking / matching, grids and mobile-first responsiveness. Find amazing websites, try to pick out what makes them amazing.
    • Pick frameworks for:
      > Front-end JS + CSS (React, Vue, Bootstrap, Foundation, Flexbox etc)
      > Back-end code (Rails, Laravel, Django etc)
      > Tests, tests and more tests!
    • Use a PaaS such as Heroku, Appfog, AWS

    I'd also recommend going to work full-time at an agency or an online-first company just so you understand the business side a bit more; and work with some talented people to see what makes them tick, and why things are done the way they are. Doesn't mean you have to do it as well, but just a broader understanding.

    Also don't forget - there's places like 99designs, fiverr etc where you can pick up some pretty decent designs, logos, and even websites on the cheap - it might be worth just using them for now to get a strong portfolio to attract clients that are willing to pay a lot of money, which can let you find even more talented designers and developers to do your work for you; and of course learn from them etc.

    Feel free to message me if you have any questions - I've been doing this for a while now :)

  • malouphix on 01/02/2017 - 10:31

    OzBargained?

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 01/02/2017 - 14:40

      We're at around 149 orders as of now… Much more than I expected :P

      • malouphix on 01/02/2017 - 17:07
        +1

        That's great, congrats!

        Now to choose the lucky punters.

  • noshopping on 01/02/2017 - 10:42
    +3

    Good luck to OP and I am happy to see another Aussie giving it ago - the enterpreneur spirit, however I'd advise the OP to read this. Lots and lots of valuable information. If you still continue doing this 10 years time OP, every word on this page will be spot on. https://silktide.com/why-we-gave-up-web-design-after-10-succ…

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 01/02/2017 - 14:41

      Thanks for that, I'll give it a look :)

  • Shiny Mew on 01/02/2017 - 11:48
    +1

    Coincidentally, my dad just had a website 'made' for his small manufacturing company but it looks terribly outdated. Unfortunately, I've an exam tomorrow so this deal would have otherwise been the PERFECT thing to jump on. Are there any other deals you could temporarily extend to OzBargainers, OP? :)

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 01/02/2017 - 14:42

      Check your PMs.

  • misu p on 01/02/2017 - 12:23
    +3

    Some feedback for the OP, I kind of did the same thing when starting our previous business in another country. We offered some friends and acquaintances "free websites" for their business. Because they were free none of them ever saw the value in them. Almost none of them ever updated anything on them so they kind of all fell in disrepair. Some of them still had our placeholder text in them after a long time.

    After some thought I realised that the problem with them was that they were "free", they were good websites (at that time anyway) easy to use, easy to update. But if you loose something that is free you will be like "meh". If you pay for something you will try to make sure you get value for money out of that something. If it is free… there is no "money" spent so people do it see the value.

    Other have commented on other things, with some I agree with others I do no, just my 2c on the "free" thing.

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 01/02/2017 - 14:42

      Thanks for the advice!

  • LiMaaa on 01/02/2017 - 12:44
    +2

    I vape, therefore I am in need of as much help as i can get, including a new website.

    But it all seriousness, I know you have received a lot of criticism here, but i think you guys will do well. I started an Australian gaming community and at first we had our quirks and issues, but now its regarded as one of the best places to game in Australia, respective of the game it caters for. I have put in a request for a small 1-2 page donation portal and I am curious to see what you two can do. Best of luck with the business.

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 01/02/2017 - 14:43

      Cheers! :)

  • born2reign on 01/02/2017 - 12:48
    +1

    Made an order just now.
    I applaud your initiative to really throw yourselves out there to get your business off the ground

    Ignore the haters unless they are contributing some real advice.
    Regardless of what you do in life, people will shoot you down and tell you what a bad idea it is.

    What you learn over the next few months of this project, will be invaluable to you and Jack in the long run - just never stop learning from everything (both good and bad).

    All the best!

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 01/02/2017 - 14:40

      Cheers buddy!

  • smitchy on 01/02/2017 - 13:10
    +1

    Coming from someone who runs their own agency, giving away 20 websites will really choke you to death as you have now put yourself amongst the pigeons who are tight arses (no pun intended)

    You will deal with revision issues, you will deal with procrastination, you will deal with not making any money on the whim that you may get some work in the future from referrals. MAYBE.

    You are not charging for hosting, you are not charging for websites, so what are you charging for or making money on?

    P.S When I read the part of NO WORDPRESS, I fell of my chair, as if you disregarded its 25% market share of all websites built upon this platform…. do you really think developing a custom system is better than developing on a open source platform with hundreds of core developers and thousands of plugin developers is better ?

    P.S.S Here is a tip, instead of putting this as a blatant 20 websites free offer on OzBargain, why don't you approach your local charities or church's and offer them this service for free, they would be most grateful since most are self-funded plus you will feel better once the job is done.

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 01/02/2017 - 14:44
      +2

      so what are you charging for or making money on?

      Nothing, the point of this deal is to build our portfolio, and it's a learning experience.

      Your advice is good, appreciate it :)

  • mike001 on 01/02/2017 - 13:46
    -1

    Never mind the tech bits. What about their poor grammar and bad spelling? Probably operating from an Indian call centre.

    • Gravy on 01/02/2017 - 14:38
      +1

      I don't think that is the case after a bit of private messaging with them (Indian call centre). It's possible but not very likely judging by language used.

      Nothing really stands out to me as being written by a non native English speaker. There are a couple of minor errors on their description page for their "Notified" project. "Employers" used twice when they meant employees, and "Current" rather than "Currently".

      What in particular did you pick up on? You might be able to help them out.

  • mike001 on 01/02/2017 - 15:53

    How about the use of amateur rather than amateurish. You think taht's not pigin English. Have a look at their websites. Probably a Google translation. They have no idea on verb plurals, adjectives, gerunds or proper sentence construction.

    I guess you get what you pay for. If a website is your window to the world, any basic error will be an embarassment and cast credibility on your own businesss.

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 01/02/2017 - 15:57
      +3

      We're human, we make mistakes. Instead of belittling us, why not point out the errors, so we can fix them? You can help out people without being nasty.

    • Gravy on 01/02/2017 - 16:27
      +1

      You probably meant pidgin English.

    • malouphix on 01/02/2017 - 17:12
      +4

      You think taht's not pigin English.

      any basic error will be an embarassment and cast credibility on your own businesss.

      Check yourself before you wreck yourself.

  • justinh93 on 01/02/2017 - 16:07
    +1

    Hey Deanylev

    Awesome deal and idea to get exposure! Just wondering how we know whether we were made the 20. Would love to see you and your teams capabilities.

    Cheers

    Justin

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 01/02/2017 - 17:31

      We'll send an email your way if you made it :)

      • justinh93 on 01/02/2017 - 19:25
        +1

        ok great. I did it on the dot.

        Best lead generation exercise I have seen in a while! All the best.

  • FittyFitty on 01/02/2017 - 17:29

    Looks like you have work on your service availability and continuity some…

    "This site can’t be reached

    The webpage at https://jdstudios.design/ might be temporarily down or it may have moved permanently to a new web address"

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 01/02/2017 - 17:30

      That's on your end. Have had hundreds upon hundreds of people able to access the site just fine. Just checked, it's definitely up.

  • congo on 01/02/2017 - 22:59

    Placed an order, hope I am not too late.

  • shekiepie on 02/02/2017 - 07:06

    Thanks for the great deal OP

    I had browsers open at 9:59am and was ready to go at 10am ;)

    I had some additional details I wanted to add to my requests. What would be the best way of getting them to you? I get the idea that additional details would help you scope out which website you want to work on. In particular some example pages of what the end product could look like

    Cheers.

  • ipiok on 23/02/2017 - 16:39

    So would anyone who received this deal care to share examples of the companies work?

    • Associateddeanylev @ jdstudios.design on 23/02/2017 - 18:26

      Nothing finished quite yet. We're running way behind where we wanted to be. We'll get there though :)

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