Feature - Community Development

Getting traffic to your web site is one thing. Getting visitors to come back is another. Chris Newman talks to us about web site solutions that make people want to come back again and again and again...

"The problem with a static web site is that once you've read it, there's rarely any incentive to go back again. If you frequently update the content people will keep coming back, that's where news sites excel. But usually there's a massive infrastructure already behind them - the same news is also in print, or on TV and the web site alone would not be profitable."

Chris heads up a team of developers for Lightwood Consultancy Ltd that specialise in dynamic web sites, and getting databases online.

"We help people to see the real benefits having a web site can bring. Our E-commerce solutions are very much in demand at the moment, but interactive web sites aren't just about selling things.

"If you can't provide loads of frequently updated content yourself, let your users do it for you! A huge number of sites already have bulletin boards and benefit from those visitors who get hooked on a discussion and keep coming back for more.

"You can do a lot worse than building an Internet community, a group of people who share a common interest - promoted by your site - will want to interact with each other."

It doesn't stop with bulletin boards. The web-enabled applications you can use are only limited by your imagination.

"If you're running a site for soccer fans, give out fantasy teams to anyone who wants one. They'll need to come back to see how their team is doing, and sing their praises on the virtual terraces. Why not let the aspiring artists and photographers who come to your site upload images of their work."

"One particular system we wrote allowed visitors to store their bookmarks on the site, and access them from anywhere in the world. When we added the facility to reveal some of your bookmarks to other site members it became a real community of people wanting to show off interesting sites they'd found.

"What I love about the Internet is some of the amazing ideas for sites you hear about. People have a brainwave and want to see it in action quickly which is where we come into it. It's incredibly exciting to see the transformation from concept to fully working site in a matter of weeks."

This is all awfully expensive though, isn't it?

"I began putting database on the web whilst I was writing software with Oracle. For most people, the commercial database licencing and support fees are way out of their price range. Thankfully there are a couple of really good alternatives that are free to use."

Chris's preferred platform is Linux, running the latest Apache web server. For database enabled sites MySQL or PostgreSQL are used, depending on the particular situation, and PHP is used to pull everything together. Every component can be used commercially without charge.

"They're so much hype about Linux right now. You just have to look at the facts - you get great performance and stability. The same can be said for all the open-source solutions we use. MySQL is incredibly fast and ideally suited as a web database, and PHP makes almost anything possible."

"Everyone in the team is extremely flexible, and thats something I always look for in the people we hire. Our US clients seem to really appreciate that kind of commitment, that we can be working when they are.

"The other thing about the Internet is that it opens up possibilities to almost anybody. We have been approached by people with brilliant ideas that are trying to test the water on the side of their full time job. It certainly pays to adapt to your client's needs."

To find out what Lightwood Consultancy Ltd can do for your web site, call Chris Newman on 0800 092 3441 or email chris@lightwood.net.

Internet Money, March 2000