Are there folks who can do this for me?

[Craig Walsh]

We currently have an Actinic e-commerce site --- www.luciesfarm.co.uk --- that works well for us. It was created, and I maintain it, with Actinic Business v7.0. The site uses some templates of its own, but I believe these are only slightly (not extensively) modified from Actinic templates.

I have downloaded the trial version of Actinic Business v8 and have asked it to please update my site. The result was a surprisingly awful version of our website, where the fonts had changed, alignment was completely horrible, and the black background had been replaced in parts with some graphics that were truly awful.

I re-published the site with V7 and breathed a sigh of relief.

I am afraid, however, that we will not be able to integrate V7 of Actinic into the latest release of Sage Line 50 Financial Controller (I've posted this problem in a separate thread) and that V8 may become a necessity.

I don't have the patience to do the upgrade. I've read some of the postings here --- with tales of woe --- and they fill me with dread.

I know there are websites for folks who will design an Actinic e-commerce site for me from scratch, but I don't really need (or want) that. I would like someone to simply convert my existing site from V7 to V8. I will then license V8 by purchasing a support contract.

Can anyone suggest someone who can do this for me?

In this process, we have Actinic hosted here in the UK as part of a shared hosting package by a firm that specialises in Actinic hosting. (I've asked them about helping me to upgrade to V8 --- their response is that it's "easy" and I can "do it myself.")

We also have a dedicated Linux server in the States --- and pay one price each month for the entire server (plus 24/7 live support). If I am able to move our Actinic store over to our hosted server, it will save me the additional cost of the separate Actinic shared hosting. But this is too gnarly for me, I'm afraid.

Any help, guidance, etc., would be most appreciated.

[RuralWeb]

We also have a dedicated Linux server in the States

I would think hard about this as it may affect your search engine rankings in the Uk.

[leehack]

Craig

Sometimes your site looks a complete mess, but in reality it can be sorted out quite quickly, especially if you have very few altered templates (this is of course open to interpretation). Almost all, if not all, problems will have been met by us already and there will a number of posts addressing the issues. There is also a Problem Solvers thread at the top of the forum.

I'd suggest having a go and then employing, if you really can't fathom it. If you don't fancy that or haven't got the incline or time, then i'd recommend ruralweb up above this post, of all of us in here, he has the most Actinic sites that i know of up and running. (i may be wrong on this).

[Craig Walsh]

I would think hard about this as it may affect your search engine rankings in the UK

Interesting point. I hadn't thought about that.

We have different domains (such as www.bark.ch and www.photofini.sh) registered in different countries hosted on our dedicated US server. We also have UK domains hosted there. And we have UK domains with purely UK-focused content --- but using a .com domain and hosted in the States --- such as www.nhs-sucks.com

I'm certainly not an expert in SEO matters, but the physical location of the server has not seemed to matter. The domain suffix certainly does seem matter, although in my anecdotal experience the distinctions seem to become blurred with .com domains.

In the past, when we moved from a shared hosting environment to a dedicated server at a different hosting company, we saw no change in our rankings. When we moved from a "regular" website to a Flash website (still at www.luciesfarm.com) we saw our listings completely vanish from Google overnight. Our Flash website is still there, but I've learned my Flash lesson!

[leehack]

I think it is widely accepted that hosting a uk site on a uk server is the best practice and gives the best chance of achieving what people want to with the search engines. As with most things, the perfect recipe is not the only recipe that works and yours is just a typical example of why reading up on seo can make you pull your hair out.

I have always classed the speed of performance as important as i have seen some terrible slowness on US hosted servers. If you have seo cracked then this is what i would suggest lokking into and confirming all is as you would expect.

[Craig Walsh]

The Mystery of SEO

Several years ago I went to a "master class" about using video content on websites at BAFTA in London. (I was very excited by what I saw, but didn't do much about it --- in retrospect, silly me!) One of the speakers was a European executive for Macromedia: this was in the pre-Adobe past. When it was time for the inevitable Q&A session, the first question from the floor was, "How do I improve my ranking on Google?"

The big cheese from Macromedia smiled, and said, quite simply, "Pay for it."

He was, of course, talking about Google Adwords. I find it quite amazing that I can get a number one listing in about three seconds --- as long as I'm willing to pay the price to the zillionaires at Google. Yes, yes I know there are lots of ways to improve your search engine ranking without paying for Adwords . . . but the other methods (at least in my experience) certainly aren't as fast or as reliable.

When I do a Google search on "Kobe Beef +UK" --- our main product --- our websites are the top four Google listings. We are fortunate in that "Kobe Beef" is a relatively obscure, yet very descriptive, search term. I don't think we'd achieve this success if we were selling iPods. Amusingly, the number one listing is for www.zyra.org.uk --- a very eclectic website. We have an arrangement with them to promote our website, and this has proven to be more cost-effective than anything else we could have done.

We've had the dedicated server in the States for just over two years, and speed has never been a problem. The hosting company also guarantees 100% up time (they make a big deal of the fact that they're talking about 100%, not 99%). And so far, for two years, they've achieved that.

Having said that our Actinic e-commerce hosting in the UK has also been extremely reliable and speed has also never been a problem. I guess I was just trying to consolidate to save some £££.

If you don't fancy that or haven't got the incline or time

Wow, that's me! I guess I should wait to see if I really do need to upgrade to V8 to get my Actinic-to-Sage Line 50 link working again. If I don't, then I don't see a compelling reason to upgrade to V8. But the link is important enough to us that if we have to upgrade we will. But I'd really love someone to scoop us up and convert the website for us. Things are always easy when you know how . . .

[RuralWeb]

When we moved from a "regular" website to a Flash website (still at www.luciesfarm.com) we saw our listings completely vanish from Google overnight

The guys at Macromedia always promoted adwords because they new that you could NEVER get a flash based website rank in the organic listings.

[Craig Walsh]

I Hadn't Thought About That, But . . .

The guys at Macromedia always promoted adwords

I hadn't thought about that, but you're right. Makes complete sense.

We fell victim to the siren song of Flash. We paid to have a website created that I could no longer update myself, and a site that was completely invisible to all search engines. I went off to a Flash course --- three nights a week for three months. What did I learn? That I didn't really like Flash anymore.

I was surprised at how simple it is to do an animation in Flash --- yet a client would think it was incredibly complicated (visions of all those Disney animators in the 1930's hand-painting each cell for Snow White). So Flash projects can be sold at a premium --- at least in relation to the amount of work needed to complete one.

[RuralWeb]

We paid to have a website created that I could no longer update myself

Yes thats the other problem that becomes apparent once the novelty has worn off