We would like to design websites for local non-profit organisations and community groups free of charge?

Question

me & two of my friends are currently in college studying computer science and web development, we would like to start a companyt that designs websites for local non-profit organisations, how do we get started? any ideas would be much appreciated

Answer 1

I suggest that you find the nonprofits in your area, and contact them to let them know that you are willing to donate your services for web design. Ask for the marketing department - they'd most likely be the ones in charge of the design/look of the website.

To prepare yourself, you can check on the web to see if they have a website. If they don't, then you have your pitch. If they DO have a website, but you feel that you could give them an easier to navigate or more effective design, then that's your pitch.

Be advised that nonprofits may have limited staff to perform website maintenance and upkeep, so be sure to keep your design simple, and suggest a program they can use to maintain the site appropriately.

If they don't have a domain name or webhost, you can walk them through the process. But they would have to be prepared to support the site - that's not your burden as designer.

Answer 2

Well if you want to put websites on the web your gonna have to pay a host to put them up or use a free webhost service that has ad supported web pages or a domain name like www.geocities.yourname.com.

You cause is really great, but somebody has to fork out some kind of money to get a host service. You can find some webhost that allow you to host your site with them for like a few bucks, you'll just have to look around.

If your doing this for a good cause then I suggest trying to get some type of funding by donations on behalf of the organizations or try some other way to fund the cost to keep the sites up on the web!

If your trying to start your own company then look into getting yourself your own server, which is a big expense, but you can host all the sites you want free of charge, but its coming out of your pocket of course!

Hopefully this was helpful!