I am new to RapidWeaver although an experienced web designer having used DreamWeaver for years and years. I really do not like Adobe’s subscription policy so I have decided to move to RapidWeaver.
My wife is a founder of a charity. It is The Zimbabwe Cancer Support Networks and aims to support patients and their families battling cancer in one of the poorest countries in the world. We are paying for Chemotherapy treatment for a number of patients, providing financial and emotional support for their families and paying for hospital accommodation, x-rays and scans etc.
Although the charity is registered in Zimbabwe, the founders and our main fundraising is centred on the UK where my wife is a Specialist Cancer Nurse.
I am looking for help from this community in a number of ways:
Can someone recommend a suitable RW template which I can use to build our first site?
Is there a recommended or preferred site which can register my domain and provide hosting services?
What add-ons would folk recommend or shall I start with vanilla RW and work up from there?
Can people like GoDaddy host RW websites?
Any other tips and hints would be extremely welcome.
Go Daddy can depending on the plan, but I’d recommend not using them. Most companies like them sound like a great deal but end up costing a lot more in the end because you often have to upgrade to get a working site.
Start slow. The one addon I’d recommend you get right away would be stacks plugin.
In RapidWeaver, there are themes that control the look and feel of the site. Start out playing with the included RW8 themes. Then go from there.
Knowing more about what you want the site to do like raise money, memberships, newsletters, sell products and or make people aware of events would help folks give some advice.
Your comments about hosting are especially welcome!
I especially agree with your last remark! If I can prose more information about the aims and objectives of the site from the founders - who are all medical professionals and not IT folks then I will have a much better idea!
Subscriptions are a real turn off and many times even though the product they are selling is good, as soon as I see it is subscription based I turn away from that product.
There are many good Rapidweaver template sites. However one of my favorites is MultiThemes ( Professional RapidWeaver Themes & Stacks ). There themes (and stacks) are always very professional AND creative, and there support is world class.
You don’t have to register and host the domain from the same place. Namecheap ( https://www.namecheap.com ) has good domain pricing. Take your time to choose a good host. Most these days also include a free SSL certificate.
That all depends on what you need your site to do. Having said that I do recommend that you get the main stacks plugin ( Stacks 5 Plug-In ). It will make your life much easier. The more you tell us about what you want your website to do, the easier it will be to recommend specific stacks to use on your site.
Yes they can, but they would be the last hosting company that I would use.
Start slow, watch tutorial videos, and make a test website first. Making a site landing page is a great way to learn how to use Rapidweaver.
Thank you! I have taken up a recommendation above and registered the domain and arranged hosting via A2 and I have to say that the setup of RW for FTP to the site is very simple.
I have bought the Stacks plugin and can see that it is extremely useful. I have also watched more videos than is healthy as I learn how to sdo stuff with RW.