Name of your website?Filron
Your name?
Phil
Your Location (city, etc)
Darlington
Please give us a short summary of your website?
Filron supply quality inkjet, laser printer, copier and fax cartridges and toners, plus other related products such as projector lamps and computer accessories, at low prices across the World.
What inspired you to launch your own website?
2 years ago we found that web sites we used to buy printer consumables ourselves were either expensive and/or gave poor customer service. We thought we could do better.
When did you launch your first website, and what was it?
In November 2005 we launched www.filron.com.
How did you decide on a name for your website?
It's a variation on the site founder names, Phil & Ron = filron.
What makes it different from other, similar offerings?
Combination of good value and level of service. We're also constantly expanding our product coverage.
What is your eventual goal? (To sell it, keep it for income, secure a book or other mainstream media deal?)
For the foreseeable future our intention is to continue to grow and improve the site together with expanding the geographic coverage.
How does your investment of time and money balance against your success?
It always takes longer than expected... and more hours of work.
If you had an unlimited development budget for development, how would you change your site?
Buy a much more advanced online store package.
If your site got really big, really quickly, would you be able to keep up with the demand?
A nice problem to have, we'd manage and bring in people to help with rapid unexpected growth.
What unexpected costs and headaches have you had to deal with?
Used some Comparison Directory sites with pay-per-click advertising. Found some of them don't categorise your products properly and this resulted in us getting charged for unrelated clicks and the costs mount up very quickly.
What has been your biggest challenge?
Obtaining traffic without incurring expensive advertising costs.
What method has been most successful for promoting your website?
Google Base (formerly Froogle) by far.
How has running your website differed from your expectations?
It's been more time consuming than expected, but a worthwhile challenge.
How long have you run the site already, and how long will you continue to keep it up if you don't enjoy big gains in traffic, income or popularity?
The site has been going since November 2005. Rather than waiting for traffic we've opened other sites to target geographical locations and specific product areas e.g. www.ukprojectorlamps.co.uk (UK replacement projector lamps), www.filron.co.uk (UK only), www.filron.nl (The Netherlands), www.filron.eu (mainland Europe starting with Germany) and www.filron.us (USA).
What is your website address?
Filron
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