I’ve just completed a classified ads website for a client.

The site is called Homestay Pals and is specifically to enable anyone with a spare room in their house to advertise for paying guests – a small home business opportunity which is quite common around the world.

The difficulty in creating this site was creating a secure registration process that enables both Homestay Hosts and Homestay Guests to upload their own information and contact each other through the website.

Rather than hire a coder, I’ve used an off-the-shelf solution called Classipress Theme.  This has a lot of settings and functionality which makes it quite difficult to configure but it is far easier than starting from a blank piece of paper and coding the site from scratch.

My main concern, which has been voiced to the customer, is how he intends to get traffic to the site and how does he get the site up and running with a critical mass of ads that will drive and engage visitors.

Also, there are clearly security issues in inviting strangers into your home as a Homestay guest but Homestays are quite a common business model around the world.

Despite these reservations, my client wanted to proceed as he intends to put his own house on the site and invite friends and family to join him.

He is a Christian and believes that prayer and goodwill will assist him in his endeavour to help other people to earn an income from the spare rooms they have in their homes.  It also provides the guests with cheap and affordable accommodation so that everyone is a winner.

If you would like to see this classified ads website that has recently been completed, then click this link or you can view some of my other website projects at Salmon Web Design.