How
much is that doggy in the window?
ANIMAL
lover Bella Giles-Smith has the perfect answer to her
pet allergy - she's got her own Internet pets!
Unable
to have an animal in her home because they make her
sneeze, the Staines resident set up her own animal-related
website.
It
has already proved so popular she has recorded 2,000
visits in January, rising to 3,000 in February.
It is also the first site to be shown by web directory
Yahoo in a search for any kind of animal for sale.
The
site deals with everything animal related, including
sales, wants and show dates, everything in fact non-human
on two or four legs. She has even had a wanted
ad posted for an iguana.
Bella
first put her site together last year. "It
was trial and error," she said. "I really
didn't know what I was doing. It had a bit of
everything on it. My hobbies are horse riding,
pets and ballroom dancing and really it was just like
my home page.
"I
got excited if I got ten visits in a week. At
first, I didn't have a clue, it took me hours every
day for months to put the first site together".
At
the end of the year Bella had her laptop, containing
all the information, stolen, but after buying a new
computer with upgraded software, launched her revamped
site on December 1.
She
said: "That month there were 200 visitors.
I contacted Yahoo and various other search engines and
they obviously liked the site".
At
first many of Bella's advertisers were friends from
the Sunbury area where she does most of her horse riding,
or friends at work at Integra Networks in Chertsey.
But slowly the advertisements came in from people all
over the UK and some from abroad.
Puppy
and kitten sales were the busiest and Bella received
many congratulations from people who had successfully
sold litters.
"I'd
hoped that for the first couple of years that all ads
would be free." said Bella.
"But
I received so many requests - literally hundreds - for
ads to be posted, that the only way I could cope was
to charge for them."
A
short while ago she asked people to pay £5 per entry
for 'for sale' ads, although entries from charities,
events and wanted ads are still free.
So
far, Bella has made just £40 from her site, but she
hopes to sell it eventually for several million pounds.
|
