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<h3>Overview</h3><p>The client, requested we design a human resources system suited to their specific industry sector and country. It was decided to investigate a Software as a Service (SaaS) solution that could first be used by the client and later sold on a monthly subscription plan to other related companies in the same sector. This would initially involve creating a software design document that would outline the required features along with deciding factors, technologies, security concerns and key milestones.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>As a sub contractor for a software consultancy, I performed preliminary research followed by a system design document. The system design proposed the use of Laravel PHP Framework with Stripe payments for automated monthly subscriptions. Development would incorporate an agile approach to allow for later additions and evolution of the early features. Initially the focus involved building a fully functional prototype. This prototype would then form the foundation for evolving the system.</p><p>Working in Laravel, I developed the early stages, database design, seeders, subscription and signup, user interface, recruitment and personalised signed documents before handing over to a larger outsourced team for rapid development.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>After developing the marketing site, SaaS subscription features, recruitment process and personalised signed documents, the client demonstrated the progress prototype and secured a new investment partner. This has allowed for the introduction of a wider team of developers who are continuing to develop and evolve from the original prototype.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>PHP, Laravel, Livewire, Stripe Subscription Payments, Multi-Tenant SaaS</p>

Multi-Tenant SaaS

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<p>The client, requested we propose and create a directory system for paid property listings. Payment would be monthly or yearly and represent a cost effective advertising option to support the existing marketing efforts of property owners. The design followed a common pattern to other property search websites with mapping and search by tag, location and keyword for each listing. The paradox to success of the directory involves advertisers first expecting users and users first expecting advertisers for the website to be viable for advertising or a useful online resource.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>To help make the website an attractive destination for regular users, it was proposed that the website be pre-loaded with a large number of carefully researched listings. Having a growing user base would later encourage advertisers to signup in order to promote there listing and convert from a basic to a featured version.&nbsp;</p><p>After creating the initial graphic design and various page visuals, the website was developed using PHP/Laravel. Laravel has some great tools for building and evolving the database design ie “migration” as well as populating ie "seeding" tables with relevant data such as locations, cities, tags and categories. Laravel also includes tools to generate authentication for login and registration along with authorisation to protect features designed only for admin roles.&nbsp;</p><p>The consumer website has search by tag, location and keyword for each listing along with map and markers for each region. Advertisers can claim their listing using a verification process or sign-up to create a new one. Subscription payments are automatically renewed at the interval selected using credit card tokens, this ensures sensitive credit card data is only ever transmitted or captured by the trusted payment provider.</p><p>Much of the data came supplied in spreadsheets by the research team. Rather than manually typing the data in the UI, batch import process was created to read and insert data into various tables like listing, tag, location as well as API calls to geo-tag addresses for the mapping features.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>Whilst its still early in release, subscribers continue to grow and the website is steadily improving in the search engines for target phrases. The current site represents a good starting point for further feature development whilst focusing on core deliverables in the first release.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>PHP, Bootstrap 5 CSS, Laravel, LiveWire, Laravel Cashier, Stripe, Google Geo/Map API</p>

Laravel Property Listings

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<h3>Overview</h3><p>Forestry is one of New Zealand's prime industries with timber products widely used in the construction sector. The client, a leading timber provider, processes forestry into a variety of building products designed for a range of uses. The client asked for ideas to help their team of regional sales representatives market products to builders merchants, to distribute promotional merchandise, track performance and develop a database of customers and end-users.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>Working as a sub contractor for a software consultancy, I developed a solution design with product training features. The system consists of a range of courses, exams and certifications which candidates complete after reviewing training materials or in person sessions.</p><p>Whilst the system supports casual registration and access to on-demand product training, the primary usage involves attending an event, hosted at builders merchants and presented by a sales representative. Attendees would be:- builders, end users or the builders merchant's staff.</p><p>The key benefits of the system include training staff, advisors and end users on the correct product. Detailing key points of difference between the premium timber product and lower cost competitors. Developing relationships between sales representatives, builders merchants and their staff. Developing relationships between builders merchants and their customers. Collecting registration details for supply of promotional merchandise and future marketing opportunities.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>The system has proved to be very popular with the sales representatives. Following initial deployment the system has been expanded to support various certification scenarios from specific exams, course completions and event attendance. The system also allows builders merchants to brand certificates for their hosted events further supporting the partnership between reps, their customers and end users.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>Custom PHP, PDF Generation, Concrete CMS Custom Theme</p>

Marketing Tool

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<h3>Overview</h3><p>There are plenty of software options for invoices out there and for full accounting you will find it hard to beat Xero. I have simple invoicing requirements but need to generate them as PDFs in a certain way. I also need the ability to modify and adjust things which is often not practical with software as a service subscription systems like Xero. My previous invoice software was developed with an earlier version of CodeIgniter framework which is now obsolete. My choices are to rewrite and patch the old system to work on the latest CodeIgniter framework or develop on an alternative platform.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>Given the latest CodeIgniter would involve major changes to my legacy code, it seemed like a great opportunity to expand my skills with Laravel. The new project will utilise Laravel framework, and be a good exercise in designing and producing a useful end product within a quick time frame. Using Laravel and some other tooling to short-cut development, I scaffolded the role based login and authentication along with some crude listing and editing features for some of the basic data models. Invoices are a little more complex so I applied LiveWire UI components to add, edit and remove related line items, payments and history. Following that I perform calculations for tax, totals, due dates and amount owing and use the DOM PDF dependency to output the branded invoice as a PDF file.</p><p>I adopted LiveWire which is a technology to bring ajax components into Laravel similar to React or Vue but using PHP in place of Javascript. I would consider it a good evolution from JQuery which is the previous way I might build ajax interfaces before React or Vue became prominent.</p><p>I made good use of the database migration and seeder features in Laravel to pre-fill the database with sample data. The application also has automated feature tests to check url availability, role based access permission security and various financial scenarios for the calculations.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>Goldfish Invoices has now been beta released as an open source project on my GitHub account. I also use it for my own invoicing and will continue to expand and improve over time with reporting and further modal dialog forms and alerts to improve the user experience.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>PHP, Bootstrap 5 CSS, Laravel, LiveWire, PDF Generator</p><p><a href="https://github.com/goldfishinternet/goldfish-invoices">View on GitHub</a></p>

Laravel Invoice Application

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<h3>Overview</h3><p>Manufacturers face various challenges bringing products to market especially if they supply globally. The client wanted to support various global distributors by providing each with e-commerce and promotional tools to drive sales and showcase their products. Each distributor had different requirements - variations in product range, metric or imperial measurements, prices, currency, tax and shipping. To add further complexity, some distributors would own and run the e-commerce sales tools, others would just manage and process orders.</p><p>The in-house head office team already included a marketing manager and a designer however other professionals such as photographers, IT and software developers where contracted in when required. This lead to a variety of disparate systems built and hosted with different languages and technologies.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>A casual contractor, I continue to work with the in-house team developing and maintaining e-commerce websites for various global distributors. Working from supplied designs websites are developed and optimised for regional SEO. Where product data is shared between distributors, text titles and descriptions are made unique to avoid duplicate content issues with Google.</p><p>When payment or shipping extensions are not available, I write or adjust custom payment facilities along with specialised shipping features that utilise api calls to remote shipping providers.</p><p>Over time, as each distributor's shopping cart ages - I work with the designer to replace or refresh the target website. If that is not possible, I work on maintenance and support patches to help secure and extend the life of older systems that still generate good sales.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>A continual maintenance and review schedule, coupled with regional Google Pay Per Click advertising campaigns have proved to be an effective strategy over the last decade as sales continue to improve year on year.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>Custom Open Cart Themes, Custom Open Cart Extensions, Credit Card Payments, Shipping Providers</p>

E-Commerce

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<h3>Overview</h3><p>Forestry is one of New Zealand's prime industries with timber products widely used in the construction sector. The client, a leading timber provider, processes forestry into a variety of building products designed for a range of uses. Each year the heavy processing machinery is stopped so that annual maintenance can be completed by multiple contracting companies and individual contractors.</p><p>Each contractor needs to understand and comply with the Health and Safety responsibilities laid out in the client's policies and any work needs to be planned and approved in advance. New contractors need to have been given induction training and every few years each contractor needs to complete a review to confirm they understand the safety rules of the work site.</p><p>The client had some basic tools to train, induct and track contractors however they requested ideas to improve the process and remove some of the manual steps that slowed down the induction of contractors and posed problems with reliability.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>Working as a sub contractor to a software consultancy I developed a system to train and induct contractors online. Each contractor is held in a draft state until they complete training and successfully pass the induction exam. Any new work is submitted as a request by the contractor's company and held in an approval queue before being given site access and permission to perform hot work, work at height or vehicle access.</p><p>For contractor companies with multiple staff, they have specific tools to add contractors to their team and begin the induction process. Companies can see any staff that have failed inductions and require further training. Using the system's messaging tool they can liaise with the client's administrators on the occasion that they need support.</p><p>The key benefits of the system include training contractors, keeping compliance records and tracking jobs.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>The system has proved to be successful and much appreciated by the admin team. It has now handled over six annual maintenance breaks in addition to managing general contractor access through the year.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>Custom PHP, PDF Generation, Concrete CMS Custom Theme</p>

Health and Safety

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<h3>Overview</h3><p>Manuka Honey is one of New Zealand's premium health products. Each extraction is tested and graded by measuring the concentration level of active ingredient which forms the key health benefits found in Manka Honey. Part of the production process involves mixing various batches to satisfy commercial orders for a specific grade of honey. Optimising this process can have a major profit benefit so careful selection and blending is required in order to maximise the harvest.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>Working with operations manager we developed a combination of databases and automation processes to collect and track internal extraction data through the year and merged this with remote testing result data provided by accredited laboratories using their api services. Utilising a combination of stock levels and test grades we designed and developed a software tool to select a range of optimal blend options from current stock and save these as draft or final blend combinations for use by the commercial supply team.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>This automation process helped cut out many months of manual work, improved accuracy and allowed new staff to quickly become familiar with the blending and selection process.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>Multiple CRON Processes, Multiple API Sources, Automation, Database, Email Alerts, CSV Export, Javascript UI, PHP</p>

Honey Blend Tool

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<h3>Overview</h3><p>The farming industry has various health and safety risks specifically those associated with off road vehicle use. Often accidents are avoidable and are caused by a lack of training or hazard awareness. In order to confirm compliance and reduce insurance levies, farmers need to demonstrate that they and their staff are suitably qualified, licenced or trained in the operation of machinery and vehicles.</p><p>As a farm vehicle trainer and assessor the client wanted to offer various certification packages for online training and assessment. These would include courses for Quad Bikes, Farm Bikes and Tractors.</p>

<h3>Solution</h3><p>Working as a sub contractor for a software consultancy, I developed a custom training and e-commerce system with marketing facilities to promote online certification. The core system consists of a range of courses, exams and certifications which candidates complete after reviewing training materials.</p><p>The project involved creating a set of design visuals which, once approved, were converted to a custom Concrete CMS theme. The e-commerce system presented a range of course qualifications as products. Unlike standard e-commerce each item purchased resolved to an individuals access to a course and certificate. Farmers purchase training courses and assign them to staff for completion. Each course consists of training materials defined as HTML text, graphics and photos, file downloads or videos. Courses have multiple choice exams and an optional practical assessment. Once completed the student's course becomes a qualification certificate. Farmers use these certificates to provide evidence that staff have completed suitable training. This helps ensure staff are well trained and farmers comply with Health and Safety regulations potentially reducing insurance levies.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>Following initial deployment the system has been expanded to support practical assessments and qualification of regional assessors. The system continues to certify farmers and staff although online remains more successful than practical in-person assessments.</p><h3>Technologies</h3><p>Custom PHP, Stripe Payments, PDF Generation, Concrete CMS Custom Theme</p>

Custom E-Commerce

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BCH Lawyers

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Trailer Sauce

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Drift Hair and Beauty

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Age Concern (Tauranga)

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<p>My web design service maximizes the potential of your business brand. I provide budget options for small business websites or larger custom made database driven systems to fit your specific feature requirements.</p><p>I make sure that the design suggestions compliment your branding and print based materials. The design will communicate effectively to your target market using the correct voice for your brand. My designs are also optimised for search performance, usability and clear navigation ensuring your website grows with your business.</p><p>If you need to make your budget stretch further stock photos and AI tools can be used for video, content writing, illustration and photography. I have made heavy use of AI text and images to produce this website to demonstrate that these tools are completely usable and getting better by the month.</p>

Web Design

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<p>At Goldfish Internet I design and build mobile and tablet optimised websites. This is supported by a range of services to maintain your system, content and communications.</p><h3>Shopify, WooCommerce and Open Cart</h3><p>For e-commerce I normally recommend Shopify, Open Cart or WooCommerce. If Shopify does not support your full range of planned features, Open Cart or WooCommerce can often be customised to handle what you need. Each system has its strengths with costs dependent on subscription fees for hosting plus any third party extensions, custom components or plugin licences.</p><h3>Concrete CMS</h3><p>If you need a unique design, custom features and perhaps something more powerful I recommend Concrete CMS. Concrete is well suited to extending with a fully custom design theme and packages tailored around your specific needs. Whilst you might build your business needs around Wordpress features, we can build Concrete features around your business needs.</p><h3>Wordpress</h3><p>Lets face it Wordpress is still the most popular platform for general websites and for good reason. Great looking "off-the-shelf" templates are widely available which makes this the first stop choice for full feature websites on a budget. I can setup your Wordpress install and also arrange suitable hosting with the essential backup and patching facilities needed to keep your website secure.</p><p>If you already have a Wordpress website and need help with content or securing, patching and maintaining your system - I can review your setup and propose a suitable plan to fit your budget/needs.</p>

Web Development

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<p>Along with general web design and development services, Goldfish Internet designs and builds database driven web applications, interactive tools and specialised e-commerce and Software as a Service (SaaS) systems for business start-ups.</p><p>Working directly with clients or as a contractor for agencies and consultants, I have designed and developed systems with the following features:-</p><ul><li>Online Training Courses and Examination</li><li>Health and Safety Inductions</li><li>Association Group and Individual Member Pages</li><li>Subscription Based Paywall Services</li><li>Automation Tools</li><li>Inventory and Accounting Integrations</li><li>Property Listings</li><li>Booking Facilities</li></ul><p>I create flexible, robust and secure software systems to meet the full scope of your plans and budget. Call me at Goldfish Internet to discuss your next big idea or business bottlenecks.</p>

Software Systems

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<p>At Goldfish Internet, I can help you connect your systems to your clients or suppliers systems - facilitating sales, inventory, messaging or other specialized data exchanges.</p><p>Using API technology, selected parts of your data or processes can be secured behind an authentication service and provided to your clients or suppliers, your service would act as a server. Reversely, your scheduled tasks and automation scripts would act as a client to your suppliers API services.</p><p>Some typical examples might include:-</p><ul><li>Hybrid Website and Mobile App shared content API</li><li>Database connectors for merging and analysis of separate sales, inventory, CRM and operations</li><li>Data transfer and synchronisation between locations</li><li>Messaging, GEO location and other online tools and services</li><li>Providing sales and drop shipping services to affiliates and associating commissions</li></ul>

Automation and API Integration

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<p>I have worked for various design, marketing and public relations agencies through my career so I know and understand many of your challenges. You may be a single consultant or have a small team working on campaign ideas then outsource your production work. Maybe your developers are focused on other projects or on annual leave when the client expects a new feature or fix. Otherwise you just need an extra pair of hands to help your team and the freedom to book out time as and when needed.</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

<p>I currently have regular days available through the week having recently completed some projects. If you are local to the Greater Manchester area: Bolton, Chorley, Wigan, Blackburn, Preston I would be happy to work on-site in your offices with you or your team. Otherwise for further afield, occasional visits for meetings and briefings followed by remote work.</p><p>Here are some reason to consider hiring me for projects</p><ul><li>I have reasonable rates comparable to full time staff&nbsp;</li><li>Casual or relaxed agreement, you are not committed to employing me long term&nbsp;</li><li>Experience supporting a wide range of code bases with or without documentation and in varying states of quality or repair</li><li>Able to take a project from start to completion, from graphic design to build, deployment, hosting and support</li><li>Versatile having working with OOP for PHP, ASP.NET and Javascript along with SQL, HTML/CSS</li><li>Good Laravel skills</li><li>Increasing React/Next.js skills</li><li>Cloud services AWS Lightsail and Linode</li><li>Debian/Ubuntu Server Admin and some historical Microsoft Server Admin&nbsp;</li><li>Training including video demonstrations</li></ul><p>If you are potentially interested or have a proposition, give me a call or email me and we can discuss further.</p>

Agency Work

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<p>Building a great looking site is not the end of the story. It will need installing and hosting on a suitable web server and periodic maintenance to keep upto date with security and stability patches.</p><p>I supply cost effective shared hosting, cloud or dedicated servers and containers with informal support, backup and maintenance included. With informal managed hosting I take care of your install and system setup then monitor, apply security patches and perform periodic backups. Unlike the shared hosting providers, I take care of your website not just the hosting service. I include a reasonable amount ad-hoc support in working hours however, if you need more demanding server resources, or guaranteed support levels I can help you arrange fully managed hosting with other suppliers.</p>

Hosting, Maintenance and Support

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<p>Getting large traffic volumes from search engines is a high priority for most website owners. The majority of on-line purchases begin with a keyword search. Optimising your site for search engines is an ongoing process and at the core is the need for good quality content and developing signals that demonstrate your website's authority and relevance for a specific topic or area. Relevance signals will be directly related to the content of your website whilst authority signals come from a mix of domain trust, inbound links and search visitor behaviour.</p><p>SEO is a rapidly changing sector with ranking algorithms typically changing many times each year. What was once an important ranking factor may now be obsolete or far less important. Search itself is going through a metamorphoses with users accessing AI tools in place of search engines. In response search engines have started to promote AI answers over links to third party websites in there results pages. This has introduced challenges for internet marketing teams as well as some new opportunities.</p><p>Here at Goldfish Internet I can help you develop an internet marketing strategy to increase your traffic and sales. If your site is commercial, an ongoing paid search campaign is usually the best way of getting a reliable stream of traffic. I can also help you with target keyword research, content creation plans, search engine optimisation and traffic analysis.</p>

Internet Marketing, Advertising and Analysis

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<p>Goldfish Internet also design and supply printed materials to support your online marketing efforts. From marketing strategies, concepts and visuals through to final artwork and print.</p><p>&nbsp;</p>

<p>Print-based marketing is often an overlooked component of marketing strategies. Despite the focus on digital media, print materials such as posters, leaflets, brochures, and banners should play an important role in reaching and engaging your target audience.</p><p>Printed materials are physical items that customers can hold, keep, and refer to, creating a lasting impression. They can be distributed strategically at events, at your business, or through the post, reaching your audience before they might otherwise find you online. Well designed print materials lend credibility to your brand and by integrating print with online, you create some effective opportunities.&nbsp;</p><p>Here are just a few ideas</p><ul><li>Send posted leaflets to past customers inviting them to claim online promotions.&nbsp;</li><li>Use QR codes on business cards that link to your review channels or newsletter subscription form. Hand these to customers after completing work or services.</li><li>Create Refer a Friend tear off ticket promotions that rewards referrals</li><li>Merchandise like pens and drink mats</li></ul>

Printed marketing materials

Graphic Design

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I have options to suit your budget, from an attractive pre-built template website to a unique and fully custom web design

Andy Carroll, Freelance Web Developer

My software solutions, integrations and automation solve problems, eliminate tedious work and save you time, enabling you to focus on more important priorities

Web Software

I create and maintain robust and secure shopping carts, monthly subscription and service booking systems. All with optional hosting, marketing and support to keep things running smoothly and securely.

I provide cost effective web hosting or cloud services with informal, no fuss support, backup and maintenance

Web Hosting

Andy is a top notch web developer / IT guru, who is an expert across number of different platforms. Not only is he excellent at what he does, he is also incredibly versatile. I have put a number of 'out of the box' projects his way (everything from web dev to databases to apis) and he has always delivered great results for me. So much so that I had used him with a previous employer and I am now using him for my own business. Highly recommend!

Menodoctor

We have been collaborating with Andy from Goldfish Internet since 2020. Goldfish Internet developed our firm’s website and continues to meet our web servicing needs. Andy is very knowledgeable and consistently provides prompt answers, solutions and great ideas!

Andy at Goldfish Internet is one of the best website developers I have had the pleasure of working with over the past 12 years. Andy's computer wizardry, years of experience, and attention to detail, as well as listening to our ideas and thoughts, turns them into a stunning works of website brilliance. I highly recommend Goldfish Internet to anyone looking to have a new website built or to give their existing mediocre website a fresh and invigorating new look!

Bryce Rae

Healthy Options Ltd and Herbal Ltd have both used the services of Andy of Goldfish Internet. His unique ability to grasp proposed concepts and add additional design input has been invaluable. Thoroughly recommend his services. Dr Janice Priest

Health Information

Andy has looked after our website since we bought our business and has been proactive and supportive throughout that time. Thoroughly recommend Andy and Goldfish internet.

Drift Hair Salon

Great service easy to work with from start to finish. Additions and alterations to website etc no problem and done in a flash. Highly recommend.

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