Toby Joiner-Brown has been involved in web-design and programming for about five years.  It is very much a spare time hobby to my full time occupation as an airline pilot, but that is great because it offers plenty of time off to focus on various web projects.   Other than that nothing beats spending time with my two beautiful daughters, Georgina and Hannah, and my wonderful wife Rebecca.

My main web project over the last five years or so has been the Joiner Marriage Index, which has become the definitive source for marriage records in England before 1837.  With over 2 million marriage records in 26 counties, no one else offers such an easily searchable resource that is so accessible without a subscription.  I built the site from scratch for my father as family history has been a hobby of his for many years.  Unsurprisingly, to take on such a vast project with as little experience as I had at the time was a massive undertaking, but the site has been running exceptionally smoothly since December 2006.  It has given me fairly extensive experience in the running of a commercial site and the pitfalls.  There have been many challenges, but I am glad to say that most have been overcome.  In the building of the site I became proficient in the use of PHP and CSS scripting, the building and use of MySQL databases and the integration of an automatic PayPal verification system to electronically deliver our digital product.  Had I realised how many hours would have to be invested in such a project I may have shied away from the task, but I am incredibly proud of the success of the site.

Since that project I have been involved in a number of others, using Joomla and more recently WordPress to make the design process a lot easier and quicker.  Most recently I have become very excited about Search Engine Optimisation (SEO), particularly with Google who change their ranking parameters on an almost annual basis.  Without professing to be anywhere near an expert at it yet I can profess a high level of success so far in promoting my sites for particular keywords.  My main focus is always the Joiner Marriage Index, but I am working on a number of other projects:

The Joiner Marriage Index blog will work hand in hand with the main site to give further information to our customers on all things relating to marriage records and other family history related items.

Smart Mouse Trap is my project for this year’s 30-Day Challenge, where I am using Ed Dale’s world renowned Internet marketing techniques to build a micro-niche site.  Who knows where it will go, but it’s certainly fun!!

Gordons Bay : A South African Oasis is a well established site run by a colleague which I am helping to improve SEO-wise to expand the business beyond what is already an incredibly successful directory.

Land Rovers Spares is a joint project with a good friend looking at ways to improve the economy of Land Rovers.  Focussing on different elements, from tyres to air filters to polish types (joke!) the information should prove invaluable to all owners of the classic vehicles.

I am always happy to offer what advice I can on web-publishing.  Perhaps I can help you avoid some of the very many web-design mistakes I have made over the years!  Feel free to contact me with any queries!