How to build a website on a shoe string budget
You've decided that you want a web presence, but just don't know where to start? Creating and maintaining a website can be a scary thought, especially if computers really aren't your cup of tea. Don't be intimidated.. there are lots of great tools to help you get the look and feel that you want in a website while getting your message across loud and clear.
I'm not going to repeat all the stuff you can already find on the internet...
I could re-type all of the information that is already out on the web about choosing a domain name, finding a web host, etc.. but why do that? Let me just tell you were I go for information..
First, stop by http://www.thesitewizard.com/ to learn just about anything you could ever want to know about choosing a domain name, finding a host, building your pages, and getting your website noticed on the web. Be aware, however, that if you are truly a "newby" to website creation, much of what you are going to see there will be over your head. This site is full of stuff that will - over time - become your best resources. But to get you started, let's just look at the basics.
1. Choose a name for your business that makes sense- If possible, name your website the same name as your business. If you can't do that for whatever reason, at least name it something that has some relationship to what you are trying to promote, sell, or create. If you have a business named "Suzie's Homemade Pies", then by all means have the words "Suzie", "Homemade" and "Pies" in your webpage name. Preferably, I'd go for something like "www.suzieshomemadepies.com" . If the name is already taken (which is very likely these days), consider a name with .net or .biz as the extensions instead. Some extensions are only available to certain types of businesses and organizations, so be sure to check out The Site Wizard's article on choosing a domain name for specific naming rules and conventions. You can find a great article on this topic at http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/domainname.shtml. There are several ways to check for name availability. The easiest is by using the tools provided by whoever you have chosen as a web host.
2. Choosing a web host- The next question I'm sure you have is "How do I choose a web host?" This can be a tough one, because there are just so many hosts to choose from these days. Some are great, some are OK and others are downright terrible. I guess the best answer I could give you is "it depends".. it depends on what you need, how you plan to use the site, how much traffic you plan to get, how much bandwidth you are going to use, etc etc etc...
Rather than dig deeply into the complexity of web hosts, let me give you a couple of places that I know of that have worked well for my personal needs.
DOT5
HOSTING - I have used Dot5 for about 5 years
now and always had excellent results. They cater to the
small businesses who need a web presence with all of the tools
like email accounts, shopping cart software, free online web
development tools (although these are a bit limited in
capabilities), unlimited space, unlimited bandwidth, and much
more. Their customer service has been awesome and I have
only had 2 instances of brief downtime in over 5 years. I
really like that I can chat online with customer support, or if
I have a low priority question, I can just log a case and
usually get an answer in less than twenty-four hours.
They register your domain name for you as part of the setup, and
on many of their promotional campaigns, you actually can get
your first year's domain name registration for free when you
sign up for a year or more of hosting services. You can
CHECK OUT DOT5 HOSTING HERE to learn more about their services.
While Dot5 does have some free website development tools available, I still consider this web host most useful for individuals who have some background in building websites using a software package such as Dream Weaver or Microsoft Expression Web. Their services are excellent if you know how to utilize them, but if you are not familiar with web development and want to start with something a little easier to use, take a look below at Weebly.
WEEBLY
- I recently built some pages using Weebly software and
I must say I am HOOKED on this easy to use WYSIWYG (What You See
Is What You Get) program. Weebly provides you with a wide
variety of templates, tools, add-on, plug-ins, you name it.. to
make your site look completely professional -- and you never
have to write a line of code or even own a web development tool
like Frontpage, Expression or DreamWeaver. If you've ever
priced web development software, you know that there's a big
investment needed not only in dollars, but also in time.
Learning to build pages from scratch takes time, training and
talent. Weebly fast-forwards your efforts by making their
online development tool so easy!!! If you can type on a word
processor, you can use Weebly. You can drag and drop
photos, maps, videos and more onto your pages and customize the
design with ease.
Here's the best part.. Weebly lets you build a site, hosted by them, using almost all of their tools ABSOLUTELY FREE- and there's really no catch. They don't make you post a bunch of ads or banners like some other so-called "free" site hosts do.. the downside is that your free site will not have your own personal domain name associated to it. Instead you will create a name like "yoursitename.weebly.com". You can, however, have weebly host your website for a fee and use your own domain name. The service is not as robust as what you get from a place like Dot5 Hosting, but the advantages of using the extremely simple Weebly software make this a package worth looking into.
By the way....... Dot5 hosting actually does provide a scaled down version of Weebly to its customers for free, but you can only have up to 6 pages to your website using their free version of Weebly and many of the features are not available. You can pay an annual fee to Dot5 on top of your regular hosting fee and get all of the features and unlimited pages, so it just depends on your other needs, such as unlimited email accounts, unlimited disk space, etc.. things that are not offered by Weebly.
If you have a small website in mind and just want to try things out before making a huge commitment, I highly recommend Weebly. Then, if things start taking shape and you wish to upgrade and have Weebly host your site with your own personal website URL, it's an easy transition. You can check them out more about WEEBLY WEBHOSTING SERVICES HERE.
SEO - Search Engine Optimization
Not sure what SEO is? Read this article about Search Engine Optimization at SEOmoz .
There are a couple of camps on the topic of SEO.. some people say it is a complete necessity and others say it's a complete waste of time. How do I feel? As usual... IT DEPENDS..
If you are building a site that will receive traffic based on your personal branding, your brick-and-mortar business, or some other concept that literally POINTS the customer to your site, SEO isn't entirely necessary. The idea of optimizing your site revolves around the ability to find your website based on search terms located in your page name, description and content. However, if you want your customers to be able to find you when they do searches on Google or Bing or any other search engine, SEO can make or break your ability to actually be found.
A couple of things you can do to ensure that your website is search engine "friendly" are listed below. This is by no means the entire list! There are people who make their living just optimizing web pages using hundreds of techniques... and the tricky part is keeping up with the ever-changing (and rarely revealed) rules of SEO that sites like Google and Bing come up with. However, if you take care of the items below, you'll have a fighting chance of at least being found during a search.
1. Give your pages descriptive titles and actual "descriptions" in the html code (or in the description space provided by your software). - SO many people overlook this simple step, and it's a shame. How many times have you searched for a topic and the page comes up in the search engine (usually on about page 10 or so..) with the title HOME or PAGE 1 ? Then in the description is either vague or non-existent. Take the time to actually name your pages with unique names that amply describe what can be found on that page. Titles, subtitles, headlines, photos.... When you are building your webpages, you probably don't even think about these... but the search engines do. Your page title is more than a series of bolded text at the top of your page. If you look at the actual underlying code, you will see that there are html tags that define what type of text you are using. Search engines look at this info to help determine the content of the page. Titles, subtitles, headlines and photos that are well defined can help improve your page ranking in search engines. Check out this article at hubspot.com about title tags.
2. Add new, GOOD content on a regular basis. This has two-fold benefit.. first it keeps the search engine robots coming back to re-index your pages, and second, it keeps your current readers coming back to see what new stuff you've put on your site. Make sure you are using key words in your text that relate to your website topic.. but don't get crazy with it! If your page is about PIES, using the words "Pie" or "pies" would be beneficial. However, if you use the word "pies" 50 times, most search engines will find that excessive and pass you by. Using phrases instead of individual words seems to get better results as well. Instead of saying "We make great pies", you might talk about the "delicious chocolate pies" or the "best apple pies in Texas".
3. Get other people talking about your site. The number one way to get recognized by the search engines and drive traffic to your site is by word of mouth, so to speak... Inbound links from other reputable sites tells the search engine robots that you are worth looking at. There are many schools of thought on how to go about this, but the most important thing I can say is this. BUYING links into your site or joining link sharing rings is not the best option. Getting what is known as ORGANINC links, which is basically links that individuals voluntarily provide to your site because you have good content, is a much better option. So how do you do this? There are a number of ways: use social networking tools like facebook and twitter to get the word out about your site, develop relationships with others in your same area of interest and trade links with them, write articles and publish them on free sites like ezinearticles.com. You've probably heard that adding comments to other people's blogs with links back to your site will help you gain "juice" to your own site. That can be true ... BUT ... Do NOT add meaningless comments to peoples' blogs just to get links. You will immediately be tagged as a SPAMMER (a person who posts unwanted material with no meaning except to gain personal exposure) and potentially damage any chance of developing a real relationship with others in your field. I get about 100 of these people on my sites each day - no kidding! It's a very bad practice and I suggest that you avoid it. If you do, however, find a site that you like and have something legitimate to contribute in a comment section of a blog, by all means, speak up and provide a link back to your site if the blog owner allows it.
4. FLASH or No FLASH... There are a ton of awesome looking sites out there with FLASH graphics and animations but be careful.. while there are new articles coming out on how to optimize your flash pages, it is still a stickler. The problem is that web crawlers have a much tougher time determining what your page is about .. they just can't "see" your content if its all embedded in pictures instead of text. My best advice is to use only limited amounts of flash graphics if any. It looks really cool, but if you are wanting to be found by the search engines, it can be a killer. You can learn more about Flash and the pros & cons by reading this article called "Flash and Search Engine Optimization".
There is so much more information that I could provide that I have learned along the way, limited only by the space I have here-- so to make the information more "digestible", I will bring you further updates through my blog. Be sure to check back often for new information.
Follow these links to learn more about the services I recommend and use
- Passion to Profit - by Bob Doyle, creator of the Wealth Beyond Reason Program and co-star of the movie "The Secret"
- Visit my e-Business Solutions page located here at Source of Good Stuff
- Website Tools Information here at Source of Good Stuff
- 5 Minutes with Jack - this is a new blog dedicated to teaching you how to find your passion and manifest it online.
