Learn To Create A Website

Use Our Exclusive Free Website Design Walk Through

Learn how to create a website. Website design is not easy, but it isn't hard either. Content management systems, templates, and site builder utilities make website design a breeze. One of the first steps to starting your computer repair business will be setting up your website. The great thing about designing a website is it allows you to project whatever business themes you want. Learning to create your website here with Be Your Own IT will show you how even a small one person business can give the impression of a multi-national corporation. Using your website as a selling tool is one of the most powerful advertising tools you will have. The best part is most sites will be completed for under $50 with our system.

How to Make Your Own Website for Your Business or For Pleasure
-A Complete Step By Step Guide

Designing your very own Website is neither hard nor expensive. There are a variety of tools available on the web to make the job a lot easier and if you follow this guide it will create a very simple road map to success.

My Background

Beyond running a few sites in my spare time I have well over a decade of computer repair and computer related experience. I don’t claim to be an expert in Web Design. I learned like many people do, by looking at other sites, using their code as an example and changing what I could to customize the site. Most of my life I have used templates for my websites and with easily over 100 sites designed I have learned a lot of things about the process of running a successful Website. I have designed sites for local businesses and for myself as a pass time. In my time I have bought a lot of books on the topic, some of them helped others make great paper weights. I should say that I have never been one to learn from a book, it’s just not my style. I prefer to learn by doing, having a good example to follow and that is what I wish to do with this guide. Having your own Website, whether it’s for your home or small business or if it’s for fun, designing a Website can be a lot of fun and it a lot easier than you may think.

What is a Website?

The fact of the matter is a Website isn’t really all that complicated. A Website is simply a collection of web pages. A webpage is simple; it is just a document usually containing what is called HTML code. There are a lot of different codes to use when designing a Website with HTML still remaining the most popular.

What tools do I need?

That answer really depends on your current skill level and how skilled you wish to be. If you want to really get into the nuts and bolts of web design you will want to get a program like Dreamweaver or FrontPage, these are programs that help you write the code. The nice thing about these software’s is that if you would rather not write the code and you want to make a Website like typing a word document you can and the software writes the code automatically for you. What I mean is just as you can type up a document, change the color of the text, and insert pictures easy in something like Microsoft Word these programs make web design in many ways easy like that. The alternative is understanding and hand writing HTML code, which is good but if you’re not aspiring to be a web designer and you’re just trying to get your business online or run a Website for fun one of these programs is for you.
One more option to consider is either buying or finding a free template to start your Website with or using a content management system like Drupal or Joomla. Content management systems combine both standard HTML code knowledge and software a lot like FrontPage or Dreamweaver. They are very easy to use and manage. Most of them offer downloadable modules that can make your site look great and offer free templates to choose from.

Picking a Good Web Address

Setting Up the Hosting

Web Hosting

The next thing you will need to decide on who to host your Website. In order to have a Website on the Internet you need to put the files on a server that is online all the time. Since most of us do just have this setup lying around at home there are a variety of options available on the Internet. The company I have always used is Godaddy, it’s one a lot of people are familiar thanks to their super bowl commercials. The fact is I have been using them for many years and they provide by far the most value. Not to mention their tech support is great and whenever I had to call most times the person I was connected with actually knew their stuff. The other advantage of going with a company like Godaddy is all the extras they include. For example, they have an easy site builder; they offer preinstalled content management systems like Joomla, and Drupal, and much more. I have always had great luck with their quality of service and although their email can be somewhat of a pain, it is very affordable and easy to manage. Certainly, there are many other web hosting options, I have used local hosting but that is usually way overpriced charging more than $30 a month when Godaddy starts at about $50 a year.

Site Design

Once you have decided on where to host your Website it is time to start thinking about how you would like to design of the site to look. I have always recommended if you don’t have any design idea to simply look around at other websites and make a list of things that you like. Start with your particular niche and expand out if you need to. Do a google search for others in your field and take a look at their sites, cherry pick the good things but also keep a list of the bad ones or opportunities to be better than them. If your speaking of small businesses from my experience the vast majority of local business Website are virtual yellow pages ad’s at best. If you have the opportunity to be a cut above the rest take it. You will be surprised how easy it will be to have a better site than your competitors and that will go a long way. Keep in mind have a lot of great features on your Website doesn’t have to cost a lot either. Do your research and talk with your hosting provider to get tips and advice on how to enhance your overall Website experience.

Setting Up Drupal

Customizing Your Website

Content

Now that you have picked out how you want your site to look it is important that you sit down and really put together some good content. If you’re a business, then make sure you do more than the cookie cutter stuff like the hours you are open and pictures of the staff. Write a few helpful articles or get someone to help you do it, this will add a lot of value to your Website. Give a good history of the company, and make sure to really explain the services you provide. Go the extra miles explaining the services your company provides. Today, the yellow pages are dying and more and more people are going to the web to even find things like hours and location. Make sure the important things like that are easily available as well. Another tip from both a business and a personal site standpoint is pictures, if you’re a business make sure to take a lot of great photos of your work, products, facilities, and more. It allows potential customers to really get to know your company before they come in. Filling a site with too many stock photos or worse clip art gives websites a really sterile feel and you’ll do yourself a favor to pick up that camera, people love pictures.

Getting Your Website Seen

For Most business having your Website get seen is pretty important. That said it Search Engine Optimization is a pretty expansive topic to try and tackle on your own. They real keys in a local market is to really just provide the best possible content. There are several free options to optimize your Website like google local and local directories. If you a small business owner join your local chamber of commerce and they will give you traffic to your site by linking to it. If you are a larger company this is certainly something you should consider hiring out especially if your local market has tough competition. If you want to learn more I certainly recommend reading sites like seobook.com, seomoz.com, and other search engine optimization sites.

Keeping Your Site Up To date

If you want people to keep coming back to your Website you must keep it up to date. If it is a local business site try and post current news about the company, new products or services, anything, make it relevant to your business and keep the great content coming. So many sites get created only to be forgotten within a few short months. It is really important to make your Website a useful resource for your potential visitors and that isn’t hard to do if you keep the content up to date. The amount you update is up to you but it should be your way to communicate with people, so if you have something you want people to know put it up there, it is the cheapest advertising you will ever do and it’s to a captive audience. Unlike a newspaper ad or billboard the people looking at your Website are actually interested in what you have to say so do them a favor and tell them something good.

Training Current Customers

Don’t forget your current customers or relationships if you’re a business. Train them to go to your Website and gather email address so you can contact them about updates or new products. Something simple like asking for an email with every sale so you can keep them posted is a very powerful tool. If you are not comfortable asking for it at least put out a box where people have to fill out a card with their email, maybe give something away for entering. Keep those email addresses to you can market to them later. Email marketing is effective especially when they know you and you already have a business relationship with them. It should be pointed out don’t just email them junk, email them an offer wrapped in useful information. For example, mail them something like a “recipe of the month” and then near the bottom also inform them of a sale going on. If you run a landscaping business mail them something useful about the house, a short article on how landscaping can increase the value of their homes, then of course sell them your landscaping. Always remind your customers that you have a Website by including it in all advertising, on all business cards, and simply by telling them. The return on this simple task is you will get people looking at your Website and you can market to them again and again for free. Make sure people know about it in your neighborhood.

The End

This list of steps is by no means a totally complete roadmap, think of it more as a guide. There is much more to know about web design and running a successful Website but with a little hard work you can put your business ahead of your immediate competition pretty easily. If your designing a Website for fun these steps still apply and offer a great way to lean step by step on your first site.