Today in the web marketing course we are going to cover how to setup a website and what you require to be able to do this quickly and easily. There are a number of reasons why you should build an online presence. The website design and costs shouldn’t be extortionate when you first start out. You can setup a website for as little as a couple of hundred dollars and in some instances even for free if you just want to test the water.
Why be online?
1. This is something you need to know before going online so you can know how to build your site and what the functionality it is you want enabled and the information you need to provide.
2. Make sure you look at the purpose your site will fulfil and write out your requirements so you can look at other sites to see how they work and what you need to do to mirror their functionality
Ask yourself the following questions to find out why you want to create a website. Do you want to;
- Increase sales
- Generate more customers
- Build a community
- Provide solutions by giving people information
- Reduce overall customer and business costs
All of these points can be achieved if you know what you want to do with your site and what its main function will be. If it will be an e-commerce site you need to add in a shopping cart so people can buy from your site. This can be done with something as simple as a PayPal Buy Now button. If your company is growing then a more robust solution like a merchant account is required and there are many providers that can help with this.
For informational websites you can setup a blog either as part of your small business website or as the complete website to provide information and use the site to sell advertising space or promote products on behalf of other companies which is known as affiliate marketing.
Creating a website
To do this you need a hosting account or if you want to go for the free option use Google website builder. You can build out a small site for you as an individual or as a small company.
With a hosting account you can get a website setup as a small brochure site, which consists of 4 to 5 pages of static content. A blog is more popular and easier that you can update with regular content.
Small brochure sites can be outsourced and build for about $200 according to your specification. You will also need a domain name and this can be purchased for $10 to $20 when starting out.
The domain name can either be topic specific eg. volleyballcoaching.com or a broader authority site like volleyball.org. You can create a brand name site which can grow bigger than just a niche market that a specific topic targeted site can achieve like amazon which started off as a book, CD and DVD site..
Website design
To design your site first make sure your site is functional, loads fast and is simple to maintain or manage. Don’t go for a complicated website with a flash functionality, this can work against you as it causes the page to load slowly and can technically be more difficult to design, implement and maintain.
It will also cost you more which when starting out is something to avoid. To do this either look at similar sites and use them as a template or as an example of what your site should look like.
Small brochure sites should only need half a dozen pages which will include the initial page where you can ask for a name and e-mail address to contact people, with an information page of your services, a contact page and also privacy page, disclaimer and finally Terms of use page.
When you use a blog to build out a site you can either use the free theme templates they have on offer or you can purchase more professionally designed theme which is better suited to your functionality. You can then add additional capability using WordPress plug-ins which there are millions and most are free. These can add functionality to help your website provide more capability and make your site more engaging to ensure people come back to it.
In this web marketing course you were introduced to the basic elements of how to setup your website and to do this without spending a lot of money. You also learned that having a website means you can have additional benefits like increasing sales, gaining more customers, help build a community by having a blog and reduce your costs and have a continuous 24/7 online presence. This can be done quite inexpensively and in some cases free.
