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This page is designed for only one purpose; to give you simple answers to
getting your business online without having to search dozens of pages or
read hundreds of pages which are designed to confuse the beginner webmaster,
or frustrate the experience webmaster.
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Getting Started with a new website - Decide
whether you want to create and manage your own web site or hire a design
firm. Since you know more about your company than any web design firm,
you are the best choice for the job. We are assuming you have already
made the choice to be your own webmaster in these steps.
- First Step - Find a web hosting company: Even the
biggest web design companies use someone else's server for hosting their
work whereas the average small company cannot afford the cost of
purchasing and maintaining their own server. Hence, many small
hosting companies do nothing but rent space from a larger hosting
company. Be sure to purchase directly with the company that owns
the server not a middle man. We have noticed on many "middle
man" hosting company's web sites, they take the wording from the
web site of the real hosting company, and use that wording on their
pages making you think they are the owner of the servers. Most are
just affiliates of a major hosting company, and reselling that service
with a mark up of 300% to 1,000 or more percent. The most
important step in having a web site is your hosting company. They
can make you or they can break you, so take the time and choose
well. If you are a small company, and just want to have a web
presence, you more than likely do not need to pay more than $5 per month
for your hosting service. Do not go with a FREE web hosting
company whereas they need money to stay in business, so they must run
ads on your webpages to cover their cost of hosting your website
creating a non-professional website appearance. Your website
should sell your business, not everyone else's and should reflect your
personally of that business . For a list of web hosting companies,
click here.
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- Second Step - Design Tools: Many hosting companies now provide
built in design tools to make designing your web site as simple as typing
a letter. If you do not have a program such as Microsoft FrontPage
to create your website, you may want to consider the tools a hosting
company offers when selecting which hosting company to go with.
- Do's and Don'ts in Web Designs
- Do - the more text on a page, the faster it loads and
the better rankings with the search engines.
- Don't create a web page that is a total Flash movie,
you'll be the only one that ever sees it. Why? The
search engines of today can only read text, they cannot read a
Flash movie nor can they read a picture file. When a
search engine robot comes to index your site, it will find
nothing and skip you all together. You decide. If
the web site is for your entertainment, create it totally in
Macromedia Flash, or Shockwave and entertainment your self or
your friends with your ability in this field. Great
effects!!! If you're wanting business from your website
and want to get listed with the search engines, reframe from
using too much of this style of programming.
- Don't have a lot of graphics on one page. Keep in mind
that more than 80% of all web surfers still have a dial up modem
and cannot down load large pages, or they will not wait for it
to download, one of the two. Each page should down load in
less than 5 seconds on a 56kb modem. Remember the KISS
factor. Keep It Simple Stupid. A nationwide survey
indicates that the average web user will not wait for a page to
download more than about 5 seconds, 10 at the most.
- Don't have music start up when a page loads.
Might be great to you, but it will be annoying to your visitors
and may run them off before they find out what your company is
all about.
- Don't show affiliate programs (advertising other
companies) on your homepage. It's just not
professional. Example. Let's say you're a realtor,
and I'm referring to a page I visited not to long ago. On
this realtor's homepage, he had 20 affiliate program banners
selling everything from dog food to dresses. Then he tells
you, visit my affiliates to help me pay for this web site.
What's the purpose of his web site? Did he loose focus of
why he created the web site to start off with? Would you
want him to be your realtor to sell your house?
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- Step Three - Web Site Promoting: Just because you built it,
doesn't mean they will come. If you don't advertise your web site,
you more than likely will be the only visitor to your web pages making
the web site pointless as far as obtaining new business or promoting
your company's name. For more information on promoting your web
site, visit us at Web Site
Promotions
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