Need to learn how to make a website and market it online… suggestions?
Question by Susan: Need to learn how to make a website and market it online… suggestions?
I run a small business and am in need of a more fully functioning website. We have a service style business (nothing will be actually sold online) and the website will be used for credibility and lead generation. I have extremely limited knowledge of web design and search engine marketing, but a great deal of work ethic and plenty of time to learn. What would be the best way to learn how to create a website (I have heard dreamweaver and photoshop are essentials… which would mean I need to learn HTML, CSS, and Java?) and learn how to do search engine marketing effectively for my local business? Any free options for learning would be great, but I am also willing to spend money on education and software (of course) if necessary. Thank you!!
Best answer:
Answer by RJGoodhouse
Here is an Easy to use Website host for Dummies and not a bad price either:
http://www.squarespace.com/
What do you think? Answer below!
Why you not trying to build a blog… it’s more easy than you making a website… you can use blogger or wordpress. but wordpress is very recommended. Cause with wordpress you can build a shopping online too. But if you still want to build website, the easy way you can use is joomla. Joomla is CMS. it’s easy to build. with just a couple click your website will be online.
Maybe try MS Office Live Small Business – there are templates and web design tools to help you build a website (do not need to know code). There’s also a contact management part that will help organize your client info.
Companies are making this easier to do all the time without learning HTML CSS or anything that might take you awhile. WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) editing. The blogs at blogger and wordpress are very good as well, but for a business info page I’d recommend webs and yola for building sites easy with their sitebuilding programs. Plus it’s free but you can upgrade to a pure dot com if you want. You can also sell products with PayPal and much more.
This is tricky, and when I have someone saying “I want something professional, current, interesting, and pretty, but I want it to be optimized for search engines from the ground up, and I want it to interact with social media..” I just stop them and say “if you could do 40% of that on your own, you’d have a new day job that pays better.”
Really if you “need” all that, get yourself on with an SEO savy web design company (http://www.moonrisedesign.com/ is the best I’ve found) that knows social networking. They will give your page a midas touch, even if you started with straw. I’ve seen people take pretty bad ideas to them and turn a profit with the results. Simply amazing what talent can do.
Given that you’re small and want to do it solo, you’re either going to compromise on your goals or you’re going to have to give in to one of the less professional options, like a blog or a CMS type site where you’ll get a lot of hand-holding but you won’t be able to go play on your own as much and your results won’t be much better than someone else using the same style service.
I had some good results recently with a project over at Joomla Shack (http://www.joomlashack.com/) using some of the Joomla templates they offer. It’s good open source stuff, rather portable, and for the most part you’re really not locked into anything. Great for the person with the time but not the mindset or the money.
Checking here is a great idea because you’ll get a good mix of experience/suggestions!
Good luck!
Since you don’t want to provide e-commerce (online payments) it shouldn’t be too difficult. It also kind of depends on whether you only need what’s called web ‘presence’. Back to web sites. You’ll need a domain name, some web space, software and time to make & market your site. These articles have basic information with what you’ll need to get started.
Setting Up a Commercial Small Business Web Site
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/5582330/setting_up_a_commercial_small_business.html
Using HTML to Build a Commercial Small Business Web Site
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/5582406/using_html_to_build_a_commercial_small.html
Using Simple HTML to Market a Commercial Small Business Web Site
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/5582540/using_simple_html_to_market_a_commercial.html
I run a small business site myself. Feel free to drop by and look around for examples and ideas. I hope this is of some help to you, and good luck!
http://www.whatnots.cc
The best place to make a free website is htt://www.webstarts.com/?aff=bigdrew951
Its everything you need to build and maintain a website. Includes free hosting and a WebStarts web address.
Its so easy to use and flexible too.
Whne i was loooking to promote my company website i found the site below great help with loads of tips!
Here the article i read
http://hubpages.com/hub/Best-Free-Education-Online
and it say w3schools.com has an html and other website related class