| Last time I spoke about the Hosting and Domain purchasing and promised that this week I mention about the setting up of a site. So that's what I'll do...
OK, you've got a business, something to sell, or you have something on your chest that you want everyone to know about. A good way of letting people know about this is via the internet. There are lots of websites that offer you a free website, easy to setup and easy to manage. This sort of thing is fine if you just want to blog or keep up to date with friends, but if you want it to be professional the only way forward is your own website. You can of course build your own website with startling ease. There are quite a few WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) Website Building programs out there, that will give you step by step forms to fill in, create graphics and add text until you have a finished article that you can upload to your new host and visit via your new domain (see previous blog). These programs are relatively cheap and easy to use and will give you a web presence within a few hours of starting.
So why doesn't everyone use a Website Building program? This I can't answer, the only thing I can say is that if you are looking for a specific type of site with specific functions, a WYSIWYG program may not be able to supply them all. This is where someone like me comes in.
If you do decide to go with a professional, don't be blinded with science. You may meet with people who will talk to you in abbreviations non-stop: PHP this, ASP that, SEO another, PR something else with a little bit of HTML and .NET thrown in for good measure on a cake of MySQL. All of this does make the person sound like they know what they are talking about, but you should really try to understand everything a bit clearer before engaging in a website so that you can keep the site up to date without falling into the trap of setting up a site and letting it stagnate.
How many times have you come across a website that seems to be a little out of date? I've lost count of the times I've searched for something on Google and hit a page that refers to Michael Owen's recent goal at the World Cup against Argentina (or something similar!). This does tend to put people off if they think that the site hasn't been updated for 3 years, they may wonder if the people who made the site are still using it. If your site is fresh and looks like it is being kept up to date, people are more likely to look around and return again in the future. My advice is to ask your designer for a CMS (Content Management System) which will enable you to keep the site up to date, add products (if necessary), change the text on your pages etc. Otherwise you may find yourself having to phone your web designer every time you want to change something on the site and if they are busy, you may find yourself at the back of a long queue, or even worse if they decide to stop doing web design, you may have to find another designer to do it for you.
If you do decide to go with a designer, try to go with an idea of what you want your site to do. If you have products to sell, tell them you need to it have an online Payment Gateway (The ability to connect to a bank or Paypal to take payments), whether via Paypal or a Merchant Bank Account. If you want to display a lot of products that will need to be regularly updated, ask them for a CMS that enables you to regularly update the products in a simple fashion, without the necessity for other software. If you have an idea of what you want your site to look and function like, you will make the job for the designer easier and you will get better results.
If you would like to try designing your own site, try a google search for the following which will give you a better idea of what to know before you get stuck in:
PHP, ASP, HTML, and .NET are all web languages whith subtle differences in each. Some work together, others don't.
Javascript is another language, this generally works well with all of the languages above.
SEO is an abbreviation for Search Engine Optimisation. Generally speaking, it is the "art" of getting your website to the top of the Google Search results.
PR is an abbreviation for Page Rank. This refers to the rank given by Google on a scale of 0-10, 10 being the highest and generally unreacheable.
MySQL and MSSQL are both types of databases. You may need either of these if you are going to store a lot of information on your website.
If you have any questions, contact us via the email link on our profile page. Until next week, see you later.
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