How to Build Website
Whether you want to start a simple blog or build an eCommerce site to showcase your homemade dolls, anyone can build one. Building a website seems to get easier every day as more free software tools come out and templates become increasing available. You don't need a degree in computer programming to build and maintain your own website anymore, and it can be done for almost nothing.
- Difficulty:
- Moderate
Instructions
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1
web hosting
**Hosting**
Before you start to build your website, you will need to get web hosting. Hosting is simply the place where your website is stored. You can't host your own website unless you have a web server, but hosting services are very cheap. There are a ton of hosting sites such as go daddy and 1and1 internet. After you find hosting, get free web hosting reviews of the site you are using to be sure that they are reliable and have good customer service.
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**Blogs**
If you are simply starting a blog, you don't need a full fledged personal website because you can use one of the free blog sites like blogger. In five minutes you can create a professional looking blog hosted for free by the blog site. My blog is in the resources section below if you would like to see an example.
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3
**Free Website Building Software**
If you are using a Mac, then iWeb is going to be your best resource for website building. It creates professional looking websites and is easier to learn. You can do a search for iWeb created websites online and there are also plenty of tutorials. I build websites for customers using iWeb a lot because of how clean and professional it looks. iWeb also has a blog feature for creating awesome blogs if you want to host it yourself.
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4
**Designing The Site**
If you are familiar with CSS and HTML, you can build the website page by page before uploading it to your host. CSS is the building block that determines how your website looks. If you want to learn CSS, find online tutorials or you can take a class. HTML is important and deals with the formatting and such. HTML is a simple and logical language. Again, there are many HTML tutorials out there. If you don't want to learn, or are looking for an easier way, go to the next step.
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**Web Designers**
Web design templates are a great way to build your own website because they have done most of the underlying code for you, and all you have to do is make a few clicks. If you want a very unique looking website, web templates can be somewhat limiting. You will have to build it page by page and use their templates only but since there are such a diverse amount of templates out there, you might be able to find one you like. There are so many designers out there that it is best to just do a search and find reviews.
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6
After you have designed your site and worked out the bugs, you will have to transfer the files to your web host. This is done through an FTP client. Which FTP to use depends whether you have a MAc or PC. For the Mac, Fetch is a great FTP that is about $25.
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After your website is up on your host's server, you can maintain it using the FTP client you used to transfer the files to the host. This can be boring but if you want to make something different or add links, it has to be done.
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Tips & Warnings
For an ecommerce site or business site, try consulting a web designer because things can get pretty complicated.
Related Searches
Resources
- Photo Credit len-k-a
