6Jul
The internet has become an ubiquitous part of modern business life. It won’t be going away anytime soon. If you’re starting a business or personal brand, you’ve probably thought about starting a website.
But how do you do that, exactly? Here are the first steps you should take on how to create a website if it’s time for you to take the leap and make your brand known to the world.
It’s easy to say to yourself “I need a website” and go about creating it. But “I need a website” isn’t enough to make a truly impactful site. The question you should be asking is, “Why do I need a website?”
Do you need to sell things on your website? Are you marketing your business? Are you creating content to be shared on social media?
These questions matter – the answers form the underlying infrastructure of your website. You don’t want to get caught in a situation in which your website isn’t working for you and you need to redesign the whole thing. That’s unnecessary work! Consider writing down the top 5 reasons and uses for the website before you even start looking at web hosts.
Web design has changed massively just in the last few years. The advent and proliferation of mobile browsing means that over half of all internet traffic in 2017 came from mobile browsers. This radically changes what constitutes a “good” website.
But the other radical transformation of web design has been websites like WordPress, Squarespace, and Wix. These websites are a one-stop-shop that handles hosting and presents easily customizable themes and designs that require no knowledge of HTML or CSS to successfully implement.
Depending on what you need, customizing a relatively simple template may be plenty for your purposes. Of course, you have to know those purposes in depth to be able to build the site properly yourself. If your expectations are beyond you own skills, or if you just want a professional touch, hiring a web design company to design your website will yield a great product. Just remember that this option is a lot more costly.
All websites receive significant traffic from clickthroughs from Google, Bing, or other internet search engines. For a website to show up best in those searches, it needs to be relevant and search engine optimized. SEO is a giant industry for this reason, and it’s easy to get caught up in the specific ins and outs of it. There are plenty of professionals who assist with SEO, so don’t get discouraged if you don’t understand.
Just be aware that you need to optimize your website for searches to maximize its utility—and be aware that SEO isn’t just a one-time thing. Good SEO practice is a cycle of refinement. The internet and search algorithms are always changing, and so should your website.
When you decide to create a website, consider all of the possibilities before you start. Make sure you know the purpose of your website, whether you want to build it yourself or seek help and consider optimizing your website for search traffic from the beginning.
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