Planning free website for small business

Building a free Web site is easy with several different platforms like Weebly, Yola, and Microsoft Live. I have a Weebly site I put together for a start-up home improvement service and the learning curve is an easy one to manage. For professionals or small business owners who would like a low cost website solution for their business, I link to one in the link box containing business resources.

But before you find an application and immediately start building a free Web site – stop!

Take time to:

• plan on paper
• get organized
• choose a hosting company

These steps also apply to a business that’s hiring a graphic designer and programmer to build a low cost or premium site.

Plan

Plan a Web site on paper. Ask yourself basic marketing questions: what product or service am I selling? What does my company provide that no one else provides? How will a visitor to my site know that I can help solve their business or personal need?

Next, take a 8 ½ x 11 sheet of blank white paper and sketch how a web site will look. Will it be vertical or horizontal? How will the navigation read and how many sub-pages might there be? Use a pencil to sketch and use plenty of scrap paper.

It’s tempting to rush the planning process but take time to consider all relevant points of view.

A book I recommend is Building Web Sites for Dummies. It’s easy to skim and go to relevant portions and then return to re-read sections. Purchase it new or used through Amazon.

Microsoft Live has an excellent set of questions to consider as Step 1 in building a site. I recommend opening up an account and reading the questions whether you choose to use their platform or not.

In your industry, look at three web sites you like and find three web sites you don’t like.

Mark down the elements about the ones you like: color, headlines, supporting text, navigation, how fast it loads, use of pictures (images). Compare with the sites you don’t like.

This exercise will give you an understanding of how you should develop your site.

Organize

Make a master folder and sub-folders for your new Web site. This step applies whether you’re building a site for free or you’re paying a premium price. The Web development team should do this.

Title the Master folder “My Web Assets” with assets being photos (also called images); content (the written text); video; links to industry resources. Then make a sub-folder for images and a separate sub-folder for rough drafts and final drafts of the Web pages.

Choose a Web hosting service and evaluate it based on reliability, pricing and customer service. I recently opened an account with Go Daddy. I’ve called twice for help and have gotten through to a customer representative in two minutes or less both times. They’ve adequately walked me through procedures and answered my questions.

I also saw reviews that were negative of Go Daddy at http://www.webhostingjury.com/reviews/Go_Daddy

Hostgator and Blue Host are other Web hosting services which Web development companies use quite often.

Try and look to the future when choosing a Web hosting service: do you expect a lot of traffic in the months ahead and is there enough storage space to upload video are among the questions to ask.

Also ask about the cost of owning several different domain names that may end up pointing back to one main Web site.

And then inquire as to the cost of hosting multiple sites – what type of price structures exist?

There are also many free templates to use for a free site including the popular Wordpress. For a small business that wants to conserve cash flow in the initial stages, a free site can be a good way to get an inexpensive presence on the Web.

However, for the long term a capable designer and programmer will create a distinct professional look that will ultimately be more effective in setting the company apart from competitors.