Expert Internet Marketer

Before you create your own website, you need to list the basic requirements for designing/hosting a website.

Web Designing
Decide the purpose of your website. Is it for blogging, or for advertising? Is it content-driven or focused on link building? This will provide you a clear idea on the look-and-feel of your website. The points you need to consider are:

• Text
• Layout
• Navigation
• Keyword analysis

Domain Name Registration
You need to have your domain name registered. Alternatively, you can have your website hosted on another domain names. Check out comparative price/services for domain name registration.

Web Hosting
Select a web hosting service that meets your design requirements in 2nd Step. Compare web hosting services, look out for criteria-driven searches, expert reviews, and question-answer processes.

Bandwidth
Space is a major issue in the online space. You need to decide how many pages will your website provide, and how much of host disk space will it occupy? What�s your estimated monthly traffic? Also, what web authoring software will you use? Look out for formulas and calculators on search engines.

Web Development
This is a very crucial stage of building the website. After fixing the graphics and content flow, the technical aspects of fixing the HTML, source codes, programming languages need to be done. This has to be followed by testing, validating, and uploading.

Website Promotion
Now that you�ve developed your site, your next task is to get it indexed. Then you need to submit your site to search engines, like Google, Yahoo, MSN, by following various submission strategies and keyword selection. There are a whole set of rules on search engine optimization (SEO) to draw maximum targeted traffic to your website and earn revenue from it.

Website Maintenance
Last but not the least is maintenance of your website regular updating, links testing, host performance, and traffic analysis.

The easiest way to design your website is to purchase your choicest one among the thousands of myriad website templates. Web templates are nothing but ready-made web design with blank spaces for content and gaps for photos, which you need to fill up according to your requirements. There are also free HTML templates available on the Internet which you can download and use, or even modify. You can even modify advanced designs using notepads.

Many such sites offering freeware also contain free tutorials which have instructions on how to modify the programming codes, and customize the page. The other advantages of choosing web design templates are that you can go in for a clean, professional look without having to learn the nitty-gritties of HTML, color combinations, and styles. It�s a great, inexpensive way to refresh the look of your existing website.

If you are photographer who wants to sell photos online but knows little about HTML, photo editing tools, look for programs like Advanced Album Editor. At a cost, you can design your own websites and generate web pages. All you need to do is import your photos, set the parameters of the templates, and export the website. These steps done, you can get all the web pages of you own personal website.

Your website can generate significant revenue to your business, expand your market area, provide information to suppliers and customers, enable online transaction, build strong customerbase and enhance the brand values of your company. Thus, it’s crucial to have a well-documented plan before starting ahead.

Critical success factors:

• Do a complete research and analysis on the market and competitors
• Build an effective strategy for your online business success
• Set up business goals, project scope, site archiecture, and user profile
• Refine and create quality contents
• Finding new avenues to promote your website online through both free and paid marketing channels

Checklist:

• Audience: Who is your target audience? What are the characteristics of this audience? (consumer, business to business, etc.) Where are they located? What are their user profile?
• Purpose: What is the purpose of your web site? How do you think your website will fulfill the business needs?
• Goals: How does the proposed site align with your company goals? Will you sell a product or service online? How does the site help you obtain or retain customers?
• Size: How big will your Web site be? Larger sites cost more money; will your site be five pages or 500 pages? Have you thought about limits for the size and scope of the site?
• Interactive: Will your Web site offer interactive features to visitors? Can visitors send email, order a product or request information? How can the site give you feedback?
• Web Hosting: Where have you planned to host your website? How much web space does your site require? Have you considered search engine friendly domain names?
• Project In-charge: Who will be responsible for co-ordinating the project management activities? To supply necessary inputs to the design company? Can you respond to email messages within 24 hours?
• PHP Programming : Will you need custom programming to enable features on your site? Do you plan to have a guest book, shoppping cart, order forms or a calendar of events? Do you want any information or interactive inputs to be related to a database for marketing or sales purposes?
• Competitor Analysis: Who are your competitors online? Of those, which competitor sites do you like and why? What competitor sites do you dislike and why? How can your site beat the competition?
• Link Building : What Web sites would you like to link to? What Web sites do you want to link to your site? Have you thought about registering your site with search engines?
• Website Maintenance: How often will your Web site be updated? Do you plan to update daily, weekly or monthly?
• Online Marketing: Are you planning to register the site with search engines? Will you contact the media to review your Web site? Do you plan to buy any Web banner advertising on other sites?
• Feedback: How would you like to recieve feedback and questions from the site visitors? through online form or via email? Would you like to provide FAQs on the site?
• Website Measurement : Who will review the Web sites access logs which record some of the statistical information mentioned above? Will reports about hits, page views and popular site elements be compiled monthly?