Make a Website in 2020 (Step-By-Step Guide)
Why You Need a Website?
Creating a website is one the fastest growing ways to get noticed, share content and even make money online. This probably isn't surprising, considering that they're are over 100,000,000 distinct websites out there! No matter who you are, having a website can benefit you. Below are a few main reasons on why creating a website is beneficial whether you're planning on creating a website for a business or just having a personal blog.
Why a buiness should have a website:
- Can generate more sales
- Builds a stronger brand
- Adds a professional touch
- Gives information and or support to your clients
Why a indiviual should have a website:
- Share pictures or information about yourself
- Brand your name
- Make some extra moola
- Website managment and or creation experience
Choosing a Niche
One of the key things that makes a website successful is having a unique idea. This is one of the few core fundamentals of building a website that strikes success. Out of the 100,000,000+ sites out there only a few select websites ever make it past the top percentile. Your niche can be anything you enjoy doing as long as you're a knowledgeable source. Never make a website talking as if you understand certain topics as a pro but in reality have no idea what you're talking about! Read more about choosing your niche...
Registering a Domain Name
What's a Domain Name?
In simple terms a domain name is http://my-domain-name.com (it could also be .cc, .org, .net and soon...). If you're desiring to learn the technical explanation of a domain name.
Registering One:
The process of registering a domain name is pretty straightforward. However, there is a small fee depending on the domain name ending (.com, .cc, .net etc). Pricing can range from $1.00 up to $50.00 (this is very rare). Read more about domain registration and where to get one...
Choosing a Web Host
Every web site on the internet has a web host. In simple terms a web hosting company takes all the files you've created for your web site and stores them on their server(s). When someone accesses your domain name the web host's server retrieves your files and displays them to the user who's visiting your web site. Find out more...
Creating Content
Having content on your website is very important. The content of one website should stay the same no matter what. Always make sure it's relative to the domain's name and is added to frequently. More information on creating web content...
Designing Your Website
Everyone has seen those themes that just POP, a template or theme that stands out can make reading content more appealing and gives your website a more professional touch. Create Website has created this article to help you design a jaw dropping template. Continue reading about designing your website or learn about choosing a pre-made template.
Choosing a Niche
One of the key things that makes a web site successful is having a unique idea. This is, if not the most important core fundamental of building a web site that strikes success. Out of the 100,000,000+ sites out there only a few select web sites ever make it past the top percentile and that's because they either lack originality and or development. Your niche can be anything you enjoy doing as long as you're a knowledgeable source.
What's a hobby you enjoy, what do do with your free time? These are two important questions to ask yourself before starting a website.
Anyone can become a webmaster (someone who owns and manages website(s)), but before becoming one you need a niche. A niche is what your entire blog is wrapped around. The niche should define your entire website... not just part of it. Got it? Great! An ideal thing to do before starting a website is asking yourself the previous questions. Think about what you truly enjoy doing.
How to Stay Focused
Staying focused can be fairly difficult, that's why I suggested picking a topic you have knowledge about and enjoy discussing. Remember when you were younger and really excited about a new toy and then you lost interest in it? Well, this is similar to creating a website. In the beginning you're so excited (I hope) to make a name for yourself and then overtime you begin to sidetrack then lose interest all together.
Making Your Niche Stand Out
After picking your niche stay original. In fact, I encourage you to visit your competitors and see what they offer. Then create content they don't offer. This doesn't only make you stand out but puts you one step ahead of your competition. Make sure your content is original and interesting. Add some quality adjectives, and some humor. This keeps your audience entertained along with giving them informative information. Most importantly make sure to mention you and your. This gives your readers encouragement that they can do it, and you aren't referring to someone else.
I want a Blog To!
Blog Topics
Al righty if you're planning on creating a blog for you website you're going to want to keep your ideas or topics the same as your websites. Another thing to keep in mind is you really want to make sure it's either connected via as a subdomain or in a folder located in the main domain.
However, if you're planning on creating a blog only then you're going to want to place that blog on your main domain address such as mydomain.com and not my-blog.my-domain.com. I hope you understand but if you don't always keep in mind that you can always check out our 24/7 forum support.
Niche Blog or Personal Blog?
Now this part only applys for those who read the above paragraphs on "Blog Topics" and have decided to choose only a blog.
Somthing I always ask myself is, "Do I want to make money with this blog?" If the answer is yes then I chosoe a niche blog and not a personal blog. Now don't get me wrong... it is possible to create an internet income with a personal blog but it's much more difficult if you're not targeting a specific topic.
This means you're going to get diffirent types of people who are look for all sorts of different information. This isn't neccasirly a good thing because they're not likely going to become a frequent reader.
If you're wanting to make money with your website with a targeted topic then you should create a blog with content that’s similar to each other.
This will produce greater conversion rates and you'll rank better in the search engines and several other important benefits.
Higher CTR (click through rates) on ads on your website via to AdSense
Higher conversion rates - More people will subscribe and or buy a product or service you're selling
You'll recevice a stronger fellowship of readers who read your blog
And so many other factors
If you've decided what your website topic is going to be, theb be sure to check out step 2 - Registering a Domain
Registering a Domain Name
What's a Domain Name?
In simple terms a domain name is http://my-domain-name.com (it could also contain .cc, .org, .net and so on as it's ending instead of .com...). If you're desiring to learn the technical explanation of a domain name and why they use endings such as ".com" read A Technical Explanation of a Domain. That article should give you a much better understanding behind domain names...
Registering a Domain:
The process of registering a domain name is pretty straightforward, however there is a small fee depending on the domain name's ending letters (.com, .org, .net etc). Pricing can range from $1.99 up to $49.99. The average ".com" domain name is priced at $11.99/yr via to GoDaddy, which is the cheapest place to buy domains and the most trusted. Below is a chart which gives a general estimate of what current domains go for.
GoDaddy Domain Pricing
Is there an option for people who don't want to pay?
The short answer to this question is yes, there is. However, these types of domains are almost always (99.99%) sub-domains. A sub-domain example is my-site.my-host.com. If you're serious about making money online then NEVER use free domain names.
Make sure the domain name suits the websites content, in other words have a topical domain name which is relevant to the website's content. An example is if Jonathan (yea, him again) creates a domain named car-parts-and-accessories.com and then sells car parts and accessories. The incorrect way is selling baking supplies or something non-relevant to car parts and accessories. This doesn't only benefit your search engine ranking (don't worry if you don't know what this is yet, all in good time), but gives your customer a idea of what you're selling.
Make sure it's not already in use by someone else by using this tool (it will open up in a new tab). You wouldn't want to create an entire website and then find out that the name you we're going to use is taken!
Don't use .info or .biz domain names. When people use search engines, such as Gogole, the statistics say that domains with these endings are less likely to be clicked on. One theory is that these types of domain names look to scammy or cheesy.
A great thing which will generate traffic faster for your website, is seeing if the name of your website is being searched for. Example, let's suppose Justin (need to have some variety) creates a domain name called dog-obedience-training.com. By doing a simple search with Google's free Keyword Tool I found out that this particular domain's keywords (the words inside the domain which have the most meaning to the content), receives over 60,500 searches every month. Unfortunately, just having a domain name with those keywords doesn't automatically give Justin the highest Google ranking (at the top of the list). It does however make his domain name have greater value in Google's algorithm process and does give Justin a higher probability of showing up higher then he would choosing something else.
If you've read the above tips and suggestions you're ready to buy a domain name! After buying your domain you need someone to host your files or folders. Make sure after you've registered a domain name to check out Choosing a Web Host.
Website Builders
Website Builders are a very useful tool for beginners who are just getting started and are looking to create a website quickly and easily. The excellent thing about website builders is that they require no website programming "know how" and "web design know how". This means anyone who has a few hours to sit down and select a few preferences/options can create a website! Another excellent thing about these "packages" is that they're farily affordable for the services they give you. To help you decide which one is best, we've created a list giving the top features each top service has to offer, we also give there prices.
If you're planning on creating your own website from scratch and aren't planning on using a website builder, make sure to check out our list of website hosting companies and our getting started guide. If you're planning on developing an application that takes major disk space and or bandwidth make sure to look into VPS Hosting.
Website Tonight
Website Tonight is a service provided by GoDaddy. You can create a website in three simple steps:
- Pick a Design
- Make it yours
- Publish it!
Time Needed
The time it generally takes to build a website with Website Tonight is anywhere between 1hr-5hrs. If you already have the content on hand and have an idea, or plan, of how you're going to set everything up it shouldn't take more than one hour. If you're unsure of what your website topic, template etc. is going to be then it may take longer to create.
Some other features:
- 5-999 page websites
- Over 1,500 pre-made templates to choose and coustamize
- Over 20,000 images to choose from and use as you please
- Add Flash and RSS feeds to you website, giving it that extra element
- Add Forums
An awesome all-in-one website builder which provides an exstensive list of services. These are the steps of creating a website with Site 2 You:
- Choose a design
- Choose a domain name
- Write or provide the content
- Publish it
Their more universal and much more professional compared to ehir competitors.
Freatures
- Unlimited hosting
- Free domain name
- Flexible CMS
- No Set-up Fee
- Professional website templates
Doodle Kit
DoodleKit is an extremely powerful website builder that provides hosting, templates and much more in a reasonable price range. In fact, they even have a plan that's 100% free!
A Few Features
- Completely free plan available
- No coding required
- Full website hosting and domain name
- Advanced page editor
- Blog
- RSS Feeds
Choosing a Web Host
What's a Web Host?
Every web site on the internet has a web host. In simple terms a web hosting company takes all the files you've created for your web site and stores them on their server(s). When someone accesses your domain name the web host's server retrieves your files and displays them to the user who's visiting your web site.
Do They Cost Money?
Unfortunately, most web hosts do. Fortunately, you can find very cheap hosting plans. Depending on what you need, such as VPS hosting, Dedicated hosting or just want a static web site (like CreateWebsite.cc) there's a web host out there. Most web hosting company's offer all three of these services, so it can be difficult choosing the best one for the best price. However, CreateWebsite.cc has created a large list of web hosting companies and what they offer. Hopefully this list can benefit your choosing.
Which One Should I Choose?
Due to the large number of web hosting companies and the variety of plans they offer CreateWebsite.cc would be foolish suggesting only one web hosting company to it's users. However, we can help you decide which one would benefit you the most depending on what you're planning on doing.
If you just need a simple affordable web hosting company that will host a few pages for your business you should go with something simple and user-friendly such as GoDaddy. They provide static/cgi support for a very cheap price. For economy hosting it's $4.99/mo , which isn't bad considering the benefits they give you such as:
• 10 GB Space | Unlimited Bandwidth (How much memory your visitors can consume each month)
• 100 Email Accounts2 (The email accounts you can create under your domain names)
• 10 MySQL Databases (1 GB each) (The number of databases your hosting allows)
• FREE Ad Credits:
For larger scale projects and for more experienced users who are looking for some major horse power, try looking into Dedicated or VPS hosting. Unfortunately, this type of hosting can be very expensive, in fact it's for web applications such as MySpace, FaceBook and SN50. Anyway's, if you need this kind of hosting look into WebFaction (cheaper than most VPS hosting companies), or SoftLayer (this one is dedicated hosting and not VPS).
If you don't want to spend any money then you should look into hosting your own web site with Xampp or using a free hosting company. A few free hosting companies are listed below.
Warning:The benefits of choosing one of these compared to paid hosting is much smaller.
- FreeWebs
- Bravenet
- Wix
- 000WebHost
If you're still unsure on what hosting company is best for you, please make sure to check out the comparison list. After choosing a web host make sure you know how to write compelling content.
VPS Hosting
What is VPS Hosting?
VPS, which stands for virtual private server, hosting is a cheap way to get the power and the full control over a web server as if you were paying for a dedicated server, which are hundreds of dollars a month. VPS Hosting ranges from $15-$150. The difference between VPS hosting and regular shared hosting is that you're the only website on that virtual server. Each person pays for a small section of the real server to make their own (virtual) server. It's very helpful if you're creating a large internet application and need advanced web tools and languages and a server to run it all on.
If you're not planning on creating a large scale project, such as FaceBook, and want something cheaper go with shared hosting. For a list of shared hosting companies visit this page.
Website CMS List
If you have a website that's frequently being updated and our sick off creating a new page manually each and every time and just want an automatic page system... then a CMS (content management system) is for you. All content management systems are developed in a dynamic web language. The most common type of CMS development language is PHP. However, they're multiple different languages that CMS can be developed in. Below is a list of CMS software for your website.
Joomla
Joomla is the largest used CMS for it's extensibility and user-friendly UI (user interface). It allows it's webmasters to create, edit, administer, design and do much more with their Joomla CMS website. Joomla also provides a large number of add-ons and themes.
Drupal
Drupal is an open source CMS for advanced and novice webmasters alike. It allows a wide variety of content to be created and mange inside it's admin panel along with many modules and themes.
MODx
MODx is a free CMS for individuals and business. It offers a classic mode and a revolution mode. The revolution mode is their newest version which has new add-ons created each day.
Drake CMS
The Drake CMS is a simple to use CMS that doesn't require any databases to be used. It's completely free and is SEO friendly.
OpenCMS
OpenCMS is a very easy to use website content management system. It's used by thousands world wide and is very stable under large amounts of information. This CMS is also very easy to customize.
Java and XML
Create Website’s 30 Tips When Creating Content
Creating content is probably one of the most major fundamentals of creating a successful website or blog, so CreateWebsite decided to create a list of 30 tips on creating excellent content. If you want more ideas on creating content make sure to check out CreateWebsite.cc's Creating Content page.
- Always keep it fresh
- Keep it original
- Always use proper spelling and grammar
- Add humor to your content
- Depict your points with clip art
- Make sure your writing is clear and easy to understand
- Keep advertising to a minimum... no one enjoys this.
- Make the content interactive
- Give your visitors a place where they can give feedback
- Don't make your pages extremely long - you'll likely lose their attention
- Make the content easy to access and navigate
- Have a purpose in the content you're writing
- Make the content compelling
- Make sure you have a way your visitors/users can share what they just read
- Tell stories
- Give examples
- Add headers and a variety of colors, but don't go over the top
- Have introductions and conclusions
- Share personal experiences
- Show personality in your writing
- Link to other articles that relate to your current article
- Solve an issue or problem someone's having
- Make lists such as this one
- Add videos
- Create how to articles
- Keep it engaging
- Make sure it has an intriguing title
- Make sure it's not repetitive
- Make sure the content has meta tags (description and keyword tags)
- Share free stuff
Designing Your Website
Everyone has seen those themes that just POP, a template, or theme, that stands out can make reading content more appealing. Create Website has created this article to help you design a jaw dropping design.
First Step - Choosing Your Colors
Any blog or website that's successful in creating an appealing theme has a set of colors. Most designers call these "base colors". Base colors are a set of colors that your website is built upon. CreateWebsite.cc's current base colors are blue, light blue, brown and some occasional gray. It's a good idea that you pick colors which are easy on the eyes and aren't to bright. Also remember to resist picking any extremely black colors. Another thing that you should take into consideration is if your website is handicap friendly. A website you should look into when in the process of picking your base colors is an awesome website called Colorblind Filter. This website checks to see if your website is easy to see, or read, for all audiences. You simply give it your URL and it converts it to a number of different simulations of how your website may look to someone who's colorblind.
A good tool created by Adobe, which is perfect for choosing your color sets, is Kuler. This site can be a great starting mark. Below are a few samples showing what Kuler is capable of creating. And yes, Kuler is a free application, as is Colorblind Filter.
kuler-example
A checklist to go by when designing your theme:
- Is my theme unique?
- Is it easy on the eyes?
- Is it readable for all audiences?
- Is it original?
- Is it readable?
- Is it easy to navigate?
Double Check - Unique Design
After picking your colors at Kuler,you need to always double check that you never copy someone else's design. After all, you're aiming to develop a unique design that's personally yours. A theme is more than a base of colors. Always try to be as original as you possibly can with the colors you pick. The majority of what makes any website successful is originality. Finding colors which are rarely used, and fit you perfectly, can really set you apart!
Note: If you don't know hex codes make sure to check out our free hex code generator. This tool is great for novice webmasters and can teach you hex!
An Awesome Free Graphic Design Application
An excellent free drawing program a lot of professional website designers use is Gimp. Your websites template designs or menu bar images don't have to be anything fancy in the beginning... after all, practice makes perfect. If you're not artistic what so ever and would like a pre-made template make sure to check out Choosing a Template...
Putting It All Together
Assuming you've designed the images you're going to use for your website's template you're ready to place all the images into an web editor. Next your going to create a template from the images using the web editors template tools. A great web editor that allows easy template editing is Dreamweaver.
Choosing a Template
Tips When Choosing a Template:
- Make sure the colors don't clash
- Make sure it's user-friendly and easy to navigate
- Always pick templates that are easy on the eyes
- It's very important to make sure it's readable to all audiences (eg colorblind people) - use this free tool Colorblind Filter
A Reference List of Website Template Sites
- Template Monster
- FreeWebsiteTemplates
- Templates
- Templates Box
- Free Site Templates
- Steve's Templates
- Template4All
- mytemplatez
- Andreas Vik Lund's Templates
- webs
Alternative:
Have you ever wanted a template which was being used by another website? I think all of us have. Honestly, as long as you get that website's permission you can use it. These steps will walk you through the process:
- Start FireFox (works best with FireFox)
- Locate the website you want the template from
- While on their homepage hold CTRL+S - this saves the page and it's contents (including images, ads, flash and even their css files)
- Save it to your desired location on your machine
- Using a web editor such as NVU (it's free) open it up the website's homepage
- Edit what you desire...
Setting up a Blog
If you're wanting to create a blog which is hosted with Example.com and not eaxample.host.com than you're going to need to pay for a domain name and depending on the host you pick, hosting as well. It is possible to buy a domain name and then use free hosting with WordPress or even Blogger.
- How to Create a Free Blog on Blogger I Blogspot Platform
When you setup a free account with one of these services they host all your content. This means pictures, blog posts, videos, comments and everything else! So if you decide to choose free hosting, keep in mind that there are dangerous. One of the main dangers is losing your content if anything was to happen to your blog's host (Word Press, or Blogger) such as going bankrupt or just simply shutting down. However, the chances of either of these things happening are very slim, but you should always take into account these dangers.
If you decide you want to setup an independent blog without one of the above hosting companies you're going to need a domain name such as my-blog.com and then some hosting company to host it. After picking your domain name and choosing your web host you should look into picking a free blogging CMS (content management system). In fact, even if you choose not to host with WordPress you can still download their open source (it's free) CMS software for your independent blog. If you need help installing WordPress's CMS make sure to check out our Setting up WordPress page.
Best of Both Worlds a Website and a Blog
If you want to create a blog and website... go for it! In fact, it's probably only going to benefit your website's success! Search engines love new content, and what's a better way to give them new content then to create a blog? Another important of implementing a blog into a website is giving your visitors a reason to check back periodically, or daily depending on the frequency of your blog's updates. Just remember that you should always keep your blog's content relevant to your website's topic.
How to Setup a Custom WordPress CMS on Your Website
If you've decided to host your own WordPress blog on your own web host you're going to need to download the CMS software. Click the blue download button. This will begin the download. When the download is complete you're going to want to extract the contents onto your desktop.
After installing FileZilla connect with your login credentials. An example of logging in with correct credentials is shown below:
protocal://user:pass@host:port
Now you need to locate your websites root directory, or whatever directory you're installing the WordPress script to. Now drag all the files which you extracted in the previous step and wait until the transfer is complete.
Now head over to your web host control panel and create a new database. All control panels are different in some shape or form. Contact your webhost and ask them how to create a database if you're unsure.
Now open up your favorite browser and go to this url:
http://your-website.com/directory_wordpress_is_in/wp-admin/install.php
Fill in the correct credentials including your database's name, password and a prefix. The prefix is something that is applied to all the tables in the database to keep content organized if you only have one database for all your web applications. If you don't decide to use a prefix leave that blank.
Now click submit and continue.
You should now have your own version of WordPress installed on your web hosting account. Make a note of your admin password. This is very important! The username for the admin panel is always going to be admin. To access the admin's control panel navigate this URL in your browser:
http://website.com/directory_wordpress_is_in/wp-admin/
Login with the correct credentials and change the password immediately!
This concludes our tutorial on setting up a custom WordPress CMS on your very own website.
If you're just starting to dvelop websites and aren't sure what website editing software to use, you should look into some free WYSIWG (what you see is what you get) website editor. This type of editor is very similar to Microsoft Office... you see the results instantly and can edit in real time. A great WYSIWG editor and code editor is NVU. NVU is comparable to some of the most advanced editors such as Adobe DreamWeaver and is easy to use! You can download it for free here.
- Adobe DreamWeaver
If you're an experienced webmaster an are looking for slightly more features and a more advanced layout I'd suggest Adobe DreamWeaver. This software has the power to create any website in PHP, HTML, XML, Javascript and more in less time. You can even manage and create web applications such as FaceBook in side of DreamWeaver. You can try Adobe's 30 free trial here.
- SeaMonkey Composer
This editor was built off of Mozilla and therefore is free to use. The Sea Monkey is a all in one internet application suite provides an easy and free to use HTML Editor. SeoMonkey can be downloaded here.
- Notepad++
Notepad++ is a all in one code editor. This includes lanuages such as PHP, HTML, Java and more. Some it's features incldue:
Split Screen
Drag and Drop
Zooming
Color coded text
Code Search
Linking Your Domain Name to Your Host (What to Do After Buying Your Domain Name)
Things You Should Already Have...
1. Already have a domain name
In our article we're assuming you've already registered a domain name. If you haven't and you'd like to register a domain name head over to GoDaddy and register one. For more information on Registering a Domain.
2. You already have a web hosting account
We're also assuming you've already registered with a web host, for more information on the process of choosing a web hos.
Steps to Connecting Your Domain to Your Hosting Account
Step 1
Our first matter of buisness is to login to our web host control panel and locate our Name server list. Generally you'll find four name servers, they may follow or look similar this format:
NS1.webhost.com
NS2.webhost.com
NS3.webhost.com
NS4.webhost.com
If you can't find your name servers contact your webhost and they'll give them to you.
After finding these nameservers copy them to NotePad, we'll be using them in
Step 2
Alright, you're ready to link your domain to your hosting company. This process is fairly simple and shouldn't take more than 15 minutes. To begin you need identify which registstration website you registered your domain name with (eg GoDaddy.com). Almost all domain registration companies offer a control panel to modfiy certain criteria relating to your domain name. If you're unsure of how to access this control panel make sure to contact your domain register or ask them to change your nameservers.
- you can change your nameservers.
Inside your domain control panel there should be a bunch of different options. We're looking for our Name server options.
After locating where you can edit your name servers copy and paste your name server in their approriet order.
Now save your chagnes. You've successfully linked your domain name to your webhost, congratualations!
How to Create a SiteMap
Every website needs a SiteMap for the search engines. If you're confused on the terminology, a sitemap is a set of links for search engines, such as Google or Bing, to crawl. For example, let's say Tony has a website all about physical exercise and it's hundreds of pages of content. Tony wants more search engine traffic. So Tony decides to make it easier for the search engines to find all his pages. He creates a single page containing all of his website's urls (automatic sitemap generator). He then visited an online sitemap submitter and submitted his sitemap to all the major search engines. In a couple of hours Google and Bing followed the links inside of his website's sitemap and he now he receives over 200% more web traffic.
Way to Create and Submit a Sitemap
Step 1:
Visit this link here to get started. Give the form your starting url, change frequency (how often you update your content), last modification and then priority. Click the start button to begin the SM (sitemap) submission. After it gives you a download link download it and then upload it to your webhost www root directory or htdocs.
Step 2:
Assuming you've completed step 1 and have uploaded your sitemap to your root directory you're ready to submit your sitemap. Fortunately, there's an automated process for this to. Click here to submit your sitemap. After following this procedure you should results in the enxt few days if not hours. To find out how many pages Google has indexed of any particular website, type site:example.com and then hit enter performing a Google search.
Submitting to Search Engines
Submit-to-the-search-engines submitting to search engines is a crucial part in creating a successful website. Every website starting is like a small city (the buildings being web pages of course) in the middle of nowhere. For cars to access this city it needs to have roads, in other words you need links linking to your website. In our case it's Google (and all the other search engines) indexing your web pages and creating those links.
The process of submitting websites to search engines is pretty easy and extremely fast, this is... when you're using an automated service. In our case we're going to be using a free service called Free Web Submission. Free Web Submission is a free service (obviously) that provides a free search engine submission of the website of your choice. Click here to access their website (opens in a new tab).
Scroll down to the bottom of the web page to where it says, "Free Web Submission". This form walks you through the process of submitting your website to over 50 search engines. After clicking the obnoxious "Submit Your Site" image, it may take several minutes to submit your website, give it time to do it's thing. After it's finished submitting your website it may take up to a full month before each search engine has your website indexed. After that you should start seeing a traffic increase!
If you're interested in obtaining even more traffic make sure to check out our article on Building Backlinks and how it can double if not quadruple your traffic!
How to Insert Meta Tags
What are Meta Tags?
Meta tags are different header tags that describe or list relative keywords that relate to the content of a particular page.
Most search engines, such as Google, use these meta tags to display a description of a webpage in a web search. An example image of a meta description being used by Google:
If we investigate their homepage we see that their description tag corresponds to their Google description:
How to Use Meta Tags
Meta Description
First pick one of your web pages and open it up in your favorite editor. Inside the <head></head> tags insert the below meta description tag:
Meta Keywords
Insert the below HTMl code into your head tags. You can have as many keywords as you want and you can even have phrases of keywords.
How to Create a Guest Book
In 2 Steps...
If you're a small business and would like to give your visitors an option to sharing their thoughts and questions, a guest book is a perfect idea script to have. Guest Books are easier to install and gives any web site a nice community feature.
Requirements:
- Domain Name
- Web Host
- CGI Bin/Access
Step 1: Create a Web Form
Create a web form named guestbook.html with the following code replacing the addresses and folders according to your criteria.
Step 2: Creating a File
Now create a file called guestbook.cgi inside your cgi directory. Usually this folder is located in your htdocs or WWW directory. Now copy and paste the below code into your guestbook.cgi file using a web editor. If the script isn't working properly make sure that the perl path, on line 1, is correct.
Note: Make sure you set your file permission correctly on your cgi file and html file.
Congress, you've successfully created your very own online guest book. Feel free to ask any questions.
How to Setup a Site Manager for Your Dreamweaver Website
Site Managers are very important when creating large scale web applications, or websites, and need a way to keep content organized. Another important aspect of having a site manager corresponding to your website is being able to create website templates.
First open up your copy of Dreamweaver CS4 or CS5, it doesn't matter what version you're using as long as you have the site option. At the top of the screen on the main menu script there’s a menu option called "Site". If nothing has been changed it's the 8th item on the menu list. Click this.
site-menu-item
Now click the first item on the menu strip, which should be "New Site". If it's not, locate it on the menu strip.
Create-new-dreamweaver-site
They're two different pages on this window. Make sure you're on the Basic option. It should say "Basic" and "Advanced" on the top of the window.
The first field we have to specify is our website's name. In our case it's going to be "Example Website".
We now have to stipulate our website's web address. This should be your test server's address. If you haven't read our Setup a Test Server tutorial make sure to! If you're running a local test server give that address. If you followed our server setup tutorial this url should be:
http://localhost/
Now we're going to hit the "Next" button.
The next page asks us for if we're going to use server side technology. In our case we're going to select No. Click "Next".
Now DreamWeaver is asking for us to provide the place our website's files are going to be stored in. In our case it's going to be our desktop. However, if you followed the above tutorial you could use (we highly suggest this):
c:/xampp/htdocs/
Dreamweaver-setup-website
The Next page askes us if we want to directly update our files via to FTP, Webdav or Local Network in other words, "Remote Setup". We're going to select Local Network. Give the same folder you gave in the previous step. Then click "Next". Now review what you just created and click "Done"!
Dreamweaver-remote-setup-site-manager
Assuming you've successfully followed the above steps, you've created your very first website with DreamWeaver's Site Manager! You're now ready to start creating content.
Building Backlinks
What's a Backlink
A backlink is a link. The reason it's specifically called a backlink however, is because it's a link that links to another site. For example, let's say a dog training website linked to a cat training website. The cat training site would receive the backlink. Now what's so important about having these links? One of the major aspects of having back links is for the search engines. Google, and other big search engines, take into account how they rank a certain site by how many backlinks they posses. Your back links mostly affect your page rank. A page rank is something Google uses to determine your websites position on a certain term or keyword query (for more SEO Terminology). This is, "in basic terms" what a backlink is, and why they're useful.
5 Tips on How to Get Backlinks
Tip 1 - Submitting to Directories
Building a list of backlinks through directories, such as DMOZ or The Alma Public Directory, is an easy way to build some extra linkage. Building links through high page ranked directories can improve your PR (page rank). Although, we should warn you that if you have backlinks from smaller directories that have low or even no PR your bound to lose respect. With this said CreateWebsite.cc encourages you to submit to all the high ranked directories and avoid the others. An awesome free tool that will submit your website to the major directories automatically is EasySubmits.
Tip 2 - Blog Linking
If you're avid towards blogging and enjoy reading other blogs, comment including your blog's link. Remember never to just comment to get an extra backlink, always comment on blogs you're genuinely are interested in. Don't just do it because they have a page rank of seven. Keep in mind that most blogs have auto spam filtering systems and have moderators. Don't lose your opportunity to get an extra back link because you wanted to create a quick link.
The Downfall
Unfortunately, some blogs prohibit do follow links. This means search engines aren't allowed to crawl these links and it won't count towards your back link building. The majority of blogs do this to prevent juice exchange. The main reason people do this is to keep their PR juice. This is what keeps blogs ranking high on search query's. If you're wanting to try this tip click here for a list of do follow blogs that will give you some extra back links plus some PR juice.
Show Nofollow Tool
If you're interested seeing if your blog or some other blog has Nofollow links you can download a free toolbar called SEOmoz. Read all about it here.
Tip 3 - Forums
Forums have been around almost since the beginning the WWW. A simple yet proficient way of answering and asking questions. Many forums today offer signatures which provides' it's users a place to embed their website's URL. This counts as a back link. This doesn't only have to affect your backlinks. Forums are a great way to earn human credibility. If you provide helpful content which strikes curiosity into the people you've helped your gaining credibility. This generally results with a few click throughs.
Click here for an awesome list of do follow forums in niche categorization.
Tip 4 - Guest Posting
This tip only applies if you own a blog. Guest posting can be one of the most powerful ways to substantially increase website traffic, especially if your consistently doing it.
Novice Blogging/Website
In the beginning of your blog's or website's life it's very important to guest post (more important for a blog than website). Posting on other blogs (preferably bigger blogs) can earn you and your blog/website some decent respect. If your content is well constructed and is compelling to read you're highly likely to build a small group of readers just from that single post. It's key to aim for the highest quality content you can possibly write when guest posting. This will boost your chances of online success.
Tip 5 - Social Bookmarking
Social bookmarking is probably the easiest way to get some extra back links. The only down side is that it takes time to submit to hundreds of social bookmarking websites. A proficient and legal way of doing this is installing a social bookmark toolbar. An excellent toolbar to use is called AddThis. They provide the biggest social bookmarking websites in a convenient toolbar button. This enables you to rapidly share pages without having to visit each and every URL separately. You can download the AddThis toolbar here.
If you want more tips on building backlinks make sure to check out our article on 10 Easy Tips to Build Traffic.
SEO Explanation
SEO stands for search engine optimization. An example of correct context is, "That site could use some SEO.". SEO is used to increase a website's visibility to the search engines (Google, Yahoo, Bing etc). This is done by backlinks (other sites linking to yours) to your website, having quality content, relevant meta tags and several other aspects.
An Example of SEO
Let's suppose Eddie had a wesbite called eddies-cup-cakes.net. He does a quick Google search and finds that his site is on the second page of Google. This upsets Eddie so he decides to look up SEO and how to apply it. He finds out that having other relevant sites linking to his will increase his PR (page ranking), and over all increase his SERP (search engine results page) placement. So he links his website to several other cup cake websites. A few weeks later he checks on his Google page placement and finds he's the third result in the search query.
Page Rank
A website's page rank is determined by a complex algorithm (click here to view an example). It determines your SERP (search engine results page) placement and the quality of a website. The algorithm also makes calculations and determines how valuable and credible your content is. One of its ways is seeing if any websites/pages are linking to your pages. (That's why it's always good to submit your content to social news networks (Digg, Reddit Delicious etc).) It measures a website's popularity with a number 1-10 (If you're a 0 your website isn't even taken into account). If you want to find out your Google PR ranking download this free toolbar by Google.
What each ranking means:
SERP
SERP stands for Search Engine Results Page. It's the display of different pages from a particular set of kaywords. The SERP algorithm is determined by a websites PR and several other factors.