How To Create a Website: A Short Checklist

Decide what you want to sell / write about

This is easy enough if you are already operating a physical business, however if you fall in to the category of new found internet entrepreneur, deciding on a topic can be hard. For the new guy, I recommend always that you focus on a topic you are genuinely interested in or know a fair bit about. This is because in order for a blog to genuinely succeed online, you need to be able to portray you are an expert on a certain subject. In effect, you need to have credibility.

Look up domain names

Looking up domain names is easy. I always just go to 123-reg and use the Google Keyword Tool to find solid domain names which will rank quickly and garner traffic without promotion, however sometimes a catchy, short and brandable name is best. I chose Technology Blogged because it says exactly what we cover, and that’ technology. And it is ‘blogged’. The best domain extensions are .com, .co.uk, .org and .net.

Register your domain name

Following the steps on a domain registrars website, you need to open up an account and provide all the usual personal information before you can effectively register a domain. Once set up, you can purchase domain names for a number of years for a certain amount up front, allowing you to stay safe in the knowledge that your domain name will not run out.

Seek a hosting provider

Ahh, the hosting provider. I always say that for the best hosts for a website, you should check out reviews and make a personal decision as to where your website should live. I good bet for anybody looking for a host is to run a web hosting comparison. If you have a friend with a server though, you are quids in. We use Heart Internet here and so far their support has been next to excellent.

Look for the ideal website CMS

A lot of hosting providers now allow you to build your own website using their own system, and they will show you how to create a website. There are quite a few companies offering decent website systems, an example being WebEden which is a simple to use website builder. For others, though, this quick set up isn’t ideal and for blogs I always recommend the WordPress script, which is easily integrated through the majority of host providers control panels.

Write your website content

When launching a website, I always build the content to around 100 pages / posts before I allow it to be seen by the search engines. This is so Google and the search engines get a solid idea as to what my website is about straight away, putting on file the fact that my website talks a lot about this subject, so must mean something to somebody. In the long run, make sure you add tons of content to your website and remember, an non-updated website will not be updated in the search engine rankings.

Put your website live

Once you have followed the above, you should put your website live. Now if this were me, the website would already be ‘on the internet’ but invisible to the search engines, so putting it live simply means flicking a switch to make your blog do follow.

Done!

If you need me to clarify anything regarding the above, drop me a comment below. Otherwise, enjoy!

Now comes the marketing bit, SEO

In order to gain traffic to a website, I always make sure that my website is fully optimized for the keywords I am going to be targeting in the search engines. This means that page titles need to be completed, all meta descriptions filled in, and all meta keywords filled out just to be consistent. Other must do’s include having robots.txt on your web page, and an XML sitemap submitted to Google webmaster tools. So, just to clarify:

- Get your website fully optimized; page titles, meta decriptions, meta keywords, robots.txt and XML sitemap all need to be done.

- Submit your XML sitemap to Google

As an online marketer by another trade though, a well optimized website is only half a job. In order for a website to be fully effective in the search engines, you need to do some link building or outsource it to a specialist SEO company. For me, I never outsource, but for others this may be the logical scenario.

There are a couple of tools I have used in order to link build to Technology Blogged and my businesses, and ones you should check out include:

- Fast Directory Submitter (free until you upgrade, but there is no obligation)

- Drip Feed Blasts (not as effective now with the PANDA update, but solid enough for volume forum links)

- Synnd (the debate is still out on this web-based social bookmarking automating software, but I like it a lot. Also handles Facebook likes and Google+)

And the most effective link building tool….

Create solid, link worthy content. If your content is good enough you shouldn’t have to worry about building links yourself, however if you do not add 5 – 10 pages per day to your site full of informative info that people will WANT to link build to, you’ll need to link build.

Anyway, this is just a little section added as per a suggestion from user comments below. Enjoy!