Chime School

Posts Tagged ‘internet’

So you think you want to start up a website.  In prior posts I discussed choosing a domain name and creation of web pages.  Now let’s talk a little about hosting:  Choosing a hosting plan is a primary step in launching your fledgling web presence.

The next step after creating your website is to make it live on the internet, or publish it.  In order to do so, you will need a hosting plan.  By purchasing a domain name you have branded, or named your website.  You own the name, but now you must pay rent to someone to actually get your website online.  In it’s simplest terms a hosting plan is paying a company to broadcast your website onto the internet.  The key considerations for choosing a good hosting plan will be discussed here.

SERVICE  The number one thing to look for in a hosting plan is service.  Bells and whistles and fancy features will do you no good if you can’t get customer service in a timely fashion.  Once your website is live on the internet you will want it to be up all the time.  Strategically the best thing you can do for your website upfront is to choose a hosting company that is reliable in terms of customer service as well as “uptime”.

UPTIME  Does the hosting provider you are considering offer an “uptime guarantee? Many guarantee 99% uptime for their servers.  Even at 99% average uptime it can mean that your website will be off the internet for over 7 hours per month. If at all possible, choose a host guaranteeing up to 99.9% uptime.

SIZE  What size, or how many pages will the website have?  Most hosting providers set the pricing on their hosting plans according to the space taken up on their servers by the website.  Most websites do not require much space but if you’re planning on having a large site with a lot of multimedia content or an ecommerce site selling multiple items, you’ll probably need additional disk space on your hosting plan.

LINUX OR WINDOWS  This question refers to the operating systems available for hosting and which one to choose.  This question has no relevance to the brand of operating system you are using on your computer.  What programming language was used in the Web site design?  For example, if you designed a website using ASP or ASP.NET, you’ll need to find a Windows hosting plan. If you have a Web site that uses CGI or PHP, you’ll need to get a Linux hosting plan.  Note that if you are simply publishing a basic html website, the choice of hosting Operating system won’t really matter as much until you get into more advanced languages such as PHP or ASP.

TRAFFIC  How much traffic or how many visitors do you expect monthly?  Most hosting providers sell their hosting plans on a sliding scale according to bandwith usage.  The more visitors or traffic you expect on your site, the higher the bandwidth you will need, and the more the plan will cost.  The best advice here is to start off with a low cost, low bandwidth plan and upgrade it later as the traffic to your website grows.

SHARED OR DEDICATED HOSTING  Whether or not to choose shared hosting over dedicated hosting comes down to the following:  A shared hosting plan is exactly as it sounds, and means that your website will be stored on a server along with lots of other websites.  In this hosting format you generally have no ability to make changes to the resident software on the system, meaning you cannot change or upgrade the operating system, or the database management system, etc.  You will have to work within the software structure provided by the hosting company.  Dedicated or virtual dedicated hosting is different in the sense that you will have full control over the environment that your website resides in, and you will have the only access to that space.  In other words, you would determine what operating system to use, what type database management software, what type of blog software, what type shopping cart, etc., etc.  This type of hosting is definitely geared to the more advanced user, and usually you won’t be able to get as much customer support because it will be a custom setup.  The bottom line:  start off with shared hosting if you are a beginner, until you are advanced enough to progress to your own controlled dedicated hosting environment.

At StartYourWebsiteToday.com our uptime guarantee is 99.9% and we offer 24/7 customer service.  We also have a selection of shared, dedicated, and virtual dedicated hosting plans to suit all budgets and sizes and types of websites. To review the options we offer, click HERE: Hosting plans.

Hosting plan choice is a major step when you choose to start up a website.  In prior posts I discussed choosing a domain name and creation of web pages.  Which brings the subject of hosting into play:  Early on in your decision making process, you will want to shop for a hosting plan.

Once your website has been created, it is time to make it go live on the internet.  Publishing to the internet involves getting a hosting plan.  A hosting plan is different from a domain name.  You own your domain name but you rent a hosting plan.  In it’s simplest terms a hosting plan is paying a company to broadcast your website onto the internet.  Let’s go over some of the key important factors to consider when choosing a hosting plan:

SERVICE  The most important consideration is the level of service provided.  Bells and whistles and fancy features will do you no good if you can’t get customer service in a timely fashion.  If your website is not available on the internet you are losing opportunities to connect with customers.  Strategically the best thing you can do for your website upfront is to choose a hosting company that is reliable in terms of customer service as well as “uptime”.

UPTIME  What is the hosting company’s “uptime guarantee”? The better hosting providers will offer up to 99% uptime.  Even at 99% average uptime it can mean that your website will be off the internet for over 7 hours per month. If at all possible, choose a host guaranteeing up to 99.9% uptime.

SIZE  How large is your site?  Most hosting providers set the pricing on their hosting plans according to the space taken up on their servers by the website.  Most websites do not require much space but if you’re planning on having a large site with a lot of multimedia content or an ecommerce site selling multiple items, you’ll probably need additional disk space on your hosting plan.

LINUX OR WINDOWS  This question refers to the operating systems available for hosting and which one to choose.  This question has no relevance to the brand of operating system you are using on your computer.  What programming language was used in the Web site design?  For example, if you designed a website using ASP or ASP.NET, you’ll need to find a Windows hosting plan. If you have a Web site that uses CGI or PHP, you’ll need to get a Linux hosting plan.  Note that if you are simply publishing a basic html website, the choice of hosting Operating system won’t really matter as much until you get into more advanced languages such as PHP or ASP.

TRAFFIC  Will you be expecting lots of visitors to your website?  Most hosting providers sell their hosting plans on a sliding scale according to bandwith usage.  The more visitors or traffic you expect on your site, the higher the bandwidth you will need, and the more the plan will cost.  The best advice here is to start off with a low cost, low bandwidth plan and upgrade it later as the traffic to your website grows.

SHARED OR DEDICATED HOSTING  Whether or not to choose shared hosting over dedicated hosting comes down to the following:  First a brief description of shared hosting, which is sharing space on a server with dozens or perhaps hundreds of other websites.  The main factor here is that you will have no control over the operating system, database structure, etc., and will have to work within the structure setup by the hosting provider.  Dedicated or virtual dedicated hosting is different in the sense that you will have full control over the environment that your website resides in, and you will have the only access to that space.  Dedicated server hosting gives you full control over setup of the operating system and auxilliary programs such as database management or shopping cart or database management software.  This type of hosting is definitely geared to the more advanced user, and usually you won’t be able to get as much customer support because it will be a custom setup.  The best advice I can give to the newbie is to use shared hosting at first, until you gain more experience and abilities and are ready to take the plunge into something as advanced as dedicated hosting.

At StartYourWebsiteToday.com our uptime guarantee is 99.9% and we offer 24/7 customer service.  The hosting plans that are offered include a variety: shared hosting, virtual dedicated hosting, and dedicated hosting plans with either Linux or Windows operating systems for every need and budget ranging from the small personal website to large online multimedia sites to those interested in ecommerce website building. To see what is available, click HERE: Hosting plans.

A crucial building block in setting up a website is the registration of a domain name.  Whether you are building a site to advertise your local business, an e-commerce site, photo or video or music download site, information site, or if you want to start up a website to display photos of your newborn online, the entire enterprise begins with the registration of a domain name.

The next logical question you might ask- “What makes the best domain name choice?”.  There are various factors to take into consideration.  For example, if you are someone who wants to build a website devoted to your hobby, then the answer is that the choice of a domain name really doesn’t matter.  Why not?  Because in a case like that you probably don’t really care about gaining a lot of traffic to your website, friends and family are your target audience, to let them know about the latest goings on.  In a case like this, it does not matter whatsoever if you find a domain name like “cindyshomeontheweb.me” or not, since most likely you will only be giving out the domain name to a few friends and family and maybe Aunt Tilly in Toledo.   

The point is that in a case like this, there is no real concern with getting a lot of visitors to the website other than friends and family and coworkers, so there is no real harm in naming the website ANYTHING, because you will be giving out the website address to a select few people.  BUT……

What if you want as much traffic to your website as possible?  What if you are looking for business on the internet?

It really can bring huge dividends to have a domain name that draws attention to your company name and website.  Put some thought into how people search.  For example, if your company sells insurance or doughnuts or bowling pins or toilet bowls, find a way to incorporate WHAT YOU DO in the website domain name.  So be sure and choose carefully when deciding on a domain name.  Best case scenario is to get the name of your business as a dot com or dot net, etc.  In lieu of that, at least try to get the category of business that you are in incorporated in your domain name.  For example, a car parts website should have a domain name like carparts.com or bobsautoparts.com, something that immediately associates the domain name with the theme of the site.  It’s all about branding, and making a lasting impression on the target audience or customers.

You can find domain names by checking the WhoIs database on the internet.  I have conveniently placed a domain name search engine on StartYourWebsiteToday.com for this very purpose.  When searching for the domain name, you will instantly know whether or not the domain name is available, and if so, give you the option to immediately register it.  If it’s not available, several alternative domain names will be proposed, to help you fine tune your search, or possibly giving you an acceptable alternative domain name to register instead.

The preliminary step to start up a website is the choice of a domain name.  Whether you are building a site to advertise your local business, an e-commerce site, photo or video or music download site, information site, or if you want to start up a website to display photos of your newborn online, the entire enterprise begins with the registration of a domain name.

But you might ask- “What makes the best choice of domain name?”.  Well, what type of website are you planning on publishing?  For example, if you are someone who wants to build a website devoted to your hobby, then your choice of a domain name really doesn’t matter.  Why not?  Most likely in that circumstance you’re not looking for tons of traffic, you’re really only targeting friends and family, to keep them up to date.  You could pick something really obscure, something unique to you and your family, from the sublime to the ridiculous, and it won’t matter because you are not necessarily looking for great amounts of traffic to your site.   

The point is that in a case like this, there is no real concern with getting a lot of visitors to the website other than friends and family and coworkers, so there is no real harm in naming the website ANYTHING, because you will be giving out the website address to a select few people.  BUT……

What if the website is for business?  What if you want it to attract attention?

It pays to have a domain name that drives traffic to your site or business.  Depending on the type of business, an electrical contractor for example, would people look for your electrical contracting business online if your website had an obscure name like “bills-business.com?  So be sure and choose carefully when deciding on a domain name.  Best case scenario is to get the name of your business as a dot com or dot net, etc.  In lieu of that, at least try to get the category of business that you are in incorporated in your domain name.  For example, a jewelry website should have a domain name like jewelry.com or jensjewelry.com, something that immediately associates the domain name with the theme of the site.  It’s all about branding, and making a lasting impression on the target audience or customers.

You need to search the WhoIs database to find a domain name that has not already been registered.  For a quick search of your desired domain name, I have conveniently placed a domain name search engine on StartYourWebsiteToday.com for this very purpose.  When searching for the domain name, the results given will instantly show whether or not the domain name is available, and if so, give you the option to immediately register it.  If it’s not available, several alternative domain names will be proposed, to help you fine tune your search, or possibly giving you an acceptable alternative domain name to register instead.

Are you already blogging?  Are you doing it for fun or do you try to make money from home out of blogging?  Either one, the most important factor for anyone blogging is the audience traffic.  So how do you ensure your blog attract good traffic?

The rule is simple really.Keep posting good content to your blog.Content that help your visitor in one way or another.  This will make the visitor appreciate your effort in trying to provide useful information to them, and thus making them a loyal audience.  They will defintely follow your blog progress.

The way you layout your blog is very important.Blog that are poorly designed and have good content is of no use.You need not pay a boom to churn out good clean looking blog.There are many free tools that you can use to design and create good looking blog.

Even after you have a clean looking blog that contain great content, it is still not enough.You have to contend with millions and millions of othe web sites owners to grab a piece of the pie.This is tough, and the reality is that if your blog do not appear in the first 10 positions of the web search engine, then the chances are that your superb blog will never get anyone audience.  There are many ways to get your blog to the top of the search engine such as maximising keyword suggestion tool for traffic promotion.But, there are no short cuts at all.  Gaining credibility and ranking for your blog is a long drawn process.Using legitimate SEO methods you can speed up the process.  The process on its own may take years to happen, but with the right SEO technique, you can potentially shorten it to months.  What are you thinking about?  Nope, there is NO short cuts at all. But put in the efforts and you will be duely rewarded.

This series of posts is for the person asking “How do I start my own website?”.  To begin with:  Strategic planning and long term vision will serve you best in your choice of domain names.  One of the best things you can do for your fledgling website is to bestow it with an appropriate, catchy, easy to remember domain name. Hopefully at this stage of the game you already know that Search Engine placement is critical to getting visitors to your website.  Among other factors, the domain name you choose will help you in getting to the “top of the charts”.

OK, so now you’ve found the domain name you want, but someone else owns it.  Is it still possible to buy it?  Possibly.  It’s possible, but there are some things to consider.  However, with a little luck and enginuity you can still possibly register that coveted domain name even if someone has beaten you to the punch.  Instead, let’s check out some alternative strategies to get the domain name you want:

Hyphenated Names One strategy to consider if the domain name you want is already taken would be to hyphenate it, as in turning ricksantiqueshop.com into ricks-antique-shop.com.  Is hyphenating the best way to go?  Maybe, maybe not.  If you are dealing with an already well known name, generally the answer would be no, as most web surfers would usually just enter the non-hyphenated version in, and end up at your competitors’ website instead.  Not the desired result!  Word to the wise: keep the domain name as short as possible.  The longer the name, especially with dashes in between words, the more likely that potential visitors to your site will enter it incorrectly into their browsers, thus foiling the chances of them visiting your website and costing you customers!  So, the shorter the better.  Another school of thought: IF the web domain you want is already taken, IF the owner of the domain name won’t give it up, and IF the website associated with it is non-existent or poorly designed with low traffic, hyphenating the name might make sense after all.  But be careful:  the last thing you want is to cause internet domain name confusion because you have decided on a domain name registration that is so close to a major competitor’s name that you end up losing business to them.

Longer or Shorter?  You can purchase domain names up to 67 characters in length.  At 63 characters, thelongestdomainnameintheworldandthensome
andthensomemoreandmore.com claims to be the longest domain name in the world, and it may very well be.  Can you envision anyone wanting to type it into their browser?  My website is www.StartYourWebsiteToday.com    When choosing my domain name I wanted something that in a few words would tell the web surfer what to expect from my website.  Good name selection can be helpful also with search engine ranking.  You will want to definitely keep the name as short and sweet as possible, but at the same time let the visitor know what to expect when he surfs to your website.  Keep it as short as possible.

Brand Name or Generic  Should you give your website a descriptive generic name or do you want to use a brand name?  If your business is known by a brand name, and it is a well known name, of course it is the best possible strategy to try to register that domain name.  For instance, Nike.com is a well known brand name site, although there is nothing in the domain name to suggest that it is a site about shoes.  Still, Nike is such a well known brand name to the public that people automatically know what they will be shopping for when they get there.  If your brand name is well known, definitely try to obtain your brand name as a domain name.  But if your company is Nike or Coca Cola or Budweiser don’t discount the idea of buying the domain name shoes.com or soda.com or beer.com if they are available as well.  People often search the web using generic terms, more so even than brand names.  A person is more likely to search the internet with generic terms like shoes or footwear or sneakers than to search by a single brand name, even one as big as Nike.  So if possible cover all the bases.  You can have as many domain names as you want pointing to a single website, so the more generic terms you can acquire that directly describe your business, the better.   A generic name if your business is new or not yet well known can get great results, if you can find a good one.  To start your search for your own unique domain name, here is a link to a domain name search engine.  Good website design begins always with the wise choice of a domain name. 

This series of posts is for the person asking “How do I start my own website?”.  To begin with:  Have you thought about your long term plans for your website?  Doing so will be a great advantage in determining the best possible domain name.  One of the best things you can do for your fledgling website is to bestow it with an appropriate, catchy, easy to remember domain name. Good search engine optimization, or SEO, begins with domain name selection.  Not to mention your positioning and branding with your customer.

OK, so now you’ve found the domain name you want, but someone else owns it.  Can you still get it?  Well, let’s consider that.  It’s possible, but there are conditions.  With some research and hard work you can get the domain name you want even if it is already spoken for.  There are other ways to get the domain name you want:

Hyphenated Names Sometimes it is a good strategy to just take the same domain name and hyphenate it as in turning bobsautoparts.com into bobs-auto-parts.com.  Is it always the best strategy?  Yes and no.  If you are dealing with an already well known name, generally the answer would be no, as most web surfers would usually just enter the non-hyphenated version in, and end up at your competitors’ website instead.  Not the desired result!  Also, the longer the name you have chosen, the more tedious and error prone it becomes for the surfer to type in the name correctly, again foiling the chances that they will end up at your website.  So keep it short.  But if the name you have chosen is already taken and there is no chance of getting it from it’s owner, and the owner either has no website or a poorly designed one with little traffic, this can be a good strategy in purchasing a name.  But be careful:  the last thing you want is to cause internet domain name confusion because you have decided on a domain name registration that is so close to a major competitor’s name that you end up losing business to them.

Longer or Shorter?  You can purchase domain names up to 67 characters in length.  You could purchase a domain name like thelongestdomainnameintheworldandthensome
andthensomemoreandmore.com which is 63 characters long, but why would you want to do that?  Who would want to type it into a browser?  My website is www.StartYourWebsiteToday.com  and has a domain name that tells what kind of website you will be surfing to.  Good name selection can be helpful also with search engine ranking.  When choosing your domain name try to keep it short and concise, and if at all possible let the name tell the story of the site.  Remember, keep it short!

Brand Name or Generic  Whether or not to call your website by a brand name or to make the name a more generic description of your business online is the question.  If your business is known by a brand name, and it is a well known name, of course it is the best possible strategy to try to register that domain name.  For instance, Nike.com is a well known brand name site, although there is nothing in the domain name to suggest that it is a site about shoes.  Still, Nike is such a well known brand name to the public that people automatically know what they will be shopping for when they get there.  If your brand name is well known, definitely try to obtain your brand name as a domain name.  But if your company is Nike or Coca Cola or Budweiser don’t discount the idea of buying the domain name shoes.com or soda.com or beer.com if they are available as well.  People often search the web using generic terms, more so even than brand names.  A person is more likely to search the internet with generic terms like shoes or footwear or sneakers than to search by a single brand name, even one as big as Nike.  So if possible cover all the bases.  You can have as many domain names as you want pointing to a single website, so the more generic terms you can acquire that directly describe your business, the better.   A generic name if your business is new or not yet well known can get great results, if you can find a good one.  To start your search for your own unique domain name, here is a link to a domain name search engine.  Good website design begins always with the wise choice of a domain name. 

You may be asking yourself “How do I start my own website?”.  Well, for starters:  What do you want your website to portray?  Thoughtful consideration of your website’s future direction will help you in deciding on the optimum domain name for your site.  Careful consideration of your website’s domain name can pay off in dividends once your website is published online. Fine tuning your choice and thinking it through will help secure good placement with search engines and in the minds of your potential visitors/customers.

OK, so now you’ve found the domain name you want, but someone else owns it.  Can you still get it?  It’s Possible.  It’s possible, but there are conditions.  However, with a little luck and enginuity you can still possibly register that coveted domain name even if someone has beaten you to the punch.  But for now, lets look at some alternatives to getting that domain name you want:

Hyphenated Names If the domain name you want is already taken, consider hyphenating it, as in taking billsplumbingsupplies.com and making it bills-plumbing-supplies.com.  Is hyphenating the best way to go?  Maybe, maybe not.  For example, if the domain name you want is already taken AND well known, most likely this is not a good idea, because most web surfers would likely just type the non-hyphenated version into their browsers and thus could end up at your competitor’s website.  Not the desired result!  Word to the wise: keep the domain name as short as possible.  The longer the name, especially with dashes in between words, the more likely that potential visitors to your site will enter it incorrectly into their browsers, thus foiling the chances of them visiting your website and costing you customers!  So, the shorter the better.  But if the name you have chosen is already taken and there is no chance of getting it from it’s owner, and the owner either has no website or a poorly designed one with little traffic, this can be a good strategy in purchasing a name.  But be careful:  the last thing you want is to cause internet domain name confusion because you have decided on a domain name registration that is so close to a major competitor’s name that you end up losing business to them.

Longer or Shorter?  Domain names can be up to 67 characters long.  You could purchase a domain name like thelongestdomainnameintheworldandthensome
andthensomemoreandmore.com which is 63 characters long, but why would you want to do that?  Who would want to type it into a browser?  My website is www.StartYourWebsiteToday.com  and has a domain name that tells what kind of website you will be surfing to.  Good name selection can be helpful also with search engine ranking.  You will want to definitely keep the name as short and sweet as possible, but at the same time let the visitor know what to expect when he surfs to your website.  Remember, keep it short!

Brand Name or Generic  Whether or not to call your website by a brand name or to make the name a more generic description of your business online is the question.  Definitely if your business is known by a fairly well known brand name, then you would want to try and secure that as your domain name.  Budweiser.com is a site that is well known and gets a lot of traffic, even though there is nothing specifically in the domain name that says anything about beer.  But because Budweiser is known all over the world as a beer brand, people know what they are getting when they surf to the website.  If your brand name is well known, definitely try to obtain your brand name as a domain name.  But if your company is Nike or Coca Cola or Budweiser don’t discount the idea of buying the domain name shoes.com or soda.com or beer.com if they are available as well.  People often search the web using generic terms, more so even than brand names.  A person is more likely to search the internet with generic terms like shoes or footwear or sneakers than to search by a single brand name, even one as big as Nike.  So if possible cover all the bases.  You can have as many domain names as you want pointing to a single website, so the more generic terms you can acquire that directly describe your business, the better.   A generic name if your business is new or not yet well known can get great results, if you can find a good one.  To start your search for your own unique domain name, here is a link to a domain name search engine.  Bottom line, the beginning phase of how to start your own website is choosing the right domain name. 

You may be asking yourself “How do I start my own website?”.  Well, for starters:  Have you thought about your long term plans for your website?  Doing so will be a great advantage in determining the best possible domain name.  One of the best things you can do for your fledgling website is to bestow it with an appropriate, catchy, easy to remember domain name. Hopefully at this stage of the game you already know that Search Engine placement is critical to getting visitors to your website.  Among other factors, the domain name you choose will help you in getting to the “top of the charts”.

You have searched for your desired domain name and it turns out someone else has already snagged it.  Now what?  Can you still get it?  It’s Possible.  It’s possible, but there are some things to consider.  However, with a little luck and enginuity you can still possibly register that coveted domain name even if someone has beaten you to the punch.  Instead, let’s check out some alternative strategies to get the domain name you want:

Hyphenated Names If the domain name you want is already taken, consider hyphenating it, as in taking billsplumbingsupplies.com and making it bills-plumbing-supplies.com.  Is hyphenating the best way to go?  Maybe, maybe not.  If you want a domain name that is already taken by someone else and is already a well known, well traveled website, this might be a bad move, because users already familiar with the original domain name will just type the original, non-hyphenated version into their web browser, and end up not at your site but at your competitor’s site.  Not a good strategy.  Word to the wise: keep the domain name as short as possible.  The longer the name, especially with dashes in between words, the more likely that potential visitors to your site will enter it incorrectly into their browsers, thus foiling the chances of them visiting your website and costing you customers!  So, the shorter the better.  But if the name you have chosen is already taken and there is no chance of getting it from it’s owner, and the owner either has no website or a poorly designed one with little traffic, this can be a good strategy in purchasing a name.  But be careful:  the last thing you want is to cause internet domain name confusion because you have decided on a domain name registration that is so close to a major competitor’s name that you end up losing business to them.

Longer or Shorter?  If you want to, you can purchase up to a 67 character long domain name.  You could purchase a domain name like thelongestdomainnameintheworldandthensome
andthensomemoreandmore.com which is 63 characters long, but why would you want to do that?  Can you envision anyone wanting to type it into their browser?  My website is www.StartYourWebsiteToday.com  and features a name that in a few words encapsulates the purpose of the site.  Good name selection can be helpful also with search engine ranking.  You will want to definitely keep the name as short and sweet as possible, but at the same time let the visitor know what to expect when he surfs to your website.  Keep it as short as possible.

Brand Name or Generic  Should you give your website a descriptive generic name or do you want to use a brand name?  Definitely if your business is known by a fairly well known brand name, then you would want to try and secure that as your domain name.  For instance, Nike.com is a well known brand name site, although there is nothing in the domain name to suggest that it is a site about shoes.  Still, Nike is such a well known brand name to the public that people automatically know what they will be shopping for when they get there.  If your brand name is well known, definitely try to obtain your brand name as a domain name.  But if your company is Nike or Coca Cola or Budweiser don’t discount the idea of buying the domain name shoes.com or soda.com or beer.com if they are available as well.  People often search the web using generic terms, more so even than brand names.  A person is more likely to search the internet with generic terms like shoes or footwear or sneakers than to search by a single brand name, even one as big as Nike.  So if possible cover all the bases.  You can have as many domain names as you want pointing to a single website, so the more generic terms you can acquire that directly describe your business, the better.   A generic name if your business is new or not yet well known can get great results, if you can find a good one.  To start your search for your own unique domain name, here is a link to a domain name search engine.  So in conclusion, the first step in “how to start a website” is in the wise choice of your domain name. 

The preliminary step to start up a website is the registration of a domain name.  Whether you are a butcher, baker, or candlestick maker, or if you want to start up a website to feature your family dog Spot, the entire endeavor begins with the selection of your domain name.

Then again you might ask- “What makes the best domain name choice?”.  There are various factors to take into consideration.  The domain name chosen for a family and friends website won’t be as crucial as with other types of sites.  Why?  Because in a case like that you probably don’t really care about gaining a lot of traffic to your website, your site is probably only something you are going to produce for family and friends, to keep them informed.  You could pick something really obscure, something unique to you and your family, from the sublime to the ridiculous, and it won’t matter because you are not necessarily looking for great amounts of traffic to your site.   

So really what is most important in coosing your unique domain is the TYPE of site you want to publish.  If it is only for friends to see, it hasn’t got as much relevance as a business related or e-commerce website.  However…

What if you want as much traffic to your website as possible?  What if you are looking for business on the internet?

The simple answer is, it pays to have a domain name that draws attention to your site or business.  If your website is about car parts for example, do you really expect the average web surfer to remember how to get to your website if it is named “bobsthingsforsale.com” or some other unrelated name?  So be sure and choose carefully when deciding on a domain name.  Best case scenario is to get the name of your business as a dot com or dot net, etc.  In lieu of that, at least try to get the category of business that you are in incorporated in your domain name.  For example, an antiques website should have a domain name like antiques.com or bobsantiques.com, something that immediately associates the domain name with the theme of the site.  It’s all about branding, and making a lasting impression on the target audience or customers.

You can find domain names by checking the WhoIs database on the internet.  I have conveniently placed a domain name search engine on StartYourWebsiteToday.com for this very purpose.  After searching for the domain name, you will instantly know whether or not the domain name is available, and if so, give you the option to immediately register it.  If it’s not available, several alternative domain names will be proposed, to help you fine tune your search, or possibly giving you an acceptable alternative domain name to register instead.