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Six years ago if you advertised your business and listed a website address you would have been considered to be ahead of your game. Today, if you don’t have a website, you would be considered to be behind the times and may be loosing out on vital business.
You can create your own basic website yourself using Microsoft Word or can start building web pages from scratch using a text editor like Notepad and entering HTML code (the web page programming language). Alternatively, you can buy web design software to create the web pages. Microsoft FrontPage, Macromedia Dreamweaver & Serif Internet Design (the most affordable) are some of the more popular web design packages.
Before you upload your web pages to the World Wide Web you need to decide what domain name to use (www.mydomain.co.uk) and register it. There are many web hosting and domain registration companies to choose from, such as www.fast-name.co.uk or www.fasthosts.co.uk. You can search for available domain names and decide what extension you want to use. A domain name with .co.uk extension is cheaper than a .com extension. You will also need to choose a hosting plan for storing the web pages. Many companies offer free domain name and email addresses (info@mydomain.co.uk) when you buy a hosting plan. Typical cost is £50 per year.
Once the registration is completed, you will be sent the access details that are required to copy the files to the space reserved for you website. You can register your website with search engines like Google and business web directories.
Wordpress is also a very popular service for creating websites and blogs. You have the option to save all the web pages, blogs and images on Wordpress’ server so you don’t need to buy a hosting plan for storing the web pages (perfect for small businesses and charities). You also don’t need to buy software to install on your computer, the Content Management software is available on www.wordpress.com.
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Overall appearance should be appealing, with quick loading graphics and the right message targeted to the audience.
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Verdana is a popular web friendly font. The colours should be carefully chosen so that the content is clear and easy to read.
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Navigation should be consistent, clear and easy to find.
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The content should always be fresh and up-to-date.
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Use short, simple and direct sentences (18-25 words maximum). All your key points should be included in your opening paragraph and explain less important information further down the site.
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Use links, to point the reader to more detailed or specific subjects.
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The business address and contact details should be included on each web page.
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If you don’t fancy tackling this yourself, it’s actually not that costly to employ Emerald to design and manage the whole process for you. If you require e-commerce functionality, then we can recommend web designers who offer this service. We can also provide a list of websites which we have recently created.
Creating your own website
Top tips for creating a good website: