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How
To Design A Website for people new to the internet
WHY
YOU SHOULD TRY
Most people are Internet novices and don't know how to design
a website. People worry about their ability to design an attractive
site and are anxiously seeking the quickest and best alternative.
After 18 years on the Internertet, I believe you need to learn
how to design your sites yourself: here's why:
The Internet is made up of several elements, but two are
the most important:
1. Text and Pictures
Audio and video technologies are growing fast, but if you
hope to sell on the Net, it's critical to appeal to your audience,
those folks who are willing to pull out their credït
cards and buy your products. A shrinking percentage of these
are still on dialup and certainly aren't very sophisticated
and overly fancy techniques will isolate you from many of
them.
So what are your choices if you want to build a website?
1. Buy a Template:
But unless you are familiar with web graphics programs
like PhotoImpact
you will have trouble editing them.
This can work sometimes. I've bought them myself and they
do look great. But there are some real problems with templates:
• They can be expensive - especially if you want multiple
websites. Good templates aren't cheap. The few I've bought
are in the $60-$70 range.
• If you don't know what you're doing, you can
waste your money on templates that won't work for you. For
instance, you will often see templates with icons, pictures,
company logos, "Buy Now" buttons and more. Yes,
they look great. But when you download the images they are
not editable because if they are in jpg or gif format, you
can't make changes. The most common 'editable' images are
in 'psd' format. If you own image editing software, like Photoshop
(which usually sells for about $600), you can make the changes
you wish. But if you don't own this kind of software then
forget it - your images can't be changed.
• Editing templates isn't easy. You might unwittingly
purchase a template that allows 8" of space - and your
copy needs 10" of space. Now what? Cheaper templates
require the purchaser to "slice" them. This is tedious
and time consuming and requires editing knowledge that most
people don't have. Higher quality templates allow the owner
to edit them without slicing, but they are more expensive.
• Even if you can edit your new template, do you really
think that you should allow a designer to dictate the placement
of your sales copy? Beautiful design does not equal sales.
Just because something looks good doesn't mean it's a good
sales site. Many novices are impressed with the good looks
of a template, but beauty doesn't equal profit on the Net.
Earning money comes from effective direct response marketing
which means testing the elements on your sales page and changing
them until you have a winner. If your design is forced on
you, you are limited in the changes you can make.
2. Pay a Website Designer to Build a Site for You:
• Hiring a professional can be expensive, unless you
get a very good company like Richweb to build for you. But
even then, IF you have the time, you will save money
in the long run to learn a little about building a website.
• Every time you want to make a change on your site,
you must wait on a designer to make the changes. This is expensive
and can be time consuming, if the designer is busy with multiple
clients. If you have your sites built get some client
content management features to free yourself up from the
developer.
• Just like a purchased template, most web designers
are focused on looks and appearance, rather than functionality
or sales. All the best marketers acknowledge that plainer
sites are more lucrative because the focus is on the copy,
the words, rather than fancy graphics or beautiful colors.
Take a look at the top money-making sites on the net. They
rarely are flashy or dramatically impressive.
• Relying on a web designer creates dependency. You
can always pay them to help you out of a jam, but generally
the motivation of entrepreneurs is freedom so waiting for
another person to make even the smallest changes to your site
isn't taking you in the direction you want to go.
3. Buy Site-Making Software:
Every program I have seen involves a learning curve. One
popular site builder, for example, has a 500 page manual,
is expensive and a lot of the learning doesn't transfer to
other site systems. I looked at another one recently with
a 300 page manual. The time that you spend learning these
methodologies could be spent learning an HTML editor that
will make you fully capable of building your own sites, whenever
you choose, for almost zero cost.
I recomend that you just "Pay your Dues" Dreamweaver
has always been the worlds choice for WYSIWYG
editing for websites for a reason, and the tutorials that
come with it are quite good. There are more good books on
using Dreamweaver than any other program out there. Also,
if you learn to use it your work will be compatible with everyone
elses on the web. And, you can get a 30 day free trial.
4. Get a copy of Ulead Photo Impact 10 to mange your
graphics and phtographs in. It is far more powerful than photoshop,
way easier to learn to use, and costs a whole lot less. It
is extreemly fun to use in any event. 30
day free trial
Saying "I want to be an Internet marketer" and
not learning how to build websites for yourself is like wanting
to be a mechanic - and refusing to learn aboutcars; like being
a movie star - and refusing tocomb your hair. Your first sites
won't win a design award, so what? You will get better. And
you will be independent. Isn't that the entire point of working
on the Internet?
AVOID FRONTPAGE AT ALL COSTS - DO NOT MAKE THAT MISTAKE.
read
more
If you have an offline business, you need to seriously consider
having a website as well. The cost of setting up a website
falls within $200 for creating a simple 3-page design and
$80/year for a budget
business web hosting. You don't need a good design website
and best web hosting unless
you start generating income from your website.
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