Does your Content Make or Break your Website

Once you have your website designed and formatted to your requirements, you now are faced with the challenge of deciding what content to include which will effectively promote your site to your visitors and prospective customers.

The information you provide to those who view your website is just as important as the design and layout of the site.  Poor unrelated content will drive visitors away.  Your words are your life blood to your site.  Without the right words you will not entice your visitors to stay and read the information you have provided.  At best they will merely skim the surface or simply scroll down to the end. At worse they will merely click the back button.

If your content is not original, does not motivate, inspire, educate or provide a solution to a problem for which your visitors are seeking an answer, they will simply move on and probably never return.  

Your content must be relevant and useful so that it will promote sales and boost revenue.
The more unique your content is the better it will be for keeping your customers interested and repeatedly returning to your site on a regular basis. 

Unless you are generating income by selling your products or services your website will be merely a money wasting venture rather than a money making venture. 

It is vital that you refresh your website information regularly.  A lazy site will deter repeat customers and reduce sales and consequently lower your income. 

Content should not be seen just as a marketing ploy.  Although you want to promote your website and get as much traffic as possible unless you convert this to sales you are not fulfilling your ultimate reason for being online.  Naturally this will not apply if you have set up your website just for family interests like sharing photos, you have a favourite hobby you want to promote without selling products or alternatively your site is not for profit and purely information only.  The majority of people online are there to generate income whilst providing solutions and answers for problems and questions your visitors are wanting resolved. 

Carefully evaluate  the information you are offering to your visitors to make sure it is in keeping with the purpose of your site.  If you fail to meet this basic principle your content will be seen to be futile and of no value as it will not be what your visitors are searching for.

Inappropriate or irrelevant content has no place in your website.  You must strive to create the most up to date data there is available in respect to your subject matter.  Keeping your site current will not only attract new visitors but will motivate them to becoming customers who want to return to your site time after time.

Try and keep your visitors hungry for more.  The standard of excellence achieved by your content will encourage your visitors to share the excitement they have experienced at your site with their family, friends and colleagues who they know would love what you are offering. 

The result is your customer base grows and your income thrives.  You will have achieved the ultimate goal of being online – repetitive passive income.

Apply these steps and you and your visitors won’t be disappointed. 

Mel

Designing your Website

In order to have a website that is just how you want it to be, it is essential that you take the time to ensure that it is designed according to your requirements.  Naturally if you have decided to use a pre-designed template this is certainly going to reduce your costs in getting your website up and running. Be aware though, the more elaborate the template is with quality graphics the more costly it will be.  Remember a basic template with little or no graphics is going to be less expensive. Nevertheless you still need to be aware of any restrictions such a template has before proceeding with this step.   It is no good deciding that you want to change the colour of the website once it has been completed and is online to find that the template you have chosen restricts edits of this nature. It is important at this stage to know exactly what you are getting and whether any editing is possible.

It is a good idea to browse through as many templates as you can before making your final decision. The more choice you have the more likely you are to find the one that best suits you.

For instance, if you intend to have a website to promote beauty products you would more than likely consider a feminine designed template rather than one which portrayed a corporate image with laptops, whiteboard or cell phone graphics.  Make sure the colours you select are appropriate to what your site is promoting.  As a general rule subdued natural colours work best, so it is a good idea to keep bright dazzling colours to a minimum unless of course you want to convey this type of image. Don’t rush this step as it is imperative that you get it right, remembering that this will be going world wide for all to view and you don’t want to convey the wrong impression.  What you want is a template that has high impact and will capture the interest of your visitors and customers so that they will want to return again and again.  First impressions do count. 

It is essential that the website package you have selected is able to provide all the features you need.  The layout and navigation of your site needs to be such that visitors can easily access what they are looking for.  If it is too difficult to locate what visitors are seeking they will go elsewhere.

Make sure you can plan the layout to your liking with a good balance between text and graphics.  In this instance less is frequently more effective.  In other words, don’t over do it. The layout should be pleasing to the eye with contrast and spacing used to optimum advantage.  Don’t try and cram all your information on one or two pages just to keep your costs down.  This won’t work and will be to your disadvantage.  Spread your content out however be clear and precise and don’t overdo images and graphic.  Otherwise the site becomes too busy and will distract from the message you are trying to convey.

Since your text is vital to the success of your website it is important that you use a font that is easy to read such as Arial.  Don’t chop and change fonts as this also distracts from your message and is unappealing. Keep animation to a minimum as this can become annoying if overused. 

Don’t make your pages too wordy.  Less is best.  Just use sufficient text to convey your message in a concise and direct manner limiting images so they simply complement the text.

Remember the design of your website is vital to its success.  Choose wisely and it will be a success.

Mel

How to register a domain name

Once you have decided what you want your website to focus on, the next important step to take is that of selecting an appropriate domain name.  If you are unsure as to what a domain name is all about, it can be likened to your residential or business address or perhaps your telephone number.  Its purpose is to allow visitors to locate you on the Internet.  So it is important that the domain name you decide to use is appropriate and depicts what your website is all about.

Before you can start using a domain name you need to check with a domain registry service to find out if the name you want is available.  For domain names ending in .com the availability of distinctive and unique sounding names is practically non existent. 

You will need to be willing to play with the words you want in your domain name to see if this helps you find one available that meets your specifications.  You may need to change your wording to get a registered domain name. You will also need to think about this carefully as this name is going to depict your website and the services and products you are offering your visitors.  An inappropriate domain name might result in less traffic to your site.  Less traffic means missed opportunities to grow your online presence.

Trade marking your name is a wise decision but this is a more involved topic which should be dealt with by a qualified practitioner in this area of legal expertise. 

Your domain name will form part of your web address.  For example mybusiness@domain.com.  Once visitors click on your web address they are immediately transferred to your web site.  Naturally it is extremely important that the spelling of your domain name is accurate otherwise your visitors may end up on someone else’s landing page. 

To have your website operational it is not vital that you have your own domain name, however if your web hosting company goes out of business you lose your address and have to be transferred over to an alternative hosting company.  This may prove a costly exercise if you then have to change your offline stationary to reflect the changes to your web address.

The length of a domain name is restricted to 26 characters.  It is best to keep your domain name as short as possible as it makes it easier for your visitors to remember your domain name and keep on returning to your site.  Lengthy domain names are less easier to remember.  Please remember that domain names are not case sensitive and you can use a mix of upper and lower case alpha characters and numbers to make it easier to read. 

Once your domain name is found to be available you will then need to register it with one of the domain registers online.  Usually membership is for a two year period but 12 months registration is also available if you prefer this option.  If you do not act immediately when you decide on what you want your domain name to be, it is fairly likely that the next time you check you may find that someone else has taken it.

With your domain name in place and your website concept decided upon, you are now ready to proceed to the next vital stage of actually deciding on the design of your website.

Mel 

Start building your Website in Next to No Time

Does this seem too far fetched?  Well, it isn’t.

No need to stress over how you are going to get your own functioning website up and running.  Even if you do not understand all the technical jargon, web design or HTML and really have no idea how to go about creating a website, this is not a problem.

Lets have a quick look at what you can do to get started.

Do some research to locate a site that specializes in building websites.  This is easy.  Simply key in the phrase “Build a website” on either Google, Yahoo or MSN search engines home page.  The choices are quite numerous.  Click on any of these and review the services they are offering.  You can elect to go for a custom built site or it you prefer you can use one of their pre-designed templates.  If you go for the first option this will be a more expensive choice where as if you elect to use a template they already have available, this will be much cheaper.  Remember that using pre-designed templates means that these templates will more than likely be in use throughout the web by other users so you will need to make sure that you are able to do some fine tuning to the template to make it more unique to you and your business.  Even so, for beginners on a limited budget this would probably be a more economical choice.

Check out the various packages on offer to make sure what you want is available and the costing is within your budget.  It is best to go with something small and uncomplicated to begin with so you can get the feel of having your own website.  Naturally before you commit to having a website built for you, you need to know what you want your website to be about.  Is it for business, family or to promote a hobby you particularly enjoy so that you can share your knowledge with others and also have the opportunity to earn income by promoting your own products or other peoples products through affiliate marketing?  Make sure it meets all your requirements so that it will perform according to your wishes and not merely be pleasing to the eye.  A pretty website that does not provide information your visitors are looking for is fairly much a waste of time.

Getting a free trial is always a good idea.  If you don’t like the service you are with or you decide you want extra features you then have the opportunity to sign up for a paid site or just quit the project altogether and try somewhere else.  It is that simple.

This is just a brief overview to getting started online.  There are many more important steps to take before this process is completed.  These steps will be covered in more detail in subsequent articles.

Mel 
 

Welcome to the Next2Notime Blog

I am delighted that you have taken the time to visit my blog. I plan to offer tips and tricks about getting online as easily and quickly as possible.  I will be posting articles, reviewing related products and bringing you the latest about quick and easy websites to fast track your online business. 

Please feel free to comment on anything I post here and if you have anything to offer about quick and easy websites that generate income with little to no fuss, you are more than welcome to share it here.

Thank you for dropping by and if there is any information about quick and easy websites that you would like discussed, don’t hesitate to ask.

Mel