in this section...
in this series...
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so, you're building a web site...
This article will cover some of the basic things that you'll have to
consider when building a web site.
In general, this is what you'll need if you're trying to get up
a simple web site:
- A domain name - for example, www.yourcompany.com
- A place to host your web site
- A program to edit your web site (FrontPage in this case)
- A program to edit images for your web site (see our Graphics
page)
- If you want ecommerce and don't have thousands of dollars to
spend on it, we recommend PayPal's shopping cart/button system - easy
and cheap!
But before you even get to these things, you need to do some research
and thinking.
- What's the purpose of your web site? To sell? To provide information
about your services? To persuade people to call you? If you can narrow
down what you want your viewers to do when they're at your site, you can
save yourself a lot of time by focusing your web site content.
- Who is your audience going to be? If you already have marketing
materials, you've probably already thought about this. For example, do
you have a specific audience such as African-American women? If so, this
will help you to choose relevant imagery.
- What kind of technology is your audience using? Are most of
them going to have high-speed internet access? If not, you may want to
stay away from large image files or large animation files such as Flash
movies.
The answers to these questions will help you to stay focused as you build
your web site.
The following articles will cover these topics:
Choose Your Tools
Choose Your Template
Register a Domain Name
Choose a Hosting Provider
Content and Images
Bells and Whistles
Ecommerce
Publishing Your Site
Testing Your Site
Marketing Your Site
Improving Your Skills
Give up? Hire someone!
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