Tutorials To Build Your Own Website

Building Your First Website

Although the tutorials on this page present information in a linear format, in reality, before you begin building your first website, you should look at the big picture first. Consider all the aspects of the site before you ever begin creating it. Create an overview or outline that answers the following questions.

• What is the topic of my website? What is the niche?
• Is this niche viable? Are there enough people interested in the niche to ensure it can get enough traffic if it is marketed properly? If it does get lots of traffic, is there a way to monetize it? Are there products available for it? If I search for this niche in Google, does Google provide a wide array of ads on the topic? Are there any affiliate programs that I can sign up for that allow me to earn commissions on products in this niche?
• If the niche is viable, what type of site will I create in this niche? Will it be mostly information (such as tutorials) that I give away or sell? Will it be mostly products that I sell? Will it be a review site? Something else?
• Where will the content come from? Me? Me and a group of people I will hire/partner with? Somewhere else?
• How big will the site be? What is the general outline of the site, including main topics, subtopics, etc.? How much time will it take to build out this site, and add all this content? How much time will it take to maintain the site over time?
• What methods will I use to monetize the site? How will I earn money and how much money do I expect the site to make?
• Where will I host my site? (Where will my site "live"?)

I suggest you first do a quick scan through the text on this page to start formulating your "big picture ideas", without worrying about grasping the fine details. Once you think it through and have the vision of your site, you can then go back and re-read this page, concentrating on the specifics, and learn what you need to accomplish your goals.

Hosting Your Site

Let's answer that last question first. Where will you host your site? Your website, once built, needs to be served from a server someone where "out there" on the Internet. Companies that serve sites are called hosting companies (or web hosts for short). There are literally thousands upon thousands of hosting companies, and it can be very confusing to choose the right one. (The wrong ones - and there are plenty of those - will make you miserable). After having used many hosts over the years, we can easily recommend one that shines - Hostgator. Their speed and reliability is rock solid. Enough said.

Coding The Site

The basic building blocks of a website are HTML (or XHTML, which is the more modern version of HTML) and CSS. HTML is relatively easy to learn, as are the basics of CSS, although CSS can get complex as well. Still, you can definitely learn both - at least to the extent where you can create your own websites and/or modify templates to customize them for your own sites. We aren't going to attempt to reinvent the wheel. There are plenty of good tutorials already created, so we will merely point you to the best of the best.

Site Design

Now that you understand how to create a basic website, you'll want to make it look good. This is where the design work begins. Of course, you can always just hire a web designer, but we're going to assume you want to get your hands dirty, and do a lot of this work yourself. Not only is it economical to do it yourself, but you gain knowledge and knowledge is always useful.

Color Schemes

One of the easiest ways to work up a color scheme is to use one of the many color scheme tools on the web. My favorite is this color scheme designer because not only does it make it easy to just pick one color, and then provides you with various pleasing color schemes based on that color, but it then also gives you the option to see example sites using those schemes - both in a light version and a dark version. This makes it so much easier to visualize what a color palette will look like in the real world.

Logos

Now that you have your color scheme decided upon, you'll want to use 2 or 3 of those colors in your new logo. You can make your own logo, of course, but I recommend sourcing this part out to the experts. These days, it's relatively inexpensive (as low as $50 or so) to get a professional logo created, so it makes sense to do this part right. After all, it's the logo that is the representation of your site and business everywhere. It needs to stand out and look good. I recommend LogoNerds to get a nice, custom, professional logo designed quickly.

Images

Your design will probably need images to spice it up. Don't make the mistake of grabbing images off the web (or at images.google.com) to put on your site. More than likely, any image you grab will be copyrighted, and you will essentially be breaking a law or two if you use them on your site. Don't take the chance of getting sued later on. Images can be licensed for you site for very, very little money - often as low as $1 each. Trust me, it's worth it to do this part right.

Content

You've got your site designed, but it's lacking something - CONTENT! The meat of your site is the content, and it matters a lot. There's no tutorial that will help you create the content, I'm afraid. This is where you, your knowledge, or your wallet comes into play. You need to create the content or have it created for you. This may include articles, videos, podcasts, infographics, product information, sales pages, etc.

Traffic

Once you have a beautifully designed site, with killer content, you need to let people know about it. You need traffic to the site. The best site in the world is pointless if no one knows about it, and no one goes to it. Here are the top ways of obtaining real, qualified traffic to your site. (Important Note: Never ever fall for one of those ads that tell you that you can buy tons of traffic for a small amount of money. Every single one of those is a scam. You will end up paying for tons of fake traffic. The traffic you obtain either won't be real people at all, or if the traffic does consist of people, they are people who are not in the least interested in your site. Don't waste your money).

Advertising

Of course, the quickest route to acquiring traffic is to advertise. Most people start out by advertising on Google using Adwords. This can be a great way to acquire traffic, because you only pay when people actually click on one of your ads, but even this method can be a little tricky to manage. You'll want to be very careful not to accidentally overspend. If you decide to advertise using Adwords, I strongly suggest you use Google's Adwords learning center first.

Search (SEO)

In our opinion, the best way to get traffic to your site is by ranking well in search engines. If someone is actively searching for something, and your site shows up at or near the top of the rankings in Google, Yahoo, or Bing search results, you've scored a victory, and your traffic can skyrocket. This method of acquiring traffic is known as SEO (search engine optimization), and it can be a very complex field. However, if you master just the basics, that can often be enough to succeed. You absolutely MUST ignore 90% of what you read about SEO however. Many things you'll read are either flat-out wrong, or designed to deceive you. There are however, many SEOs who are extremely knowledgeable and ethical (and I personally know most of them). For that reason, I recommend only a few sources of information when you want to learn the basics of SEO. Start with The SEO Handbook and once you are comfortable with the basics, then consider getting some advanced training via Aaron Wall's SEO Book Training.

Word Of Mouth and Social Media

A good example of acquiring traffic to your site via word-of-mouth or via social media is Twitter or Facebook. Social sites like these enable people to easily share links with their friends and followers, so if someone likes your site, they may let all their social network friends know about it. This is a great way to get traffic to your site, and it can create buzz and have a wonderfully viral effect that spreads quickly. Don't abuse social networks, but utilize them to let others know what's happening with your site. If you've created a good site, and you don't spam others on social network sites, you can use social media and word of mouth to generate very good traffic.

Google Analytics

Once your site starts getting traffic, you're going to want to track that traffic. It's vital to know who your visitors are, and how they found your site. This information enables you to make marketing decisions to bring even more traffic to the site. The best free tool for tracking your site's traffic (also called website analytics) is Google Analytics. Below are some videos designed to help you learn everything you need to know about Google Analytics

Monitoring Site Uptime

Although we've recommended Hostgator as your host of choice, all hosting companies occasionally have problems. When they do, your site may not be available or visible to anyone for a while. (The standard phrase to describe that situation is "Ack! My site is down!"). Hopefully, this happens to your site rarely, and when it does occur, it hopefully comes back up online within a few minutes. Still, you want to know when then happens, so you'll want to monitor your site's uptime. I recommend using SiteUptime to keep an eye on your site. If SiteUptime lets you know that your site is down, you can get in touch with your host immediately to try to solve the problem asap.

Monetization

Of course, the looming question is always, How do I make money from my website?. It's a good question, but the answer is different for everyone. Basically, there are numerous ways to make money from a website, and often the best way is to utilize more than one way. Not every monetization method works well for every site. It's usually best to test various methods and see which appeal to your site's audience the most. You'll likely fine 2 or 3 that, used in conjunction with one another, will bring the best results. Here, then, are the main ways sites make money.

Ad Revenue

The best way to understand this method of monetization is to think about the newspaper and magazine industries. Newspapers and magazines are in the business of providing content to readers, just like websites are. While newspapers and magazines do charge a subscription fee, and most websites do not, those subscriptions really aren't the main revenue generators for those publications. What really pays the bills in those industries are the ads that are included in the publications.

CPC Contextual Ads (aka Google Adsense)

Google Adsense is the easiest way for sites to monetize via ads. Once you get approval from Google to display Adsense on your site, you simply create some text ads via Google's site (really, all you are doing is setting up an ad size and choosing some options), and include the provided snippet of code that you are given onto your page(s). From then on, the ads are automatically placed in that spot on your page(s). Any time a user clicks an ad, you earn a few cents. (Note: CPC stands for cost per click, which is the indicator that this revenue stream results from clicks on ads).

CPM Banner Advertising

Unlike CPC ads, which earn money based on click-throughs, CPM ads pay based upon number of times they are shown to users. In other words, whether or not a user clicks on an ad, you get paid for having shown it to the user. This is priced per 1000 views, so if the revenue is stated as $2 CPM, that means that you would get paid $2 every time the ads are shown 1000 times. If ads are shown 10,000 times, you'd be paid $20. In general, it's a little more difficult to get accepted into the ad networks who pay with this model, because they usually require that sites get a minimum level of traffic before being allowed to show their ads. When you are just starting out, you probably won't qualify.

Direct Ad Sales

This type of ad revenue is a direct buyer-seller connection. Rather than using a 3rd party, like Google or an ad network, you deal one-on-one with an advertiser. You and the advertiser agree on a price, which could be a flat monthly fee, or cost per click-throughs, or cost based upon number of impressions. In most cases, a new site will charge a flat monthly fee because it is easiest to handle. No tracking of clicks of ad impressions is required. This is a favorite method of bloggers.

Affiliate Marketing

If your site isn't selling your own product, you'll want to find other ways to bring in income. Affiliate marketing is one of the best ways to do this. Essentially, when you are an affiliate marketer, you are simply acting like a salesperson for another company. You tell your visitors about a product that is relevant to your site's topic, and refer those visitors to the website of that product. If one of your visitors buys the product, you get a commission from the sale. Of course, not all companies have affiliate programs, so you'll need to find companies that offer affiliate marketing programs (and there are plenty). Plus, you'll need to learn the finer details of how to best participate in these programs.

The best way to learn about affiliate marketing is to learn from the masters. Here is the best of the best: Super Affiliate Handbook by Rosalind Gardner. You can watch the video below, but the meat of the content is in the handbook.

Selling Knowledge

Often, a site that focuses on giving information freely to users, also offers some type of upgraded version of that information. So for example, if a site's goal is to teach users how to cook on a budget, they may give free tips on the site, but the user can also choose to purchase a book (either physical or more often, an electronic version, called an ebook). The free tips on the site give the users a sense of the value that they'll receive if they purchase the book. If the users like the free information, they feel confident that the upgraded version will be worth paying for. The most common way of selling knowledge is by creating an ebook. However, there are other methods as well. You can sell a physical book, and can even self-publish the book via places such as Lulu.com. You can set up a private membership program, where users pay a monthly subscription fee, which entitles them to access password-protected sections of the site. These members-only sections may include extensive information, group interaction via chat or forums, or even one-on-one discussions with you.

Selling Tangible Products

Of course, if you have a real, tangible product to sell, then by all means, do so! Maybe you create hand-made quilts or paint beautiful portraits. Whatever your product is, selling it via the web is a good idea. You will have to consider how to ship items however, so keep that in mind.