What is Required in Setting Up a Website?

It is best at this point to address the above question, before we go on. Most of the potential clients that call me when they realize they need a website, or they are curious as to what they should do to get one, know very little about what is involved.

This short chapter will hopefully clear up some of that confusion, and is also designed to give you some pause for thought before signing on the dotted line as it were. Rushing into a website without a clear view of what you need and how to find someone to design and build it for you can be a financial waste of time.

So here’s some of the basic requirements…

Domain Name

Simply put, this is the name of your website. For example, www.albanymuffler.com would be a good example of the illustration used in chapter 1. Note that the name clearly indicates what the business is. This will be explained more in chapter 11. So after careful thought, you would need to have your domain name registered.

I strongly suggest however, that you write down a number of choices you would like to have as your domain name, then wait until you are actually talking to the person you have chosen to design and build you site for some assistance on picking the one that is best. They will be able to check any and all choices you have for availability as well as being able to advise you on what will work the best for recognition and success in the search engine wars.

Do you need a .com, .ca, .us, .org, .net etc., extension? Would it be advisable to register your website name with more than one extension? Talking with a good website designer will take a lot of the worry away from you.

Hosting

A website is really nothing more than a computer directory with a number of subdirectories very similar to your home computer, except that the directories and files live somewhere on what is known as a “server”. A server is (certainly should be) a very secure series of high capacity computers that store hundreds if not thousands of websites. When someone enters your domain name that we registered above, the Internet routes the request to the hosting computer where your site lives, and the result appears on the screen.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

More on this in our Search Engine Optimization (SEO) section.  In short, it deals with how easy it will be for someone to find your site when they do a search. It’s generally harder to find a good website designer who is also an expert on optimizing your site. It’s often easier to design a website than to make it easy to find. Your site can have lots of glitz and glamour with all the bells and whistles, but if nobody knows it’s there it just becomes a source of amusement for you when you look at it yourself, and a source of grief when you realize how lonely you are.

Therefore, I thought I would mention it at this early stage of the book so you don’t have too many surprises later on.

I should also mention that the registering of your domain name and the hosting of your site will be annual expenses. I’ll expand on this more in the next chapter.

Top up your coffee and read on.