Ever made your own website?

GlossyTundra

GlossyTundra

Tractor Detailer
I pulled up godaddy.com to see if my domain name is taken. That site makes it seem like building your own simple html website is simple and easy. I just figure, why pay someone else $250 to do what I can.



Anyone ever done it? Is it harder than i'm thinking? Tips/Tricks?
 
I honestly think most of us on here have made our own. I know I made mine. And I'm in the process of making another one. I made my wife's for her business. Most of the other guys I talk to have made their own as well. In fact I'm not recalling anyone out there that had someone else make theirs off hand.
 
If you are just talking about using a godaddy template it's easy. If you've never made a site before or have not knowledge it would be tough to do it from scratch. What will the site be used for? If it's just a personal site I say go for a godaddy template. If it's for a business I said let a professional do it who can get you good organic rankings.
 
It's just a simple website for my buisness. I dont know much about websites or anything like that, so i'd be lost.
 
Well the whole point of a website it getting it optimized. Meaning when people are searching for your service in your area they can find you on the webs. There's a ton of how too's out there on how to properly optimize your site by adding meta tags or keywords etc etc. It's really not hard once you start playing around with it. You'll be able to pick up on things pretty fast.
 
If you use a template it's all plug and plain. You probably won't need to know one ounce of html to do it.
 
Yea the cookie cutters are very straight forward. But if you google "Flint Detailing" without even knowing my name or anything I'm always the first thing that pop's up. I can help you optimize your site after you get it built if you want.
 
Ive made about five good websites, don't get into flash unless you have ALOT of time on your hands. If you want simple easy to maintain website make you one on Google easy to do and take about an hour to have a awesome site!
 
Im using webs.com your final adress is easy to rember. Mine is still under construction but take a look if you want.



kandsdetailing.webs.com
 
Haha, I typed that while looking at my instructor in my college class, who's name is Jack.



Should I be paying attention? Noooooo
 
i designed my, the layout, colors, text, pictures, etc. but then i had someone else code it! I tried coding it, it was taking me too long. i did the go the godaddy thing before my current site now, it was good, but not good enough.



i say have someone else do it, but im picky and i care about what my site looks like. Its the first thing the customer usually sees and if it doesnt look professional, more than likely they wont call you. some might argue this, but thats my take on it! goodluck
 
Brandon,



You have 3 things to consider really. Your time, your budget and your brand (or how seriously you want to be taken).



Taking the last point first, if this is for your business, which I'm assuming it is, you want people to do one of two things when they find you online - call or email you. The only way they're going to do that is if your site looks better than the competition, or if you have no competition. If you have no competition, then the professionalism of the site matters less. However, people are getting more Internet savvy each day and even if you generate tons of traffic to your site, if it doesn't have a professional look, you won't get the business.



Like any other kind of marketing you do, you have to look at it as an investment. You can invest a lot of time to do most of the research, writing the content and learning how to put a site together and generate traffic, or you can invest money and hire someone to do it all for you. Regardless of where you come in with your time versus money investment, you'll need to do some research.



Check out these sites and enter some common search terms that you think people would use to find your business on the Internet.



Free Keyword Suggestion Tool From Wordtracker

Google Trends



Go to Google and Yahoo! and see what your local competition is like. This will give you some idea of where you need to be with your site.



Your time and money investment will then come into play as you'll now need to figure out if you want to try and do it yourself with a GoDaddy template, or maybe you decide to purchase a template from Template Monster (see link below) and either customize it yourself or hire someone to do it for you. There are a lot of cheap web designers out there that will also put something custom together for you relatively inexpensively. If you go that route, just make sure you get a good look at their portfolio so you know that they're capable of coming up with a design you like.



Web Templates, Flash Templates, Website Templates Design - Template Monster



Lastly, don't look at it as a "fire and forget" kind of deal. Among many of the things you can do to help your site in search engines is to have information relevant to what the search terms are that people are using to find you, and KEEP IT UP TO DATE. If people don't get the sense that your site is current, they'll often assume that you're no longer in business.



I've got tons more advice if you'd like, just send me a PM.
 
I make everything for my company myself from the web site, business cards, flyers, SEO. It takes a while to learn how to do all of it, but it will save you $1,000's so it's well worth the time investment!
 
Brandon, banacheq said it perfectly... either you spend a lot of time learning how to make a good looking, inviting website that people will like to visit, or you pay someone to do so... this is where you decide whether your time is worth the money you would otherwise spend on a good website done by someone else... personally, I did mine for 2 reasons... I learned some HTML over the past years and I like to do stuff myself if I can (if I can't, I try to learn, and if I think it won't be good enough, then I'll pay someone for a service)...



I've heard nothing but great compliments on my website, although it needs some cleaning up when it comes to code and re-sizing images, etc. So again, I would highly advise against some 'plain' site if you want to use it as a marketing and informational tool... if you want to only host some photos with your e-mail and #, fine, do one of the templates and you're done in 30 mins. However, if you want a nice looking site that people will look at and see the quality of your work, making them want to contact you, then you either need to invest, by my very rough estimate, about 20-30 hours in learning HTML and design it yourself, or pay someone $500-800 for a nice website. You'll have to learn how to upkeep the site anyway when it comes to photos, etc. but if you consider your time @ $15/hr, plus the time that will go into making and designing the site (plus $ for software if you don't have it, like Dreamweaver) you're well into the $500-800 range... your choice, so decide wisely.



Best of luck
 
i tried making two sites from templates...both sucked!



I then had someone make me a new one (free) and it was OK



then I paid someone to make me one (350) and it was much better



then the guy I paid decided he wanted to apply some new things he learned and made me a whole new one, my current one...100 times better! retail on the new site with all the hours put into it was said to be about $1000!



so you get what you pay for...free (cookie cutter) or pricey (quality)!
 
I made my website, but I have a little bit of experience. I'm sure it could be better, but I feel like it's nice and is simple to navigate.



You can check it out under my profile.
 
I have been using Yahoo Sitebuilder for a few years and found it much easier to use than the godaddy option. Make sure you set you key words right and you will come up in every search engine on the first page.
 
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