Creating a Web Site Part 2

A Step by Step Guide

This page is intended to assist you with creating a website for your home business. This is page two. You will find additional information on the following pages. Please leave us comments, questions, or success stories so that we can improve this guide.

Web Hosting
Having a web site built and ready to go is all good an well however, you need someplace to put it. Let's start here as many of the web hosting companies offer web site creation software for free.

A web hosting company has many largest computer (also known as servers) that are linked into high bandwidth "portals" to the internet. Most people decide to use a web hosting company vs. using their own computers because they simply cannot afford to maintain the speed, bandwidth and reliability that a large company can. By using a hosting company, you are almost guaranteed that your site will be up and running 24/7. If there is a computer malfunction, power loss, or other act of nature that causes problems, the responsibility falls to the web hosting company to resolve. Often they will place your site in multiple servers for redundancy.

Let's take a look at Yahoo Small Business. Yahoo Small Business is a great place for beginners to start. In order to access their small business resources you will have to sign up. Don't worry, this part is free. Simply go to www.Yahoo.com and click on the small business icon in the upper left of your window. Click on Sign Up if you do not already have an account and complete the form. If you have an account, fill in your user ID and password then click submit.

Once in the small business you will see the option of:

• Building a web site
• Create an online Store
• Get a domain name
• Market your online business
• See other services.

The building a web site offer a tutorial and Yahoo software that will allow you to build your site. Creating an online store is up to you and depends on the type of home business you are wanting to start. However, getting a domain name is the next crucial step in your web site.

After you have built your web site, you are ready to upload it onto a server. But wait, how will anyone know where to go to view your site? The address someone used to view your site is called a URL or Domain Name. Think long and hard about what name to use as you cannot change it once it has been created. Try to find something that is both relative and easy to remember. In the example above, Bob might have used something like, www.yourfinances.com or www.yourfinances.biz. Again, the name is easy to remember and relevant to his service. Having a name like www.bobsplace.net while easy to remember, is NOT relevant to his service.

Click on the left menu to learn more about creating and hosting your web site. If you still need help starting your own website, check out Office Live