What you need to know before getting a website!

Hey so as you have probably figured out by now i create websites for people but having done this for years now there are some common things you may or may not know which i feel is vital to know before you step into the world of websites.

So how do websites work?

Websites contrary to popular belief do not exist in clouds but on physical hard drives in a server center. Think of it as files on your computer. So for example you create a document on a windows computer and you will likely save the document on the C: Drive. Well websites are exactly the same. The website which is a series of documents are stored on physical drives.

This storage is what we refer to as the hosting when it comes to websites. This is a yearly charge where they will give you so much space on a plan to store your website in. There are many hosting packages out there and i am happy to work alongside any hosting services you choose but on average you can expect to pay between £150 - £400 per year to “rent” the space required to host your website. Alternatively I do share my server to my customers for £100 a year which is mainly just dedicated to small business and creative websites.

Why are you cheaper for storage?

Essentially it's cheaper because it's shared. There are pluses and minuses to both methods. With hosting on your own server you will always have control over that server and it will be separate from other sites. As a result it will be a little more faster and responsive but it will cost more than hosting with me. The downsides to hosting on my server are the website may be marginally slower to load by comparison and if one site goes down then all of the sites go down. Naturally if my site is down then you can be sure i am doing my best to get it back up.

Is that the only yearly cost?

Unfortunately no. so you have the place to store the website but people need to know how to get to it. For that you will need to rent an address. This is referred to as a domain name. As the name suggests this is your domain this is your address. These addresses can take the form of an address ending with .com or .co.uk to name a couple but there are many other types available.

So I am only renting the website then? I thought once I bought it that it's mine forever.

Unfortunately that is the case all the website addresses are only owned by a certain amount of companies and you are just renting it.

How much does an address cost?

This varies depending on what the name is etc but on average you can be looking at it costing around £25 per year.

Can I have any address I want?

Within reason provided no one has already registered it.

What other costs are there to do with my website?

Well the previous 2 costs just cover the ability to have a website in the first place not the actual building of the website. My sites that i build are targeted towards small business owners and creatives and start at £250.

What if I already have the hosting and domain name?

I am happy to work with you on that. My cost is the same regardless of if i am building the site from scratch or creating your site for you on your squarespace account.

Do you code the website from scratch?

Those days are largely gone where you have to code from scratch. Most websites are powered by website engines such as Wordpress or Backlight. There are other engines out there but those are the 2 that i use. All the websites are built with your involvement so you feel a part of the process.

So i have my site up will that mean i will become number 1 on google?

That would be unusual. Google is constantly crawling the internet for new content so unless you were a really random obscure subject then you will not become number one on google very fast (potentially years) Your website is your business card for the first year most of the people that come to your site will be because you have sent them. There are ways to increase this such as adding more content such as running a blog which gives people reasons to come back to you. Ask yourself why would you go back to a site you have already visited?

How can I get to number one on Google?

Number one in what? Millions of people are searching for millions of things. It should be relatively quick for you to show results for your own name but if someone is searching for your actual website name then it's likely they are just trying to go directly to the site and searching it by accident.

Natural search results consist of websites that Google think are relevant to the search term that has been put in. This is down to you and your content. The more written content you add about a subject then the more important the algorithm will think you are. You are up against thousands of other websites with the same goals as you. There is only one way to guarantee first place on Google and that is to pay for advertising. This can get expensive fast so i would not recommend this unless you have very deep pockets!

Treat your website as your business card. Send people to it and give them reasons to stay with good content and most of all be patient.

If you have any further questions website related please use the form below and i will be happy to answer for you.