Build Your Own Website

How to Build Your Own Website

Are you a small business or just an individual with a desire to set up your own website but don’t really know how? Well, creating a simple templated website can be easy and cost efficient. In this digital age, having a website is crucial in gaining customers through Google ranking and adding credibility to your business. Here are some easy tips on how you can do it yourself without any coding.

1. You have to have a strategy. What’s the point of your website and how are you going to structure it? I tend to create a really basic plan of what separate pages I want, what the purpose of them are and what I want included on them. From there you can build the structure and the content up.
2. You need to have a clear idea of who your target audience is in order to create content that they would want to read and find useful. Also, the longer people stay on your website, the better it is for your Google ranking.
3. And last but not least, the templates you’ll chose have to be in line with your company’s image, vision and values since this is what will communicate who you are. It’s also worth checking out the competition to get an idea of what you’re up against.

Now, let’s have a look at some website-building platforms.

1. WordPress

This is a blogging platform which can easily be made to look like a more fully featured website. In its free state it has some limitations, like requiring the URL to include ‘Wordpress’. That doesn’t do well for the Google ranking or the legitimacy of your compay but is absolutely fine for a blogging website or a website at a basic stage.

If you fancy something slightly more professional, you can by a domain through us and add that to your WordPress plan meaning that you can have a URL like www.lucidica.co.uk.

WordPress offers a huge range of functionality in the form of widgets and templates, but many of them are paid content. It is a great way to create an adaptable and scalable website which you can add-on other features as you grow to make it look more professional and improve it’s usability.

2. Free online website platforms

… such as Wix, Weebly and many many others.

These are simpler to set up and navigate than WordPress. They offer smooth and attractive templates for beginners and can embed links/social networks with ease. Additionally, when you upload an image, the platform lets you play around and manipulate the image.

However, if you are using the free versions, you’re once again required to add the site name to the URL (something that can be removed with a paid subscription).

Unlike WordPress websites, Wix has fewer features, neglecting things like analytics which is a massive downside if you grow and gain a marketing department who needs to access how to improve user numbers and click throughs.

Online website platforms like these and WordPress are very flexible with their templates, allowing  you to easily change their colours, the font and the size of the text, drag pictures, buttons and text all around, and it all happens online!!! All it takes is a bit of creativity and a lot of free time. If you’ve got even more time and ambition you can create your own style sheets, templates and themes.

3. Website Software:

… such as Microsoft WebMatrix, Adobe’s Dreamweaver, Serif WebPlus and others. These require a lot more knowledge, usually of HTML. Secondly, you’ll have to install the software on your computer. Furthermore, this specialised type of software is not free; you’d have to purchase it and it can be quite pricey (the Adobe Creative Suite can cost up to £1,800 or through a monthly subscription service.)

Creating a website in this way can be a fun experience and learning curve since it allows you to play around with the design, the layout and the features of the platform, as well as with your creativity. It’s also a great way to get into coding.

However, if you don’t have the time or the energy to experiment with it but you do want a sleek, cool and authentic design that will make your website stand out, it may be worth investing in someone who can do it for you.

Here at Lucidica we offer a selection of different website packages including a simple £250 templated website with 5 hours of engineering time to get your website up and running. These small things can ease you into creating a website that works for you without doing all the leg work at the beginning.

Feel free to contact us, we’d be happy to be to help!

 

Lucidica is the IT support team for London businesses.