How to get started on your new web site project

There is a lot that goes into creating a web site and getting it published on the web. There are many things you will need to do, some things harder than others, some more expensive than others and definately some more timely to develop than others. But whether you choose to hire a web developer or create a web site on your own, the most important thing you should do is get started today! Yes, that is possible!

Whether you create your own web site or hire a professional web developer, building a web site is a big project that requires a lot of planning. Like any good project it takes time to research, plan, develop, implement and launch. The first initiative you can take is to create a team for your new website project.
Listed below are various roles that you can assign to your team members:

Project Manager: defines the project, its goals and specifications, focuses on the collaboration of data and distribution of duties, ensures time lines and budgets are met, and provides reports of progress, challenges, set backs and accomplishments to upper management.
Web Administrator/IT: focuses on the web site's architectural and technical requirements, purchases domain name, web hosting package, sets up permissions, controls directory of username and passwords, and defines any database connections, etc.
Web Developer: designs the web page layout, color schemes, and cascading style sheets while using published SEO guidelines. Reviews the specific requirements of the site and programs the pages using a variety of web programming languages. The Web Developer is responsible for "putting all the pieces together" to deliver your end product.
Graphics Designer: creates new images, edits existing images, and manages the image library.
Content Expert: creates keyword inclusive content with specific information that "sells or markets" the products or services. Since creating the web content is a bulk of the development process you may want to divide the tasks to several different people including a saleman, customer service representative or marketing gurus assist. Your Web Developer will work with the Content Experts to decide the best way to deliver the information while maintaining the SEO guidelines and keeping a consistant "tone" throughout all pages of the site.

The web site creation process:

The instructions below are here to guide you through the web site creation process. You can simply browse through the summaries for a brief overview or dig deeper by following the links to more detailed information.

Step 1: Create a Plan for your Web Site Project

The planning process is the first stage of Website Design & Development. Before you purchase web space from a web host, before you purchase any website building software, - start by initializing the planning process. It's FREE and it is going to be your roadmap during your web site creation journey. You do not have to be completely finished with Step 1 before moving on to Step 2 but defining the basic goals of your web site in your Web Plan will definately better prepare you for the decisions in further steps.

Step 2: Decide whether to build your own website or hire a web developer

After you have determined a basic idea of what content to include on your web site, what features are required or may be desired later, you can determine if this is a project suitable to be built using a WYSIWYG or if more sophisticated programming is going to be required. A lot of web hosting companies provide thier own web site building programs and let you try it out using an on-line demo. You may want to try out two or three to see which one you feel most comfortable with so allow yourself some time to play around with the software and then base your decision on your own interactive experience. Read more about Web Hosting...

Listed below are a few web hosting providers that offer a WYSIWYG programs.

Step 3: Select a web hosting provider

If you decide to use a Site Builder program, then the choice of web host is simple. Just select the web hosting company based on the WYSIWYG you feel most comfortable working with and feel that can meet your requirements. But if after testing out these "do-it-yourself" demos, you feel the programs are just too limiting and prevent you from adding the level of customization you desire for your web site, then scrap the idea of using a "web site builder program" and acknowledge that what you want to accomplish is going to require a professional web developer.

Using the spec sheet you creating in Step 1, provide your web developer with clearly defined requirements. The web developer will select which web programming languages to use to accomplish the goals of the site and then assist you in finding a web hosting company that supports the necessary technologies. Web developers often have several web sites hosted with the same web hosting company and can therefore can sometimes get a discount. For these reasons you want to be sure to include your web developer in the web hosting selection process. Read more about Web Hosting.....

Step 4: Purchase your domain name

You want to decide on your domain name as quickly as possible while the name is still available. Select a domain name and register it as soon as possible. If you were able to make a decision in step 2 and have decided which web hosting company to use, you should purchase your domain name from the same company. Not only can you save money in the long run you will have fewer technical details to deal with later if you "park" your domain name and then later transfer it. Read more about selecting a domain name....

Step 5: Compile your assets into a central location

The multimedia elements that you will include on a web page are referred to as "assets". Assets include media deliverable in digital format. Start building a collection of all of the "assets". This collection of items will include text files, images, .pdf documents, animations, scripts, videos, music files and any other form of digital media that can be displayed or delivered via a web browser. You may want to set up a central location on your network so that the people on your web team can drop items into this location. You can set up a folder structure for web content, images, docs, scripts, and multimedia. This will help the people working on your web site be able to find the desired files during the creation process. Read more about gathering assets...

Step 6: Select a Website Template and Color Theme

A website template is a web page layout that is used on all of the pages of your site to give them a consistant look and feel as well as established a structured navigation system. There are many locations on the web that you can locate and download web templates. If you are going to be using a WYSIWYG then you will select from a list of pre-defined templates and you are usually limited to using only the ones provided. Website Templates are great for quickly setting up a web site layout and very benefial for the creatively challenged or restricted budget projects.

Once you have selected a template, you can define your "styles" that specifies the font-family, font-size, colors, background colors, hyperlink colors, etc. Decide on a color pallet collection that creates the "theme" you want your website to have. Read more about web site templates...

Step 7: Set up your Navigation Menus

Now grab the sitemap you created during the development of your Website Plan and use it to logically set up your web site menu. Be sure to use the styles from the previous step when determining the color of the links.

Step 8: Add your SEO web content to the individual pages of your site

Ideally, you would have already assigned the task of web content creation to someone on your web team so that by the time the web developer is ready to add the content to the site you can supply that information. Read more about creating web content that is optimized for search engines...

Step 9: Review the entire website on a testing server.

Once all of the pieces of your web site have been gathered and pieced together you will need to have the website "compiled" and viewable on a testing server. This will give you an opportunity to review all aspects of the site before it goes live for the whole world to see. Test your forms to make sure all data is being submitted, check that all images are viewable in the browser, to all of the hyperlinks to catch any broken links, check for relavant page titles, confirm meta tags are in place and unique for each page, check for spelling errors, page layout issues, and that your site is viewable in both Internet Explorer and Firefox.

Step 10: Publish and Promote your New Web Site

After you have reviewed your website and corrected any identified errors you are ready to place your files on a web server so that they can be viewed by the general public.

If you created your web site using a WYSIWYG provided by your web host company then your files already reside on the server. All you need to do is give the pages permission to "go live". This is usually as easy as pushing a button.

However, if you had a web developer build your site, all of the files are most likely on his/her computer. These files will need to be transferred from his/her computer to the computer that will host your files. Your web host company will provide you with the IP address of your website and assign you an "FTP account". FTP stands for file transfer protocol. You will need a FTP program installed on the computer in order to transfer the files from your computer to the web server.

Download Filezilla (a free FTP program) if you don't already have an FTP program. Install it on your computer and set up the connection to transfer the files to your web server.

You will first create a name for the location you are publishing to, the IP address, your FTP username and password. Then test the connection. You will see a page with a divider down the middle. On the left side is your computer (the one holding the web files). On the right side is the web host computer with a file structure set up specifically for your website files. Simply click the transfer button and your files will be copies over to the web server. Once this task is complete you should go to your web browser and type in your domain name. Your new website should now be displayed in your browser.

Once your web site is live you can begin promoting your domain name on all of your promotional products and other forms of advertising. Your marketing deparment can assist you with ideas on how to promote your new web site.

Multimedia Designs .NET