Getting Your Business Online in 4 Easy Steps

Getting Online Doesn’t Need To Be Expensive

Many business owners think it will cost an arm and a leg to get their business. It doesn’t.

While you can certainly spend a lot of money to build a web site with a lot of functionality and bells and whistles. How about $600+ million for HealthCare.gov that didn’t work?

The following 4 steps can get your business or non-profit online in one day, maybe even an afternoon.

Claim Your Domain Name

The first thing you need to do to get online is to have a domain name. The domain name is your address online. While their are scores of extensions you can buy, most people are familiar while the .COM domains. Don’t worry if you can’t get the .COM

The ideal domain name for your business or non-profit would be yourname.com (for a business) or yourname.org (for a non-profit).

If you can’t get those, I recommend NOT getting a hyphenated name. Most people will fail to put the hyphen in when they type out the domain name.

If you are cleaning company and you can’t get yourname.COM, and your tag line is “cleaning up after you”, why not try and get the domain name CleaningUpAfterYou.COM (BTW, the capital letters in the domain name don’t matter, but will help people remember it). On my business cards, I have ESGgraphics.com so that people realize that there are 2 G’s back to back.

The cost of a domain name (.COM, .ORG, .NET) will run up to $35 per year. You will need to renew these each year in order to keep them. It is a misnomer to think you buy the domain name. You are in fact just renting it for a year. You can purchase multiple years to ensure you don’t forget to renew, or you can pay people to handle this for you, we can do it for you if you’d like. Just let us know.

Host Your Files Online

Just because you have your domain name, doesn’t mean you have a web presence. You need to pay some one to host the files for your website.

There are at least two schools of thought when it comes to hosting.

Host Where You Registered Your Name

When you buy a domain name, the registrar you go through most likely will try and sell you hosting as well.

Having your hosting with the same company can make things very easy for you. You can call one customer service number and have them help you with any problems with your hosting configuration and you will typically get your invoice for hosting and domain renewal at the same time.

When you set up the Domain Name Servers (DNS), having both the domain and hosting at the same place makes this easy to do. The DNS settings basically tell the Internet where to send some one who types in your domain name. It is like the old style phone book. You type in the domain name and it knows what telephone lines to take in order to get to the phone inside your house.

Host Where Your Domain Somewhere Else

Some people like to have their domain name registered in one place and hosted another.

The thought behind this is that it provides you with more control over things.

If you don’t like the customer service you are receiving on your hosting account, you can take your files and go some place else.

If your host provide comes under a denial of service (DOS) attack, and your domain is registered some one else, your site may stay unaffected.

Since most of the companies and non-profits we work with are small, we recommend registering and hosting in the same place.

With our hosting services, we take care of your domain renewals and hosting while offering you free web site maintenance. Check out our hosting services for more details.

Web Design: Match Your Brand

So, you have a domain name and hosting. Now you need a web site for people to see. This is where web design comes into the picture.

If you type in yourname.COM, it will take your to your site. The problem is, there is nothing to see. Some registrars will set up a parking page with ads for their services.

To avoid these parking pages, I recommend setting up FTP access for your hosted domain and uploading this page(right click and save link as index.html). Upload this to your root directory and when you type in your domain name, this will come up.

If you are going to have a Word Press site, you will need to install the Word Press app inside your hosting account. Depending on your host company, it can be any where from a few clicks to some what complicated.

Once Word Press is installed, you will need to pick a theme and start adding your content.

If you are going with an HTML site, you will need to upload the files.

The look and feel of your site should match your brand. But for the sake of getting online in an afternoon, this is something that can be worked on later. Get online, provide a way for people to reach you and start working on getting your site filled with good information.

The design of your website should have thought put behind it. We would be glad to talk with you and design it for you. Please let us know how we can help you.

Social Media Platforms: Connect With Your Fans

The last piece of the online puzzle is to get set up on at least one and for most companies, no more than 4 social media platforms.

While there are more than 100 different social media platforms to be on, be realistic on which ones you can or should be on.

Hopefully you know who your target audience is and what platforms they are on, I recommend claiming your spot on Facebook and Twitter first. While Google+, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Tumblr, Instagram, etc. are viable platforms, Facebook has more than 1.2 BILLION members.

Claiming your spot is a simple as using an email address to set up the page. You then will need to verify the account by clicking on the link the social media platform sends to you.

Adding content (profile pictures, cover images, etc.) can be done later. Make sure you claim your business or non-profits name.