Putting up own website - where to turn?

[Dogmama]

With any luck, I'm launching my dog training business in 2014. I need a website. I'm fairly computer literate but known little about websites. I'd really like to try to do it myself to keep costs low because I have other fairly substantial start up costs. I have a web hosting service through my local internet company. People are telling me that Wordpress is easy to use and I've poked around their website - seems fairly easy.

In the beginning, I'm keeping it fairly clean. I just want a web presence and a way for people to contact me through the internet. I will eventually want to have the ability to take credit card payments, but that's down the road. I may do a video or two, but again, that's down the road.

Does anybody have any experience or advice?

[thekarens]

No advice, but I wanted to wish you the best of luck!

[tulip]

I use WordPress and Weebly. I find Weebly simpler to use but WordPress is more robust.

[Irulan]

Here are the basic steps:
1.Register your domain name. This is like $12/year.

2. Get a web hosting plan. - oh, looks like you have that.
3. Start building the site with WordPress or similar. Godaddy has a service that integrates with Wordpress so you get started right away. I've hand coded sites way back when, and for the new technology Wordpress is pretty simple. Wordpress is interactive software that you install on your computer, than is linked with whatever server/hosting you use.

-Even though WordPress is known as blogging software, it's great for just regular sites, too.
-You will need to download Wordpress onto your computer if that's the way you decide to go.
-I'd opt to pay for hosting. You can have a free blog/website at Wordpress but it comes with ads.

There is a ton of help out there in terms of tutorials, videos, etc. I found that any time I couldnt figure out how to do something I would just google it and find the answer somewhere.

[Catrin]

Back when I had a book indexing business on the side I used Wordpress and liked it just fine. I didn't even use the interactive software they provide, just used their free online editing/templates. I didn't have ads, and I may have paid a small amount for that, it's been a few years and I've forgotten if I did.

Good luck and have fun!

[Dogmama]

Irulan, thanks, that is what I needed to know. I bought a domain name at Godaddy (The Well-Mannered Dog)and will be talking to my web host service after the new year. I don't want ads - with my luck there would be Petsmart ads on my page.

One thing I'm not clear on - can I download wordpress, start to work on it and then upload it to my web hosting service?

[shootingstar]

I love your domain name, dogmama!

Just make sure your web host service already hosts wordpress.org blogs and ask them for their customer links. The free one is on wordpress.com on Wordpress company servers....

I have used both versions. What wordpress.com version does is to make sure its core/new features work..before they take to .org version.

I have used both versions. There is inherently some strong advantages using wordpress.com ...for free to try out. It doesn't hurt to try your own personal blog separate from your business.

[Irulan]

Irulan, thanks, that is what I needed to know. I bought a domain name at Godaddy (The Well-Mannered Dog)and will be talking to my web host service after the new year. I don't want ads - with my luck there would be Petsmart ads on my page.

One thing I'm not clear on - can I download wordpress, start to work on it and then upload it to my web hosting service?

Shootingstar is right in that you have to make sure your host is set up for WP.

As for working ahead, I'm not sure. It does help to be organized ahead of time. You can have a lot of your text ready, your images ready to go, an organizational structure in mind. It doesn't have to be complicated, but you should have a plan.

One thing that is cool about Wordpress is that there is a lot of built in options. For example, there is a "contact" form that is easy to set up so people can contact you by email. Social media integration is done with a click of the button.

This link will get you started. http://wordpress.org/
One thing to do first is to surf the themes. These are predesigned layouts that determine the look of your site. You can change colors, fonts, images and placement. There are lots an lots of them, generally sorted out by category such as e-tail site, blog, media rich and so on. http://wordpress.org/themes/

To give you an idea, when I was doing my mom's blog, I looked at three themes Chateau, Tiny Forge andTwentyTwelve

I ended up chosing the Chateau theme to play with, and this is what I did with it
http://hadditt.com/

[Irulan]

I will be using a local ISP that I've had for email for a very long time. I like the fact that they're local (I can actually go to their office!). They are extremely helpful in all matters. For example, they helped me set up my modem and get my internet working when I could get NO help from the phone company. I send them an email and receive a response in one hour. If you have any option like that, I'd highly recommend it. They really seem to care.

That works, too! You can have domain registered at one place, and host at another.
For Wordpress though, it requires certain types of software based servers so you must make sure they are set up for that.

[Irulan]

So, I started looking at themes on Wordpress and I feel like I have no clue what the heck. I need a Wordpress jargon 101 class or something. I'm sure I'll figure it out but I hate this stage of learning when it all seems like gobbleteegook.

There are good non-Wordpress sites for help out there, lots of them. I think I found a glossary that helped me sort out all the lingo. Plug-in vs widget and so on.

[Wahine]

There are good non-Wordpress sites for help out there, lots of them. I think I found a glossary that helped me sort out all the lingo. Plug-in vs widget and so on.

I signed up for lynda.com as my web dude friend suggested. It's $25/month for unlimited educational video access on every computer topic you can imagine. You can turn off the monthly access and not pay as desired. So far I've already gotten my moneys worth in 90 min of cruising the site this morning. It's perfect for someone like me who has the ability to learn this stuff but is really starting from scratch.

Unfortunately, part of what I've learned so far is that I will likely have to upgrade from Windows XP to at least windows 7 to do the stuff I want to on my home computer first before publishing my site to the web. That means learning a bunch of new computery stuff. Well, I needed an excuse to clean up my computer anyway.

[smilingcat]

Getting support on XP is going to get progressively more difficult. Better off just migrating over to win7. If you have problems with managing your web site or access via FTP, you will have better support on a win7 machine than on XP.

Save yourself from grief and save time by migrating over to win7.

And one thing about godaddy. Be careful!! They like to tack things on and extend your contract to 5 years without your explicit authorization. Really into upsell!! They like to pull the trigger on implied authorization so pay attention to your credit card billing and elsewhere. They are fairly responsive in straightening out your order so don't let it slide.

That was my experience with them years ago.

[Wahine]

Getting support on XP is going to get progressively more difficult. Better off just migrating over to win7. If you have problems with managing your web site or access via FTP, you will have better support on a win7 machine than on XP.

Save yourself from grief and save time by migrating over to win7.

And one thing about godaddy. Be careful!! They like to tack things on and extend your contract to 5 years without your explicit authorization. Really into upsell!! They like to pull the trigger on implied authorization so pay attention to your credit card billing and elsewhere. They are fairly responsive in straightening out your order so don't let it slide.

That was my experience with them years ago.

Migrating to windows 7 is the plan. Thanks for all the input smilingcat.

[Irulan]

Getting support on XP is going to get progressively more difficult. Better off just migrating over to win7. If you have problems with managing your web site or access via FTP, you will have better support on a win7 machine than on XP.

Save yourself from grief and save time by migrating over to win7.

And one thing about godaddy. Be careful!! They like to tack things on and extend your contract to 5 years without your explicit authorization. Really into upsell!! They like to pull the trigger on implied authorization so pay attention to your credit card billing and elsewhere. They are fairly responsive in straightening out your order so don't let it slide.

That was my experience with them years ago.

Well, that's not my experience. Ever. Never had an account problem with them. I've hosted up to five websites and domains with them and nothing auto renews unless I've set it up that way. I've been with them for about ten years. Now if you forget, or aren't paying attention, that's a personal problem and not them doing things with out authorization. They are always trying too sell me additional months, I do agree with that. I do pay attention to that, heck yeah- if I can save $75 on a two year contract sure I'll renew now.

Plus I'm pretty sure it's illegal to charge things that aren't authorized, so pay attention to what you are signing up for.