How do I make a website?

There are 6 basic steps to making your own website.

 
ONE

Choose a great domain name and register it. (Or buy an old domain name.)

TWO

Get web hosting. (Find reputable hosting that suits your needs.)

THREE

Start designing your site. (Plan the layout and navigation before you begin.)

FOUR

Add your content. (Be sure to check what your best key phrases are.)

FIVE

Optimize your site for web visitors and search engines. (Put the most effort into making your site great for web visitors.)

SIX

Publish your site. (Make sure that all your links work after publishing.)

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(If you wish, you can then create a free, professional, one-click WordPress website.)

 
The six steps above will NOT suit the creation of all websites:

 
Do try to decide on a domain name early.
It is likely that the first name of your choice will be taken – domain names are being snapped up every day. Registering a domain name as soon as possible is a good idea. Domain names are cheap – only costing a few dollars a year.
 
How does the domain name work with the hosting?
Your hosting provider will give you the unique nameservers for your hosting account. There are usually two.
When you buy your domain name, you log into your domain account and change over the nameservers. Now your domain name ‘points’ to your hosting account.
Then you set up your domain names in your hosting account. All done!
 
How do I get my website onto my hosting account?
You can upload the files via FTP.
Or even easier, you can do automatic installs of software such as WordPress directly from your hosting using Fantastico. (Many web hosts come with Fantastico, such as web hosts with CPanel.))
 
Remember that your website should be useful and functional for your visitors.
The real centre of a website is in the design and content of the actual site, as this is what visitors will see and interact with.
 
Of course, the next step after creating your website is to promote it!
You can try Twitter, Facebook, giveaways, guest blogging and many other avenues.
 
Note:
This website deals with the creating a website through the use of a sitebuilder or content management system.
If you would like to learn a site building language such as HTML or PHP – please visit our Resources page for links to tutorials. Our resources page also has lots of links to great webmaster tools, design guides and free templates.