If you are planning to build a business online, you need your own website. Period.
You should also have a blog. Maybe the blog will be your main site or maybe part of your social media presence. Either way, a blog will be part of your online business,
While there are free services out there and these are fine for personal blogs, they do not create a professional image. As part of your online efforts you will want to brand yourself and present as an authority in your niche.
To do that, you need web hosting, a domain name and an autoresponder service to get started.
Choosing and Registering a Domain Name
When choosing a domain name, you want something that is relatively short, is easy to remember and type. You want to try for the .COM extension. If you just cannot get that, try for .NET
This is a business so don’t use something silly or cute – it will give the wrong impression of your business. Depending on what your business is, you could use your name. If your name is not available as is, you can try separating your first and last names with a hyphen. You can also consider adding the word “online” such as “barbhillonline.com”
If you do not want your name associated with it, you can create a name that conveys what your business is about. For example, if you have a business promoting toys, you could go for something like “TopFunToysForKids.com”
Buying Your Domain Name
There are many places where you can buy/register a domain name. These are the best places to search for the one you want to see if it is available.
My favourite domain registrar is NameCheap. Make sure you check out the coupons page before buying as you can usually save yourself some money!
I suggest you add WhoIsGuard to your purchase. This protects your registration data from searches online.
Finding Web Hosting
As with domain registration, there are many many web hosting providers.
This is usually a monthly fee so you do not want to pay more than $15/month starting out. Some of the very inexpensive plans require you to pay for the entire year up front. You do not need all the bells and whistles so stick with the basics.
You need a web host that is reliable, has good customer service and a selection of plans from which you can choose. Make sure which ever one you choose provides cpanel (this is how you set up your website.) It is also worth checking to see if they also have a WordPress installer to save you time and effort.
Some good ones are HostedSafe (sample plan on the left), TMDHosting, HostGator. Make sure you do your own research to find the host and hosting plan that meets your needs. Weigh the good and the bad reviews. I have heard some people say never to use Hostgator, however, I have been with them for years and have had great customer service when needed and very little down time.
Once you have signed up, make sure you save the information they send you as you will need this.
NOTE: Most web hosting companies will also register domain names for you. While this may seem convenient, I recommend having your web hosting and domain registrar with different companies. I made that mistake when I was starting out and, when the web host proved less than ideal and I wanted to switch, it was a real hassle getting the domain moved to a different host.
Selecting an Autoresponder Service
For your online business to succeed, you should use as much automation as you can so you can focus on building your business. In any business your biggest asset is your customers.
You will want to build a list of buying customer and potential customers. You collect their email and perhaps their names from your blog. Once you have that, you can send them emails with information, offers, or maybe a free gift.
To help you manage that list, you will need an autoresponder. This is a service that saves your list information and lets you send emails to all or some of your customers, on autopilot.
There are several services available and again I recommend a paid option such as Aweber or Getresponse. I have used both in the past but I currently use Aweber.
Next time we’ll talk a bit about using WordPress for your blog.
