Starting a Simple Website For Your Business

November 14 & 15, 2011 Shannon ScanlanBusiness Services Librarian sscanlan@ahml.info

Why a Business Blog or Website?  Blogs are free  Website hosting is inexpensive  Control over your website layout and content  No need for a webmaster  Easy to publish content  Variety of applications and appearances to chose from

Where Do I Begin? Why are you creating a website for your business?  Money maker  Customer service  Informational (highlight your products)  Networking Blogger.com can be accessed with a Gmail account Sign up for Wordpress or download the software Decide who in your business is going to be creating the website and/or creating the content Decide if you need a web host Buy a domain name or create a name for your blog  http://www.networksolutions.com/ Develop a style of writing for your website

Blogger Blogger is a self publishing website for blogs A blog is a website that is updated with content, photos links, videos etc...similar to an online journal Content is usually displayed in chronological order Blogger was bought by Google in 2003 Users can create an unlimited number of blogs Those who can add content to your blog-100 users 10 pages per blog No outside hosting

Wordpress First released in 2003 More freedom with applications and design than Blogger As of August 2011, powers 22% of all new websites Wordpress software can be downloaded and used to create a website Allows for outside website hosting Website hosting incurs a host fee (GoDaddy, Bluehost) Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is built in

Wordpress.com or .org? Wordpress.com is free hosting  Cannot control plug ins or advertising Wordpress.org software must be downloaded  Hosting providers usually are less than $10 a month  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8355qaOKXC8&feat ure=related

Blogger Dashboard

Wordpress Dashboard

Design Blogger and Wordpress have templates/themes for website design Template designer (Blogger) and Appearance (Wordpress) allows for customization of color, background, column width and layout Page elements can be moved around page layout Additional users can be added Comments can be moderated

Website Stats Blogger and Wordpress have stat tracking for visitors Tracks top posts, traffic sources Wordpress tracks search engine terms and clicks Blogger tracking includes a visitor map, page views by operating systems and browsers

Adsense Adsense is a program through Google which displays text, photos, ads targeted to your website’s content Revenue is generated “per click” Blogger allows Adsense  Adsense help https://www.google.com/adsense/support/ Wordpress does not allow Adsense on free blogs

Link to an Online Store http://www.aquaricreations.blogspot.com/ Add a link to Paypal  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_r7aathpBYY

Followup Submit your website to search engines  Google  Bing  Yahoo Monitor comments and stats Be patient and consistent Share your business website URL on business cards, flyers, banners, coupons, print ads and stationary

Websites Designed with Wordpress & Blogger http://andesadventuregu  http://www.stonyfield.co ides.com/ m/blog/ http://www.alissaneilpr.c  http://www.blogsouthwe om/ st.com/ http://www.aquaresorts.  http://disneyparks.disne com/ y.go.com/blog/

Additional Information http://www.expand2web.com/blog/why-use-wordpress-to- power-your-small-business-website/ http://www.aoclarkejr.com/wordpress-business- themes.html http://wordpressforbusiness.org/ http://wordpressforbusiness.org/business-web-design/7- big-reasons-to-create-your-new-small-business-website- using-wordpress http://www.thesitewizard.com/gettingstarted/startwebsite .shtml http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gR0xZjhWfJQ&feature =related

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Starting a Simple Website For Your Business

by Shannon Scanlan

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