Building a website for your online presence nowadays is fairly easy. It all depends on what you need and the time you can spend.

We will talk about different options that are available in the market, but the list is not exclusive. These are the ones that I personally used, so I can give you my own starter tips and suggestions.

Do I need my own hosting?

Or better first, what exactly is hosting? Well, every website online takes up space. There are companies that sell you a spot on their server so you can take up a certain amount of space online. These companies are called hosting providers. I personally have used OVH for a little more than a decade now, and it’s fairly easy to use. And if I have questions, I’ll just pass by the frequently asked questions, or create a support ticket.

So back to the question. Do you really need your own hosting?

Yes, and no. The advantage of buying your own hosting at a company, is that you have the right of service. If for any reason the servers are down, you are a customer that can complain and ask for benefits if the downtime takes too long.

If you don’t own your own hosting, but it is provided for you, well… you are in the merciful hands of the company. They will work on the problem, but they will not compensate you for lost revenue.

You can see it as owning your own page on Facebook. It’s fun, it brings in revenue. But if Facebook disappears, you have no rights to claim anything. They also don’t need to talk to you about stopping the service.

Do I need my own domain name?

A domain name is the address of your website. You can make a choice if you want to have a general domain, like cookies.com or if you want to go country specific, like cookies.be.
It all depends on your customers and what exactly your website will be about. If you are a bakery in Belgium, the .be would be more than enough. Unless you are shipping your cupcakes all over the world (don’t know if that would actually be edible, but I’m not an expert on cupcakes. At least not in making them 🙂 ).

Buying a domain name can be a bit tricky, since you are not alone, competing for a little spot online. Most hosting providers will also offer a service for domain names. Since I brought up OVH before, on this page you can actually check if the domainname of your dreams is still available.

Now let’s see what your options are, for building your own website.

Little to no technical skills required

Wix.com

At Wix.com you can create your website, without having to use your own hosting. You can create a free account and just start building. Their interface is pretty straight forward, and by just using drag and drop, typing immediately into the template, you can easily create all the pages that you need.

They also offer a possibility to link your domain name, so you don’t have to go through life, as the wix.com/belgianbakery website.

Although Wix is rather simple and limited, the company keeps on expanding the functions into their tool. Nowadays, you can build a complete e-commerce module connected to your Wix website. You can take it even further, by upgrading your free account, to get more and more functions unlocked.

If you just want to get started for free and don’t require a lot, Wix is the place to be.

WordPress.com

Not to be mistaken with wordpress.org, WordPress.com does not require your own hosting. WordPress, the most used CMS (Content Management System) out there, is the software used to make websites. The company behind the software, also wanted to offer their customers the possibility to create a website, without having to deal with the hosting.

WordPress.com can be used for free, but just know in advance that you are limited in style, themes and functions. But again, it all depends on what you want to build a website for.

There is no installation or whatsoever needed. Just create your account, and start blogging. Literally. It’s similar to Wix.com, without the drag and drop, but with a bit more possibilities to connect other apps. It’s a bit less straightforward as Wix, so be sure to put in that small effort, to get the most out of your free wordpress.com website.

Some technical skills required

To CMS or not to CMS?

We mentioned WordPress before. The software that is used to create the website on wordpress.com, but you will be able to find it at wordpress.org (simple, right? )

This software, also called Content Management System, is the very basics of a website. For all three examples, you will need to get your own hosting.

Luckily, more and more hostings offer a simple click-of-a-button installation for the three possiblities and you don’t need to bother with downloading, unzipping, installing etc…

Building an online presence with WordPress

WordPress is most used for building a website. It has a very straightforward layout and it’s easy to add different apps. Installing new themes and styles (the lay-out of your website) is also by the click of a button, and the more time you spend in your WordPress, the more you will be able to finetune it to your smallest details. There are a lot of plugins (features) available to install and expand your website.

Building an online presence with Joomla

Equally simple, but a little less popular, is the Joomla CMS tool.

It has a different structure from WordPress, but don’t let that fool you. Personally I found that Joomla offers you a lot more possibilities on Themes, and innovative websites, and the library of extensions (Plugins) is massive.

All extensions are easy to use, and most of them give you a big manual with explanations, step by step, on how to use the feature on your website. It does require some technical skills and time to setup exactly what you need.

Building an online presence with Drupal

Drupal and I have a love-hate relationship. It is by far, the most complicated CMS tool I have ever used. I’m pretty sure, this software is the favorite for website developers, and you can see that by their user unfriendliness. It is not built for the average joe.

Although the possibilities are endless, you will need some IT people to help you create those possibilities. It’s not my weapon of choice, however, since the company I work for uses Drupal, I have no other choice than to comply. Yuk. But, to be fair, I feel like in the last update they are finally realizing that not everyone can afford a website developer, and they are making their interface more customer friendly.

Start building a website, today!

So there you have it. All the info you need, to get you started out, with your own website. If you have any questions, just pass by the contact page, I won’t bite!