Having a website has become essential for both companies and freelancers. With the pandemic of 2020, we have all seen that a web presence has become crucial in the survival of your business, and has even changed the landscape of the web.
Today, there are different ways and tools to create a website depending on the complexity and the means at your disposal. After reading this guide from A to Z, you will have an idea about the tools and the prerequisites that you will use to create your site yourself.
You will also find practical advice and tips in this article. Do you need technical skills to create a website? To create a very personalized website with complex features, you will obviously need to know the basics of web development or even use a professional web developer.
But don't worry, with the evolution of technology, there are now simple but effective tools to help you create and publish a website on your own.
Here is a complete guide on how to create a website:
Create a website: Four possibilities
This guide will present 4 ways to create your website without resorting to web development skills, you can use:1. A content management system such as WordPress.
2. An ordinary website builder.
3. An e-Commerce website builder.
4. And a fourth way is to code your site yourself with the different computer languages required.
The choice of which method to use depends on your expectations, your budget, and your skill.
1) Create a website with a CMS like WordPress
Content management systems or Content Management System (CMS) are more or less simple, but complete online creation tools. This option is more economical than the others. Some hosts such as 000WebHost, FreeHosting, or OVH offer automatic installation of CMS. First, you will only have to enter the information necessary for your site for its creation and its first operation.
Then you move on to writing the content and choosing the visual style of your site. You can customize it from the various extension modules (plug-ins) and the modification of the HTML and CSS codes will be programmed automatically.
We will detail the steps for creating and publishing a website with the CMS called WordPress later in this article. WordPress is the most used platform by nearly 60% of websites in 2022 for:
- Its simplicity
- Its efficiency
- Its abundance of features
- Its speed of implementation
2) Create a website using a website builder
We all believe that creating a professional or personal website would be safer and more beneficial using a more professional tool. As its name suggests, a website builder is a platform specially designed for creating, managing, customizing, and publishing a website.
Unlike technically complex processes, these steps require only a few clicks and simple manipulations such as drag and drop.
The use of these platforms is often more expensive than CMS and the features offered are sometimes more or less limited even if this tool proves to be an all-in-one solution.
Thus, the design of some of your projects cannot be completely ensured by the website creators:
- Best suited for personal sites: Website builders are great for creating a blog. The showcase sites are also within the ropes of this tool
- Less good for professional sites: these platforms will reach their limits if your website is designed to contain more complex content with databases.
- Wix (which we highly recommend): with 500 different site templates suitable for any profile, but with storage limited to 50 GB.
- Jimdo: with a hundred models and storage from 2 GB to unlimited (depending on budget)
- Site123: Offering over 180 templates and storage up to 270 GB.
- WebSelf: We also believe in this editor which is easy to use and available 100% in French, whether it is the software or the customer service.
- There are many platforms, to name a few: Zyro, Weblow, Webnode, SiteW, e-monsite.com, etc…
3) Create an e-commerce site with a website creator
Do you want to create an E-Commerce type website instead? It will then be necessary to favor solutions with a site creator like Wix but more adapted to e-Commerce. E-Commerce sites must be captivating and provide a simple and secure means of payment.
The development process is more complex since it is necessary to be concerned at the same time with the creation of the website itself, and also with the particularities of e-commerce sites, such as delivery methods, online payment, and after-sales service. -sale, etc.
The 3 platforms of the previous paragraph are intended for the creation of showcase sites. You can use them by adding appropriate modules or extensions for creating an e-commerce website. But there are more specific tools for creating an online store. The most famous are:
- Shopify
- Oxatis
- Wizishop
- The visual style of the e-commerce site
- The content: about the merchant, product sheets, frequently asked questions, news, etc.
- How it works: the order and the method of payment
This is why e-commerce site builders are recommended to start and test if an activity is viable, but if you plan to develop sales, this solution can become expensive.
We, therefore, recommend that you resort to the installation of CMS such as PrestaShop, which will only cost you the initial installation. here too if you need a tailor-made visual identity, or you want to be supervised by e-Commerce experts, we recommend that you contact an e-Commerce Web Agency.
It's more expensive than doing it yourself, but the investment is worth it, because you will develop your sales faster, and the return on investment will be faster.
4) Develop my website myself
Programming your own website is obviously a very economical way to start an online activity with a site. But the development is more or less complex and requires programming knowledge.
The essential trio in 2022 is formed by HTML5 for the structure, CSS3 for the aesthetics, and JavaScript for the dynamic effect.
For more advanced sites, you will also need languages like PHP, Python or Ruby, etc, to develop the back office functionalities... Don't worry, if you don't have time to take face-to-face training, there are plenty of documents and online video tutorials to help you.
The most recommended are Alphorm, OpenClassrooms, Elephorm, and Udemy.
The downside of coding your site yourself is the time you will spend learning the languages and implementing your project.
Fortunately, you can hire a web agency in web development. Agencies employ programming experts who can design your dream website in a very short time. The site will surely be more efficient and attractive, but it will be a little more expensive than coding it yourself.
The cost is justified by the fact that the agency recruits specialists for each of the parts that make up a website. There are front office developers who take care of HTML/CSS, back office developers who take care of PHP/Javascript, and others for other necessary trades such as web design, natural referencing, the configuration of the hosting server, etc.
Each of these aspects of the website requires advanced skills. Developing the site yourself or requesting the intervention of a web agency can offer the following advantages over the creation tools:
- Unique or bespoke visual style
- Design reflecting your activities and personality
- Advanced and unlimited features
- Ease of updating (autonomy)
Tutorial: Create a website with WordPress
In this tutorial, we will guide you step by step in the creation of your website with the famous WordPress content management system. We have chosen to teach you this option since it represents the best compromise between cost, style, functionality, and development time.
This guide will show you the creation of the site from the choice of the domain name to the development of the navigation menu. If you read carefully, you can be looking at your first website in less than two hours.
If you are still hesitating to choose between Wix or WordPress, you will find in this article a complete comparison between Wix and WordPress.
1) Choose an appropriate domain name
Before the actual creation, you must first think about the domain name that you will assign to your site. Indeed, the domain name represents at the same time the name and the address of the website. For example, the French domain name of the Google site is: google.fr Internet users will type in this name or click on the corresponding link to open a website.
So, the domain name has a primordial role and must be chosen meticulously. For visitors to quickly identify or remember your domain name, it should match your company name, business, featured brand, or location. You must also choose the domain extension which depends mainly on the location and the target audience:
- . com: professional or commercial site
- . org: non-profit site
- .net: professional service site
- . Fr,. us; . of…. : local extension for professional or personal sites of a defined country
To do this, use the domain verification devices that some hosts offer on their platforms. You can go to: nom-domaine.fr, gandi.net, or ionos.fr and enter the desired domain name.
These platforms will show that it is available if it is. Otherwise, they will suggest new names by just changing the extension or name in question. There are also tools like " Bust a Name " that will allow you to generate domain names based on the words you want to use. The tool is configurable in several ways.
2) Buy the domain name and host the website
Registering your domain name starts at €5 per year. This price varies depending on the domain extension you choose. In addition, a subscription to a host is mandatory to have a site visible to Internet users and the hosting offers of some hosts automatically offer a temporary free domain name to help you launch your site.
You will need a host even for sites created with content management systems like WordPress and some hosts even offer automatic installation of WordPress. If you need advice on hosting a website, do not hesitate to contact us to advise you on the best choice to make according to your needs. It would indeed be a shame to have oversized or insufficiently efficient hosting depending on the traffic of your website.
3) Formatting the style and identity of the site
After deploying WordPress, you can now customize the interface of your website. To access it, you must go to the administration area of your site using the corresponding site name for the very first time: http:// NomDeVotreSite .XXX/wp-admin/
Then enter your username and password for authentication. Several menus will appear to manage your account, for settings and modifications to your site. To modify the visual style of the site, click on the "Appearance" menu which in turn includes several sub-menus such as Themes, Widgets, menus, and customize.
By clicking on Themes, many customizable themes will be available to you. You can gradually modify the chosen theme for more originality by clicking on “Customize”.
The Widgets menu will allow you to add widgets to incorporate into your site. The most used are: weather, news feeds, slideshows, and the comment space for the user experience. The preview will allow you to simulate the interface and choose the theme that best suits your e-commerce site, showcase website, or your blog.
The quality of the design of the pages of the website will attract more potential customers. If you need a custom WordPress theme, we can help you, you will find in this article some indications on the budget.
4) Installation of additional plugins
A WordPress plugin, or WordPress module, is a computer program used as an extension of an existing program.
Therefore, for the complete functioning of your website, the installation of several additional modules is mandatory depending on the type of site.
These essential tools will take care of all aspects of the site ranging from design and security to SEO and cache management. For each aspect, there are multitudes of free and paid plugins that you can install by clicking on the "Extensions" menu, then add.
Plugins compatible with WordPress will appear directly on your screen. Searching with matching keywords will also allow you to find the module you are interested in, with the search results being sortable.
At the top right of each plugin is the install button which will then change to "activate".
Once installation and activation are complete, you will have the features enabled for your site. For optimal functionality, you can use search engines to find out the best modules for each aspect.
You can also settle for our suggestion to have the best ones. We have an exhaustive list, but we bring you the top two (most users and highest rating) in each area in 2022:
- Natural SEO: Yoast SEO or Rank Math
- Plugin E-Commerce: WooCommerce
- Page Creator or Builder: Elementor
- Contact form management: Contact Form 7
- Improved WordPress editor: Classic Editor
- Cache management: W3 Total Cache or WP-Optimize and/or LiteSpeed Cache
- Site Security: iThemes Security
- Optimized Images: Smush
- Creation of responsive tables: TablePress
- Stylized buttons: MaxButtons (do not hesitate to consult our tutorial explaining how to create a button for your site)
- Comment Anti-Spam: Akismet Anti-Spam
5) Writing the content of the site
After the visual style, let's now move on to the content of the site. This step consists of writing the articles for your site and designing its essential pages. The content is also important because it must also reflect the visual identity of your company or your personal life.
So, the choice of Internet users will also be based on the quality of the content of your website. All your information must be included, including:
- Your logo
- The keywords of your activity
- Your contact details
- Ads…
- A homepage: with beautiful images, a strong first impression to attract new customers. The different menus must be very visible at the top of this page and/or at the bottom of the page.
- Offer pages: essential for a sales site, giving information on your products and/or services such as characteristics and prices.
- A contact page: the maximum information so that visitors can contact you. At the very least, you must present a professional email address, a telephone number, and your address. Creating a contact form will make it easy for visitors to ask questions.
- An about page: presentation of your site, your company in general such as its activities, its history, its members.
- A blog page: to improve customer engagement while increasing search engine positioning.
6) Personalization of the navigation menu
The organization of your menu is a very important aspect of the website. A well-organized and comprehensive menu will make it easier for people to navigate your site and find what they want.
A menu with a strong impression will be pleasing to the eye and will advertise well to potential customers. To customize your site's navigation menu, follow these steps:
- Click on the "Menus" sub-menu of the Appearance menu.
- Then click on “create a new menu” to design your first menu.
- It is after that you can add the pages and the content of your website. Don't forget to save everything by clicking “Save menu” while checking the “Primary Navigation” option.
We also hope you enjoyed it and we hope to see your website soon. This tutorial has been specific to WordPress, but you can use Drupal as well. At the time, we made a comparison between WordPress and Drupal which will help you choose the CMS according to your sector of activity.
The steps to follow to have traffic on your website after its creation
As you may have noticed, designing a website is not necessarily an easy thing. This requires financial investment, technical skills, and time.
But this is still not enough to attract more visitors and increase sales for your business. Setting up a website is not enough to improve the notoriety of your company. Writing and publishing articles are useless if they are not visible to all.
Here are some tips to follow after its creation for better visibility.
1) Install Google Tools
Configure Google Search Console
After working on your website and showcasing your products and services, you can evaluate your daily efforts and performance using Google Analytics and Google Search Console.
To begin with, Google Search Console will take care of the indexing and visibility of your pages on your site on Google. It identifies issues that could affect indexing while suggesting improvements you can make. Search Console also tracks your site's performance indexes, including:
- The number of appearances of a page in search results
- The average position of your website pages in Google user searches
- The number of clicks generated
Configure Google Analytics
As for Google Analytics, it allows you to know precisely in real-time:
- The overall traffic on your site: the number and geographical location of visitors by period
- Traffic originating websites
- Traffic on each page: the most visited pages and articles
- The type of devices used by visitors
- The duration of the visits
To install Analytics, you can directly insert the Analytics codes if you have used an independent developer or a web agency to create your website.
Otherwise, you can also use plugins like "Google Analytics Dashboard" or "MonsterInsights" which represent an easier way to install it. To deepen the subject of Google Analytics: we have made two publications, one on the key indicators that must be followed in Google Analytics as well as some indications on how to configure Google Analytics for an e-commerce site.
2) Improve the SEO referencing of the website
To be visible, the first step to adopt is to improve its referencing. The goal of natural referencing is to optimize content for search engines. To have the best positions in the search engines, the contents must be well optimized, that is to say well referenced.
To win places, you do not necessarily need experts or web agencies. Some fairly simple strategies to follow will do the trick:
- Choose a reputable and quality host: so that the site loads quickly. Be careful not to oversize your hosting server, because there are always possible optimizations on the website side that will allow you to save hosting costs while having a fast site.
- Choose relevant keywords and use them regularly in the articles, while ensuring a natural and pleasant reading. Also, try including them in page URLs and meta descriptions.
- Also, don't forget to reference your images: use the “alt” attribute of the HTML code to add alternative text to the images on the site.
- Train your writers in SEO referencing and properly tie up the articles you are going to publish
- Install plugins designed specifically to improve SEO: Rank Math, Yoast SEO…
3) Make yourself known on social networks.
All notoriety is based on good publicity. In a digital world, advertisements are mainly done on social networks, which are the most used platforms today.
These platforms allow easy publication of articles and quick sharing among users. Comments and reactions are also benefits of social networks. You will be able to easily evaluate the positives and negatives of your products and services.
First, you must choose the platforms that are the most popular in your country and that have the most potential customers. Among the most used channels in the world are Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.
For professionals, it's Pinterest and LinkedIn. The use of social networks is free, but for better exposure, you will need to subscribe to paid advertising services.
Next, you need to create a page with your logo as your profile picture and with the necessary contact information.
Finally, you just have to regularly publish the articles that you have put on your own site and wait for the shares and the reactions.
4) Remember to animate your community with newsletters.
Apart from adding a blog to your site that we saw before, you can also create an email distribution list to maintain a community. This method is a very good idea to be able to increase your audience and create relationships with them.
Indeed, the creation of a mailing list can already be done during the design process of your website or after. You can include a small form on the homepage that will invite visitors to subscribe to your newsletter for free. Then, you can send weekly or monthly to the email addresses listed with the latest news of your activities. This will keep your subscribers coming back to your site to check out the offers.
5) Update your content regularly.
Finally, don't forget to update your content regularly. News or blog posts will attract Google bots. In addition, regular changes make your site more attractive to your audience.
Search engines favor active sites in the placement of search results. To do this, for example, you can frequently renew the products you put on sale, or simply update the descriptions of your products. This last trick further demonstrates the need to keep a blog that we recommend to animate the content of a website.
For example, with a WordPress blog, you can increase awareness of your site if you include a good number of articles with inbound and outbound links. By following all the previous tips, your website should get the visibility it needs to stand out from competitors, get more visitors and increase sales.
Frequently asked questions about creating a website
We hope that the indications and information presented in this guide have been useful for you to create a site, make it work, and make it visible. In any case, to complete this guide, you will find the answers to the questions often asked by certain people before and during the creation of a website.1) How much does a website cost?
The price of creating a website as well as the costs related to its operation depends on the type of site (e-commerce, blog, showcase sites, personal site, etc.) and the means used for the creation.
Using a website builder is more expensive than installing a CMS on a web hosting platform. Making a website yourself also seems to be advantageous except that the operating costs will be higher than the other solutions.
Obviously, buying a turnkey website is more expensive than using a builder yourself, but that's the price of comfort and quality.
In addition, creating a merchant site remains quite expensive compared to other types of sites, because the costs specific to e-commerce can reach more than €3,000 per year.
Several types of expenses make up the cost of creating and operating a website. Most hosts incorporate some fees into their subscription offers.
The writing of the content of the pages and articles as well as their references are the aspects with the most variable costs since they essentially depend on the contract of the writers and the expected quality of the content.
So that you can get an idea of what to expect, here is an inventory of the various costs essential to the operation of the website:
- Domain name: 0 to 50 € per year – Free for some offers from hosts
- Web hosting: from €1 per month (single domain shared hosting) up to €350 per month (VPS hosting or virtual dedicated server) depending on the expected performance.
- SSL certificate: free (included in hosting costs) to €500 per year. It is an important electronic certificate used to encrypt exchanges and authenticate an identification.
- Applications and plugins: 0 to 30 € per month
- Marketing and advertising: free to thousands of euros per year, it depends on your need for visibility.
2) Can we create a website for free?
You may have noticed that the development of a website requires a more or less substantial financial investment. Indeed, it is possible to create a website for free. Some non-performing web hosts offer a free version with which you can gain experience while developing and publishing your site.
Nevertheless, apart from the experience, free websites are not beneficial. Creating a completely free professional or personal website is not a good idea if you want to have a high-performance, credible and lasting site.
Here is a list of the disadvantages of free sites:
- Poor performance that discourages your visitors: slow speed, lots of bugs...
- Very limited functionalities: reduced choice of templates and visual style, limited content (number of pages and articles), etc.
- Bad domain name and unsuitable domain extension: you can't choose them in most cases
- You are not the real owner of your site: the site belongs to the creation platform and may be dissolved one day.
- Impossible optimization, minimal visibility: your site will be at the bottom of search engine results
- Many external advertisements: it is the shareholders of these advertisements who pay the platform for its operation and to compensate for the freeness of your site. Then, your site will be bothered by an infinity of advertisements that have nothing to do with your activity or your personal life.
Therefore, we do not advise you to use these website creation tools which are completely free. If your budget is limited, you can develop your web pages yourself by coding them from A to Z or hire a web agency to help you.
You can also carry out your web project by opting for a host that allows you to install CMS such as WordPress, Drupal, or Prestashop software.
Creating a site with a CMS is free, there is no license to pay, all you have to do is pay for the domain name and your hosting, which are sometimes the subject of interesting promotions.
Finally, with a larger budget, and easily create your website using site creation software like Wix and Jimdo, the monthly cost remains ridiculous.
So, if you want to improve your notoriety and your business, choose to invest in powerful and guaranteed tools for your website. Your investment will be quickly recouped as customers increase and sales grow.
3) What is the best solution among the methods of creating a website?
We pointed out earlier that free build solutions are not recommended. So what is the best solution? The answer to this question is not easy. In truth, one solution better than the others does not exist. Each solution meets a specific need and adapts to the specifics of your needs.
- If you are looking for the easiest and simplest solution, create your website using a site creator.
- For more functionality and flexibility, use content management systems like WordPress as your authoring tool.
- If you want to put your personal touch on your website and you are resourceful, you can code and develop your website yourself. Be aware that this solution requires much more time and implies that you will probably have to take the time to consult tutorial videos or documentation.
- Finally, using a web agency will save you a lot of time that you can use to focus on setting up your project. So don't hesitate to contact us if you need help.
4) What are the differences between creating a professional and personal site?
The principle and the processes for creating a professional or personal website are the same. The various tools and methods explained above are designed to create both types of sites. The difference remains in the quality and quantity of the content that you will put on the pages of the website.
For example, professional sites must reflect your image and the identity of your activities with highly optimized content.
The two types of sites are also different regarding the expected functionalities. So, the applications and add-ons to install are often more numerous and more complex for a professional site. As a result, the cost of creating a professional site is higher than that of a personal site.
To create a merchant site, we advise you to use website creators specializing in e-commerce to have a secure and guaranteed service.
Thus ends this complete guide on the creation of a website, we hope that it will help you in your web project…
To finish
Creating a website can be easy to achieve if your needs are simple and you are ready to adapt to the solutions and functionalities offered by these online website creation tools. If your needs start to be specific, it is very likely that you will have to use CMS like WordPress or PrestaShop.Otherwise, if you are brave and motivated to train in web development, online courses exist in abundance on the web, and you will most likely get there by devoting a few hours a day to them.
There are many possibilities, it all depends on your budget and the time you are willing to devote to it.
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