With an information overload, so much to learn and so little time available that I thought why not give you a step by step amateur’s guide to walk you through it all. For a website used by business’s, bloggers, collectors, support groups and numerous other people that show case’s their special interests and ideas. Your Newbies A to Z Guide to building your own website.

1. Get your Domain Name or URL

Your first step to your own unique site. This is the name that you choose to be registered, given to your site. Think of a short catchy name that will be relevant, will be easily spelt and remembered. Now you need to go to a registrar site such as www.Godaddy.com and check to see if that name is available.

They offer a free search on that name and give a list of all other possible variations to choose from. Go for a .com or something like .co.uk type name. These are always the best. You don’t want your prospects going to the wrong web address by going to .com when your site is called .org for instance  This name now needs to be registered to you and an annual fee paid for the right to use it. This is just the front end of your website.

2. Choose a Web Host to become a Home for Your Website.

Web Hosts are companies that have computers connected to the Internet on a continuous base’s. They offer various services such as a WordPress account, email address and Cpanel area to upload your web page’s, manage them from. This is where your website becomes visible to the world and anyone can come and view your information on offer.

The Web host that I recommend and use, is Hostgator.com.  Go there and sign up for an account to house your website/s. You can host as many domain names at no extra cost. This means all your different niches and campaigns can be managed through one account for not a cent extra. Have access to free website tools such as Fantastico and WordPress to build your site and have a cpanel to manage your websites with:  Hostgator.com

3. Transfer Your Domain Name From the Registrar Godaddy to Your Hosting Site i.e. Hostgator.

4. Decide on What Kind of Website You Want…

As a beginner your next step now is to build your website. You can go for the easy WordPress blog style website such as this one or you have other options like using your own creation of your design, to choosing templates from www.freewebtemplates.com or www.templatemonster.com and building on that. I have not used these sites so don’t know what they are like?. Depending on the choice of method in building your site, different courses will follow.

A.  WordPress Blog. Inside Hostgator/your website Cpanel or “control panel” go to Fantastico and choose WordPress. You can follow video tutorials in setting up your site from there.

B. Template Style Sites. Down load the template of your choice to your computer. You now need a HTML web editor to edit with. Dreamweaver is a program editor that you can buy or you can use a free one called NVU. A quick search found this site http://www.net2.com/nvu/ offering a free down load. This editor is what you will use to design and update your website with.

5. Hostgator now offers you a Free Web Disc Account.

The Web Disk allows you to easily drag and drop files to your hosting account from your computer. You can create a Web Disk log-in and access your Web Disk from there. Once your Web Disk is configured, you can then drag and drop files to it just like they are part of your home computer. You can also navigate through the files in your hosting account just as you do the files on your local computer.

To help you set up your own website and learn more advanced web design methods, a membership site I recommend is the one that helped me get this one going. Your first months newbie membership club membership cost I think is $1. Try it out and see how easy it is to follow step by simple step video instruction. If you do not like what you see- cancel your subscription.      

If you are any thing like me there is so much to learn you will get stuck in, to never look back at your business growth. Newbie Membership Club.

“Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.” ~Winston Churchill

Incorrect action is better than no action. Take heart.

1. Getting email address of all customers buying from you is imperative. This is to follow up on customer satisfaction and to update any further offers that could be suitable to their needs.

2. Sending interested prospects to a landing page on a web site specifically designed to just collect their names and email address. This is to build what is called an Opt-in mailing list which is compiled with participants that have requested to receive information related to your specific topic, offer or product. There are a number of ways to get prospects to your site. Pay per click advertising (PPC), article writing, blog posts, viral marketing, using social net works and so on. Offering some sort of carrot or incentive will coerce them to exchange their vital details that are so essential to your business success.

3. Using an Auto Responder Service to manage your list on auto pilot. Emails that you wish to send are loaded into a system set by you and all the rest is auto pilot. Frequency of dispatch, time of day and even pdf files can be attached to the emails as a bonus. A double optin feature prevents any spam.

There you have it, Email marketing success formula to grow your business. The larger and more targeted your address list the more business you will bring in, plain and simple.

To help you set up your own website and autoresponder mailing list system, a membership site I recommend is the one that helped me get this one going. Your first months membership cost I think is $1. Try it out and see how easy it is to follow step by simple step video instruction. If you do not like what you see- cancel your subscription.

If you are any thing like me there is so much to learn you will get stuck in, to never look back at your business growth. Newbie List Building Club.

“Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.” ~Winston Churchill

Incorrect action is better than no action. Take heart.

**Christina Saunders**

For most of us getting our toe into the water is the easy part. Making the decision to dive in and swim is another. We could be afraid because we do not know how to swim or may feel that the water is too crowded?
If you want to learn to swim, getting in the shallow end would be best to gain confidence. A few people once in the water decide that this is not for them and never swim again, others just love it and have great fun enjoying the experience. A swimmer may find a certain style that they are good at, they focus on that discipline to go on to be Olympic super stars and win gold. No one for sure knows how it will all pan out, surffice to say all the champions  work and train very hard perfecting and honing their skills. They need persistence, dedication, determination and resolve to do well.

For the blogger signing up to Google Blogger for a free Blogger.com or a WordPress.com blog would be an easy learning to swim way of starting. The instructions are very simple to follow and in no time you could be on your way blogging. This is where you learn by trying different styles to see what suits you best. Remember the true saying “Incorrect action is better than no action to find your style”.
To become a blogging super star though, this is not the pool to be swimming in, so do not stay too long here.

These “newbie” free sites are definitely the easy way to learn but do have many draw backs for the long term blogger. 
1. The site does not belong to you so would be difficult to sell at a later stage.
2. You have little control and if the site closed down, all the hard work put into your blog could be lost.
3. It takes time to build your blog name, to make it something special but it will still look amateurish.
4. Your hosts may want to put advertising on your site and capitalise on your hard work.

In the long run and if you want to be a serious blogger the best advice would be to decide on your blogging topic, think carefully about a short catchy domain name and register it for your self.                                    

1. This name becomes your personal possession.
2. You will have complete control over everything from choosing your web host, developing the site, adding advertising and content, right through to selling it if you want. Just look what the name Google means today.
3. Having your own domain name will also give a feel of professionalism to your blog.

To help you set up your own blog, a membership site I recommend is the one that helped me get this one going. Your first months membership cost I think is $1. Try it out and see how easy it is to follow from step by simple step video instruction. If you do not like what you see- cancel your subscription.                         

If you are any thing like my there is so much to learn you will get stuck in to never look back at your amateur blog status. Newbie List Building Club.

“Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.” ~Winston Churchill

Incorrect action is better than no action. Take heart.

**Christina Saunders**

What is a blog used for?
Blogs are written by professionals in all disciplines to share ideas, thoughts, concepts, expertise, art, music, stories, beauty, knowledge, experience, help, support to even their life story. What is great about the internet, is the room for everyone to share from the amateur blogs to stay at home moms using blogs to market products, chronicle events, share recipes or just how they feel.

Successful blogs.
The most successful blogs are normally written in a humorous, honest and personal way by celebrities right through to the terminally ill. Success in blogs knows no boundaries as to the audience they capture. Of course fame, writing skills, search engine optimization, blog layout and content all play a role in creating successful blogs but not always. Perhaps you could spell blind the world and dazzle us with your blog, go on show us how it is done.

Leave your comment, ideas, thoughts on blogs and share……

**Christina Saunders**