How To Make a Website
But First a Reality CheckHow to make a website? Where do babies come from? Those two questions are enough to make a normal person quake. To answer either question it is important to know who is asking. If a five year old asks, “Where do babies come from?” Mommy’s tummy, the stork or heaven might be just enough. A discourse on the reproductive system with charts and graphs which would fascinate a medical student could make the mildly curious preschooler want to eat Playdoh.
The same holds true for folks who are interested in “making a website.” If you are Googling “how to make a website,” your interest may be elementary and your knowledge basic. It is important to assess what you mean by “making” and how interested you are in making it. I say I want run a marathon but the truth is that what I want is to have run a marathon. Past tense. Over. Done with. Checked off my Bucket List.
Making a website might be the same kind of amorphous aspiration; a fleeting desire that might be nice sometime in the future. Or after acknowledging that “making a website” requires a daily, forever commitment the Googler might then go on to check out, “making wine in your home,” a much more concrete goal. For it is true, that websites are born through sweat and labor just like dimpled infants are. And it is equally true that, like those dependent little babes, websites are hungry beasts which have to be fed and handled constantly. Websites devour content as kiddies devour milk. A well-fed website can be a happy website. A hungry one cannot. Content, content, content is the name of the game. Consider the goal of this website which is obvious from its domain name, Writers Resources Café. The expectation of the regulars here is to provide constantly changing, written content: tips on how to become a freelance writer, examples of successful published and brand new essays, poetry and fiction. We pack thousands of words into cohesive, entertaining paragraphs which we hope will entice first time visitors to come back often.
If we fail to constantly “feed the beast” that is our website, we not only disappoint our visitors we disappoint ourselves. Thus we three writers work, yes work, to fulfill our understood obligation. We have accepted the challenge to write daily, tweaking content, while we simultaneously enjoy our chosen vocation and/or avocation: writing.
As we create stories, poems and thoughtful, humorous or educational pieces we consider our larger audience, developed through our web presence. We welcome new readers through social networking, introducing ourselves via Facebook and Twitter. Self-marketing is essential. If people don’t know you exist you can’t rely on happenstance for them to find you. You must create a niche for yourself or your product and be willing to proudly proselytize.
Finally, we arrive at the nitty-gritty: how to make a website. We recommend that you find a mentor, someone who has done it before. There are steps that are best taken with a guide. The system we use is Sitebuilder by SiteSell, Inc. (see direct link below) which uses a series of building blocks to create the site. As writers with little interest in the underbelly and mechanics of websites, we found that after much appreciated hand-holding along the way, we arrived at our destination, Writers Resources Café. Another Cautionary Tale |