Setting up a website / by Clive W Photography

Thought I would start by describing the process I went through to put my presence online. Stage 1 Do you want to pay or have a free website? I believe that if you have no intention of starting to sell your 'products' the best option would be a free site. If your aspirations are to one day sell you should find a provider that will allow you to upgrade the functionality of your site to meet those aspirations. A base hosted site with no selling functions are rearly quite reasonable prices.

You do not need to be a website designer or have programming skills you can select and customise templates provided by the hosting companies, many have a wide selection of templates to choose from but the templates do have differing functions so go through and check layouts etc. to confirm the template will suit your needs.

I would suggest you play around with the templates before committing to the final one. However I am still changing mine as l learn about the capabilities of the site and what looks good and suits your products. One consideration is branding if you chop and change the look entirely you may deter people coming back, but changes to content can work in your favour as people are more likely to return if there are new things to see.

Branding also brings be on to the domain name of your site, a domain reflecting your brand will be a more professional window on you products. You can purchase domain names at a very reasonable price if that are not already in use. Just be aware a .com domain will probably be more expensive than the .co.uk equivalent.

With these two items, a website and a domain you will be able to put your product out the for the world to see reflecting your pride and belief in what you are, essentially marketing.