How to Build a Professional Website

How to Build a Professional Website

Every business begins with that one idea that the entrepreneur truly believes in. The first thing you do after you have had your eureka moment is to start thinking of what you’d want to call your business. This process also involves checking the availability of the domain name of your choice so that you can establish an online presence a.k.a. a website for your business. 

Now, there are two ways of going about building a website – you either do it the old fashioned way i.e. by buying a hosting package, securing a domain name and hard-coding your website from the ground up, or by using a simple drag-and-drop DIY website builder. Both of these methods are capable of producing sophisticated and professional-looking websites. 

While website builders are perfect for those who are working with limited resources and want to get a website built without having to get into the hassles of coding, coding a website offers the liberty of complete backend control, increased customizability, and scalability. In this article, we will walk you through how to build a professional website.

First things first, the prerequisite to building the perfect website is having a goal in place. The process needs to begin with having a brand strategy in place, setting priorities in terms of the objectives that need to be achieved through the website, deciding the tone of the content, the colour scheme and design, usability, responsiveness, and most importantly, the layout of the website pages.

Once the basics are taken care of, you can proceed with the procurement of basic necessities – Domain Name, a Web Hosting package and finally build your website from the ground up. Let’s go through this procedure at length:

Step #1: Registering a Domain Name

Of all things that are important for building a website, registering a domain name that explains the identity of the website in the best manner is of prime importance. There are numerous domain registration providers which also offer domain name registration services. You can select from the available options and choose the one that best suits your branding needs as well as your budget. You can select the tenure for which you need to register your domain name (hint: most providers follow a telescopic pricing model. In simpler words, the longer the duration, the lesser is the monthly cost).

Your domain name is going to be the most important aspect of your business since it fulfils a lot of requirements – 

  • Establishing an online home by giving you/your brand identity of its own in the online world
  • Making it easier for the public to find your website easily
  • Getting better exposure and ranking on search engines
  • Safeguarding your ideas and your business by securing it with a digital security certificate

Securing the perfect domain name is akin to making a calculated investment. We suggest that you prioritise this aspect.

Step #2: Buy a Web Hosting Package

There are several flavours of web hosting available in the market viz. Cloud Hosting,

Reseller Hosting, VPS Hosting, Shared Hosting, etc. You can choose from this wide variety of options basis your criteria and list of requirements for your website. 

For businesses that are just starting out, Shared Hosting could be the best option to go ahead with. Essentially, Shared Hosting is a form of web hosting which allows multiple websites to be hosted on a single server. Each user will have a limit on the server resources that they can use, and this limit will be defined basis of your hosting package.

Since resources such as disk space and bandwidth are shared amongst multiple users, Shared Hosting is easily the most economical hosting option. It’s definitely cheaper in cost as compared to the rest of the options. The fact that Shared Hosting comes equipped with a built-in cPanel for easy hosting management and needs less maintenance means that you won’t have to worry a lot about operational issues.

Step #3: Start Building your Professional Website

Once you have your domain name and hosting package in place, you can proceed with building your website using the basic website-building blocks. There are various website building tools like Weebly, WordPress, Jimdo, Webnode and so on. Most of the tools are drag and drop tools and help you design your website easily irrespective of your tech skills. 

When building a professional website here are 5 things you must ensure:

  1. Branding – Branding is an important aspect if you want to establish your website in the online domain. Take care that your active social media links are well in place and visible to the user easily, the font and text color is standard throughout the website.Take, for instance, if you’re running a blog make sure every article uses the same font. Or if you’re running an e-commerce website add your logo (non-pixelated) on the top of every page.
  2. Choose a theme for your website – aesthetics matter, so make sure you choose a theme that compliments your business, is easy to navigate, has a responsive design and is pleasing to the eye.
  3. Add plugins – whether you’re a coder or not, plugins help save your time with ready-made code for specific actions. All you need to do is install them, be it for optimising SEO or displaying featured posts!Tip: Don’t add too many plugins as they can make your site bulky.
  4. Add pages to your website – irrespective of the type of website you have, make sure to include pages like Homepage, About Us, Contact Us, FAQs, etc.
  5. Getting an SSL certificate – With Google’s algorithm update if your website isn’t secured i.e it is ‘http’ instead of ‘https’ then your search engine rankings will be affected.

A professional website with the right mix of design and development helps you establish yourself as a brand in a sea of websites. At the same time, it helps improve your web presence, drives traffic and helps build credibility. 

We hope we’ve helped you get a basic understanding of how to build a professional website. Do feel free to leave comments below and let us know about some interesting lessons on website building that you’ve had the opportunity to learn.

WRITTEN BY:

H. Fatima used to be an Engineer by profession and Writer by passion until she started pursuing full-time writing. She is presently a Content Marketeer at Newfold Digital (APAC). She mostly writes what she deeply perceives and analyses, it is her way of unwinding. Her interests include writing, reading (an avid reader), watching foreign-language movies and public speaking.

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