Starting a website should be parallel to when you start your business. It needs to be started, established and grow with time.  Most business persons pay web designers and/or developers to build their websites only to neglect this when it is built. So why “Build your own Website”?

“Build your own Website”? But my company or my business has a social network.

Social networks are fine and should work in conjunction with your website. But let’s face it, a website is like your office where the ambiance is formal and business-like.  Some business persons have great social networks, and admittedly are able to sell off it.

The gray area in social networks, most of the time, is when the social media manager is the owner themselves. Most of the times, personal information, conversation, and other non-business activities get to be included. Having a website and a social network site can be compared to an office (website) and a hang-out, chill-out kind of place (social network). We work in an office and unwind in a hang-out, chill-out place right?

Moving on, if you have thought of the importance of a website to you and your company/business, here are some considerations you may need to think about in creating or building your website.

I. Not all websites are built for the same purpose

Some websites were designed to just be plain websites, some sort of an individual calling card on the internet where you can find the company’s address and phone number. There are websites designed to be more active like those that have a blog or an update link, etc.  And some websites are used mainly for selling stuff.

Know your purpose before building your site, this way it would save you time and resources.

II. Web forms that send you inquiries directly to your email

If you do not have a social network, there is still a way to get in touch and engage your visitors. Just create an “opt-in mailing list” form. This form can be in plain HTML. With WordPress, we use Contact Form 7 and its partner database.  This way 1) upon form submission, the contents of the form are sent to a designated email address, and 2) the form contents are also up for display in tabular/database format on the backend. Information and how to use and store it is key in this.

III. Social Media sharing of your content

Assuming that you have many, many pages of content and you want people to come and visit your site. You may either copy the link to the page you want to promote and paste it on social media.  Or you can use a script that offers those little colored social network buttons that people press to share content on their social network page/site.

For a website, the return would be great since you would be sending people to your website once you share a page that is located on your website.

IV. Nitty Gritty technical details

First, of, we need to decide on what domain name (the future www.domainofyoursite.com). Then we need to determine how much hosting ( space where your site is installed. this also where the database for your cms would be.)

Content Management Systems(CMS) – If you need your website to be constantly updated you would want to have a CMS like WordPress installed on your site. With a CMS, you can create and update your corporate pages. With WordPress‘ built-in blogging system you can create a blog, news & updates sections. And should you need to be able to give access to some items on your site to your clients, WordPress also has a built-in user system.

Web Host/Hosting – Most CMS‘ are written in open-source code and as such, would need a Linux-based hosting service, so you need to be looking out for “Linux” based hosting and not “Windows” based.

Domain Name – Some hosting companies already offer domain name registration and renewal.  Would be better if you placed both services with one service provider.

Email Address – Most hosting provide free use of email which shares its hosting with the web hosting.

Please note that if you have someone register your domain name for you, request them to register it under your name and using your own “free email domain” like yahoo or Gmail (ex. youremail@gmail.com) This is needed to protect you in case you loose touch with that someone.

Website Content – is normally provided by you to your designer/developer.

V. Social Media and Media Connections

Most Social Medias now have their own “Widgets” or little “snippets” of code that you can copy and place on your site to display your social media posts and show people who are in your network. You just have to figure out which social media you use and will get widgets from

Video from YouTube can be embedded with ease on your site, with the video still hosted on youtube.

For basic questions regarding your site, you may get in touch with us at this link.