Sunday, December 14, 2008
Introduction
Work from home, make money from your Website, join affiliate programs, summer jobs, seasonal jobs, get paid to take online surveys, get paid by reading email, get paid by surfing the Web, money making tutorials, earn revenue by placing ads on your Website, advertisement programs, get a fee to refer customers, receive commission for offering custom builds, etc.
Beginners guide
How to Start / Create Your Own Website: The Beginner's A-Z Guide
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
Although thesitewizard.com contains guides for a wide variety of issues faced by a webmaster, new or old, none of them provide a step by step A-Z guide for getting started with your website. As a result, I'm often asked by people who are absolute newcomers where they should start. Having an encyclopaedia in your hands is not much use if you don't know which articles you should read first, and which next. This tutorial attempts to fill in the gaps by providing you an overview of the web creation process from the beginning, linking to selected relevant articles on thesitewizard.com that you will need to read.
The Essential Step-by-Step Guide to Starting Your Own Website
1.
Get Your Domain Name
The first thing you need to do before anything else is to get yourself a domain name. A domain name is the name you want to give to your website. For example, the domain name of the website you're reading is "thesitewizard.com". To get a domain name, you have to pay an annual fee to a registrar for the right to use that name. Getting a name does not get you a website or anything like that. It's just a name. It's sort of like registering a business name in the brick-and-mortar world; having that business name does not mean that you also have the shop premises to go with the name.
*
Detailed information on getting a good domain name can be found in the article Tips on Choosing a Good Domain Name.
*
After you read that, you will need to know the steps to registering a domain name and the things you need to look out for when registering. You can find a detailed guide in the article How to Register Your Own Domain Name.
2.
Choose a Web Host and Sign Up for an Account
A web host is basically a company that has many computers connected to the Internet. When you place your web pages on their computers, everyone in the world will be able to connect to it and view them. You will need to sign up for an account with a web host so that your website has a home. If getting a domain name is analogous to getting a business name in the brick-and-mortar world, getting a web hosting account is analogous to renting office premises for your business.
*
There are many issues involved in finding a good web host. Read up on the various things you need to look for in searching for a good web host in the article How to Choose a Web Host.
*
After you have an idea of what to look for, you can search for one from the Budget Web Hosting page. You can also find out which web host I'm currently using from the Which Web Host Do You Recommend? page.
3.
Designing your Web Pages
Once you have your domain name and web host, your next step will be to design the web site itself. In this article, I will assume that you will be doing this yourself. If you are using a third party web designer to do it for you, you can probably skip this step.
*
Although there are many considerations in web design, as a beginner, your first step is to actually get something out onto the web. The fine-tuning can come after you've figured out how to get a basic web page onto your site. One way is to use a WYSIWYG web editor to do it. There are many commercial and free web editors around. If you don't mind spending money on a commercial web editor, one of the most highly-regarded WYSIWYG web editors is Dreamweaver. Thesitewizard.com has a tutorial on how you can use Dreamweaver to create your website: Dreamweaver Tutorial: How to Create a Website with Dreamweaver CS3.
If you prefer to use free software, you can find a complete tutorial on using KompoZer, a free WYSIWYG web editor, in the article How to Design and Publish Your Website with KompoZer. The tutorial takes you through the steps to creating a website that has a home page, an about page, a site map, a links page and a feedback form. It also teaches you some of the basic features of the KompoZer software so that you can go on improving and updating your website on your own.
There are many other web design software around. If you prefer not to use either of the above, you can find some others listed on thefreecountry.com's Free HTML Editors and WYSIWYG Web Editors page.
*
After you have followed my tutorial, and are on the way to designing your website, you might want to read the article Appearance, Usability and Search Engine Visibility in Web Design as well. The article takes a brief look at some of the real world issues that every web designer must deal with.
*
An integral part of web design is search engine readiness. Search engine promotion does not start after the web site is made. It starts at the web design stage. The article 6 Tips on How to Create a Search Engine Friendly Website is a must-read. My article on How to Improve Your Search Engine Ranking on Google is also important for the simple reason that Google is the most important search engine around, at least at the time this article was written.
*
There are many other issues regarding the design of web pages. The above will get you started. However, if you have the time after you get something out onto the web, you may want to read my other articles on Web Design and Website Promotion and Search Engine Ranking.
4.
Testing Your Website
Although I list this step separately, this should be done throughout your web design cycle. I list it separately to give it a little more prominence, since too few new webmasters actually perform this step adequately.
You will need to test your web pages as you design them in the major browsers: Internet Explorer 7, Internet Explorer 6, the latest versions of Firefox, Opera and Safari. Since all these browsers are free anyway, it should not be any hardship to get them and install them. The trick however, is testing with two versions of Internet Explorer since the later version will overwrite the earlier. For that, please see the article How to Check Your Website with Multiple Browsers on a Single Machine (Cross-Browser Compatibility Checking). Although there are two possible ways given in the article, I suggest that you take use the emulator/virtual machine method to do this. (It's probably easier.) Read the article to find out more.
One way to improve your chances that your website will work in future versions of the web browsers is to make sure your web pages' code validate as correct. You can read more about this in HTML and CSS Validation: Should You Validate Your Web Page? There are numerous free web page validators listed on the Free HTML Validators, Broken Link Checkers, Browser Compatibility Checkers page.
5.
Collecting Credit Card Information, Making Money
If you are selling products or services, you will need some way to collect credit card information. You should read up on How to Accept Credit Cards on Your Website.
If you need advertisers for your website, you might want to read How to Make Money From Your Website and the follow-up article How to Increase Your Website Revenue from Affiliate Programs. A list of advertisers and affiliate programs can be found on Affiliate Programs: Free Sponsors and Advertisers. These companies are on the constant lookout for new web publishers to display their advertisements.
6.
Getting Your Site Noticed
When your site is ready, you will need to submit your site to the search engines, particularly Google. You can find the Google submission page by clicking on the "About Google" link on Google, and then locating the "Submit your content to Google" link on the page that appears. However, submitting your site to Google alone is, quite frankly, a pointless endeavour. If there are no other links to your site on the web, Google will be appear most reluctant to index your site and show results that include your pages. If there are many other links to your site, you don't even have to bother to submit it to Google - it will find your site by itself.
This is where promoting your website is important. This involves many things, including the usual way people did things before the Internet: advertisements in the newspapers, word-of-mouth, etc. You might want to consider advertising on places like Yahoo! (which puts your ads on Yahoo!, AltaVista and CNN), Ask (which puts your ads on Ask, Excite, Match.com, Gifts.com, etc) or Google. As discussed in my article More Tips on Google Search Engine Results Placement, ads can be a quick way to get onto the first page of a search engine's results page.
There are also Less Obvious Ways of Promoting Your Website, which you might want to consider.
Conclusion
Naturally the above guide is not exhaustive. It is a distillation of some of the basic steps to getting started with your site. If you want more information, you should read the other articles on thesitewizard.com. However, the above tutorial should get you started in putting your website onto the Internet.
Copyright 2006-2008 by Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
Get more free tips and articles like this, on web design, promotion, revenue and scripting, from http://www.thesitewizard.com/.
If you find this article useful, please consider making a donation.
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
Although thesitewizard.com contains guides for a wide variety of issues faced by a webmaster, new or old, none of them provide a step by step A-Z guide for getting started with your website. As a result, I'm often asked by people who are absolute newcomers where they should start. Having an encyclopaedia in your hands is not much use if you don't know which articles you should read first, and which next. This tutorial attempts to fill in the gaps by providing you an overview of the web creation process from the beginning, linking to selected relevant articles on thesitewizard.com that you will need to read.
The Essential Step-by-Step Guide to Starting Your Own Website
1.
Get Your Domain Name
The first thing you need to do before anything else is to get yourself a domain name. A domain name is the name you want to give to your website. For example, the domain name of the website you're reading is "thesitewizard.com". To get a domain name, you have to pay an annual fee to a registrar for the right to use that name. Getting a name does not get you a website or anything like that. It's just a name. It's sort of like registering a business name in the brick-and-mortar world; having that business name does not mean that you also have the shop premises to go with the name.
*
Detailed information on getting a good domain name can be found in the article Tips on Choosing a Good Domain Name.
*
After you read that, you will need to know the steps to registering a domain name and the things you need to look out for when registering. You can find a detailed guide in the article How to Register Your Own Domain Name.
2.
Choose a Web Host and Sign Up for an Account
A web host is basically a company that has many computers connected to the Internet. When you place your web pages on their computers, everyone in the world will be able to connect to it and view them. You will need to sign up for an account with a web host so that your website has a home. If getting a domain name is analogous to getting a business name in the brick-and-mortar world, getting a web hosting account is analogous to renting office premises for your business.
*
There are many issues involved in finding a good web host. Read up on the various things you need to look for in searching for a good web host in the article How to Choose a Web Host.
*
After you have an idea of what to look for, you can search for one from the Budget Web Hosting page. You can also find out which web host I'm currently using from the Which Web Host Do You Recommend? page.
3.
Designing your Web Pages
Once you have your domain name and web host, your next step will be to design the web site itself. In this article, I will assume that you will be doing this yourself. If you are using a third party web designer to do it for you, you can probably skip this step.
*
Although there are many considerations in web design, as a beginner, your first step is to actually get something out onto the web. The fine-tuning can come after you've figured out how to get a basic web page onto your site. One way is to use a WYSIWYG web editor to do it. There are many commercial and free web editors around. If you don't mind spending money on a commercial web editor, one of the most highly-regarded WYSIWYG web editors is Dreamweaver. Thesitewizard.com has a tutorial on how you can use Dreamweaver to create your website: Dreamweaver Tutorial: How to Create a Website with Dreamweaver CS3.
If you prefer to use free software, you can find a complete tutorial on using KompoZer, a free WYSIWYG web editor, in the article How to Design and Publish Your Website with KompoZer. The tutorial takes you through the steps to creating a website that has a home page, an about page, a site map, a links page and a feedback form. It also teaches you some of the basic features of the KompoZer software so that you can go on improving and updating your website on your own.
There are many other web design software around. If you prefer not to use either of the above, you can find some others listed on thefreecountry.com's Free HTML Editors and WYSIWYG Web Editors page.
*
After you have followed my tutorial, and are on the way to designing your website, you might want to read the article Appearance, Usability and Search Engine Visibility in Web Design as well. The article takes a brief look at some of the real world issues that every web designer must deal with.
*
An integral part of web design is search engine readiness. Search engine promotion does not start after the web site is made. It starts at the web design stage. The article 6 Tips on How to Create a Search Engine Friendly Website is a must-read. My article on How to Improve Your Search Engine Ranking on Google is also important for the simple reason that Google is the most important search engine around, at least at the time this article was written.
*
There are many other issues regarding the design of web pages. The above will get you started. However, if you have the time after you get something out onto the web, you may want to read my other articles on Web Design and Website Promotion and Search Engine Ranking.
4.
Testing Your Website
Although I list this step separately, this should be done throughout your web design cycle. I list it separately to give it a little more prominence, since too few new webmasters actually perform this step adequately.
You will need to test your web pages as you design them in the major browsers: Internet Explorer 7, Internet Explorer 6, the latest versions of Firefox, Opera and Safari. Since all these browsers are free anyway, it should not be any hardship to get them and install them. The trick however, is testing with two versions of Internet Explorer since the later version will overwrite the earlier. For that, please see the article How to Check Your Website with Multiple Browsers on a Single Machine (Cross-Browser Compatibility Checking). Although there are two possible ways given in the article, I suggest that you take use the emulator/virtual machine method to do this. (It's probably easier.) Read the article to find out more.
One way to improve your chances that your website will work in future versions of the web browsers is to make sure your web pages' code validate as correct. You can read more about this in HTML and CSS Validation: Should You Validate Your Web Page? There are numerous free web page validators listed on the Free HTML Validators, Broken Link Checkers, Browser Compatibility Checkers page.
5.
Collecting Credit Card Information, Making Money
If you are selling products or services, you will need some way to collect credit card information. You should read up on How to Accept Credit Cards on Your Website.
If you need advertisers for your website, you might want to read How to Make Money From Your Website and the follow-up article How to Increase Your Website Revenue from Affiliate Programs. A list of advertisers and affiliate programs can be found on Affiliate Programs: Free Sponsors and Advertisers. These companies are on the constant lookout for new web publishers to display their advertisements.
6.
Getting Your Site Noticed
When your site is ready, you will need to submit your site to the search engines, particularly Google. You can find the Google submission page by clicking on the "About Google" link on Google, and then locating the "Submit your content to Google" link on the page that appears. However, submitting your site to Google alone is, quite frankly, a pointless endeavour. If there are no other links to your site on the web, Google will be appear most reluctant to index your site and show results that include your pages. If there are many other links to your site, you don't even have to bother to submit it to Google - it will find your site by itself.
This is where promoting your website is important. This involves many things, including the usual way people did things before the Internet: advertisements in the newspapers, word-of-mouth, etc. You might want to consider advertising on places like Yahoo! (which puts your ads on Yahoo!, AltaVista and CNN), Ask (which puts your ads on Ask, Excite, Match.com, Gifts.com, etc) or Google. As discussed in my article More Tips on Google Search Engine Results Placement, ads can be a quick way to get onto the first page of a search engine's results page.
There are also Less Obvious Ways of Promoting Your Website, which you might want to consider.
Conclusion
Naturally the above guide is not exhaustive. It is a distillation of some of the basic steps to getting started with your site. If you want more information, you should read the other articles on thesitewizard.com. However, the above tutorial should get you started in putting your website onto the Internet.
Copyright 2006-2008 by Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
Get more free tips and articles like this, on web design, promotion, revenue and scripting, from http://www.thesitewizard.com/.
If you find this article useful, please consider making a donation.
Sites some to affiliate
Affiliate Programs: Free Sponsors and Advertisers for Your Website
If you are looking for advertisers and sponsors for your website, one way is to join the affiliate programs of the companies that are looking for sites that will host their advertisements. The list below include some individual affiliate programs as well as a number of affiliate networks (which will allow you to join the affililate programs of many companies). The programs listed below are free (unless explicitly stated otherwise), that is to say, there is no charge for joining them (in fact, they pay you). Note though that it is not always easy to join since some networks and programs require you to have a minimum number of visitors to your site, and many of them require you to have your own domain name.
You can get more information about the terminology used on this page as well as how to get started from the following articles:
* How to Make Money from Your Website - basic primer plus some good tips
* Increasing Your Revenue from Affiliate Programs - more tips on improving your revenue
You should probably be aware that not all affiliate programs are equal. Some are scams - you advertise for them, but somehow you never wind up getting paid. A few change their Terms and Conditions after a period of time (when they already owe you a large amount) to suddenly exclude your site and conveniently not honour payments for the sales they previously made through you. I've already been victims of three such schemes. Needless to say, those programs are no longer listed on this page.
If your intention is to sell goods or services from your site, and not merely to obtain advertisers, you may also be interested in my article on How to Accept Credit Card Payments from your Website.
If you don't have your own domain name, and are considering one, check out the following articles:
* How to Choose Your Domain Name - there's more than meets the eye here
* How to Register Your Own Domain Name - includes a list of registrars and reviews
* My Biggest Website Regrets - don't make the same mistakes I did
Disclaimer
The information provided on this page comes without any warranty whatsoever. Use it at your own risk. Just because a program, book, document or service is listed here or has a good review does not mean that I endorse or approve of the program or of any of its contents. All the other standard disclaimers also apply.
Affiliate Programs: Sponsors and Advertisers for Your Website
RegNow
This company is used by many vendors to sell their software products. It allows affiliates to put links to these products on their website and earn commission for purchases made through those links.
LinkShare Corporation
This is a network of affiliate programs that handles accounts from a large number of advertisers. The rates of payments vary from advertiser to advertiser, with most paying commission for sales made.
Amazon.com Associate Program
Fancy selling books on your website? If so, the well-known Amazon.com provides an affiliate program that pays you referral fees on books sold. The usually heard complaint about this program is that visitors would usually just note the book on the Amazon site, or bookmark the Amazon site itself, and return at some later time to buy the book. When that happens, the purchase is not registered as having come through your site, so you lose the referral fees on that sale. There's no referral program. Note that it is apparently not easy to earn much from this scheme, and many sites report disappointing performance (as compared to other affiliate programs).
Google AdSense
This program displays advertisements on your site relevant to the content of the page you placed the supplied code on. You are paid according to the number of clicks the ads (PPC - pay per click) on your page receive. It also provides you the ability to filter out competitors' ads. I also have a beginner's tutorial on how to join this program: How to Add Google Advertisements (Google AdSense) to Your Blog or Website. Specific tutorials for putting AdSense into your site in different web editors are also available for Dreamweaver, KompoZer and Nvu. Blogger users can also read my Blogger-specific AdSense tutorial.
Related Pages
* Important Precautions to Take When Buying a Domain Name
* How Much Does It Cost to Set Up a Website?
* Free Web Statistics and Web Log Analyzers - track your site performance
* Free SSH (Secure Shell) and Telnet Clients
* Free FTP Clients, Secure FTP (SFTP) Programs
* How to Choose a Good Web Host
* Which Web Host Do You Recommend? (FAQ)
* The Beginner's A-Z Guide to Starting/Creating Your Own Website
Can't Find What You're Looking For?
Google Enter your search terms Submit search form
Web www.thefreecountry.com
www.thesitewizard.com www.howtohaven.com
Newest Pages
* Why Access Keys Are Mostly Useless for Accessibility Purposes
* How to Create a Website with Dreamweaver CS4 (Dreamweaver Tutorial)
* How to Install Apache 2.2 on Windows Vista
* Free Online Touch Typing Speed Tests
* How to Uninstall the KompoZer Web Editor from Your Windows Computer
* Free Lego Mindstorms NXT Compilers and Programming Languages
* Free Atari Emulators
* What is HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP and Perl? Do I Need to Learn Them to Create a Website?
* How Much Does It Cost to Set Up a Website?
* How to Slipstream Windows XP Service Pack 3 to Create an Integrated XP Setup Disk with SP 3
Popular Pages
* How to Create/Start Your Own Website: The Beginner's A-Z Guide
* How to Register Your Own Domain Name - how to get your own domain name
* Dreamweaver Tutorial: How to Create a Website with Dreamweaver CS3
* How to Create a Bootable Windows XP Setup CD/DVD on a Preinstalled Windows System
* Free Partitioning Software - Copy, Create, Move, Resize, Convert, Undelete Partitions
* Free Data Recovery, File and Partition Recovery, Undelete and Unformat Software
* How to Create an Emergency Windows Rescue CD
* Free DVD Authoring and Creation Software
* Free CD and DVD Burners and Copying Software
* Free Hard Disk Backup and Restore, Hard Disk Image and Cloning Utilities
Affiliate Programs: Free Sponsors and Advertisers
If you are looking for advertisers and sponsors for your website, one way is to join the affiliate programs of the companies that are looking for sites that will host their advertisements. The list below include some individual affiliate programs as well as a number of affiliate networks (which will allow you to join the affililate programs of many companies). The programs listed below are free (unless explicitly stated otherwise), that is to say, there is no charge for joining them (in fact, they pay you). Note though that it is not always easy to join since some networks and programs require you to have a minimum number of visitors to your site, and many of them require you to have your own domain name.
You can get more information about the terminology used on this page as well as how to get started from the following articles:
* How to Make Money from Your Website - basic primer plus some good tips
* Increasing Your Revenue from Affiliate Programs - more tips on improving your revenue
You should probably be aware that not all affiliate programs are equal. Some are scams - you advertise for them, but somehow you never wind up getting paid. A few change their Terms and Conditions after a period of time (when they already owe you a large amount) to suddenly exclude your site and conveniently not honour payments for the sales they previously made through you. I've already been victims of three such schemes. Needless to say, those programs are no longer listed on this page.
If your intention is to sell goods or services from your site, and not merely to obtain advertisers, you may also be interested in my article on How to Accept Credit Card Payments from your Website.
If you don't have your own domain name, and are considering one, check out the following articles:
* How to Choose Your Domain Name - there's more than meets the eye here
* How to Register Your Own Domain Name - includes a list of registrars and reviews
* My Biggest Website Regrets - don't make the same mistakes I did
Disclaimer
The information provided on this page comes without any warranty whatsoever. Use it at your own risk. Just because a program, book, document or service is listed here or has a good review does not mean that I endorse or approve of the program or of any of its contents. All the other standard disclaimers also apply.
Affiliate Programs: Sponsors and Advertisers for Your Website
RegNow
This company is used by many vendors to sell their software products. It allows affiliates to put links to these products on their website and earn commission for purchases made through those links.
LinkShare Corporation
This is a network of affiliate programs that handles accounts from a large number of advertisers. The rates of payments vary from advertiser to advertiser, with most paying commission for sales made.
Amazon.com Associate Program
Fancy selling books on your website? If so, the well-known Amazon.com provides an affiliate program that pays you referral fees on books sold. The usually heard complaint about this program is that visitors would usually just note the book on the Amazon site, or bookmark the Amazon site itself, and return at some later time to buy the book. When that happens, the purchase is not registered as having come through your site, so you lose the referral fees on that sale. There's no referral program. Note that it is apparently not easy to earn much from this scheme, and many sites report disappointing performance (as compared to other affiliate programs).
Google AdSense
This program displays advertisements on your site relevant to the content of the page you placed the supplied code on. You are paid according to the number of clicks the ads (PPC - pay per click) on your page receive. It also provides you the ability to filter out competitors' ads. I also have a beginner's tutorial on how to join this program: How to Add Google Advertisements (Google AdSense) to Your Blog or Website. Specific tutorials for putting AdSense into your site in different web editors are also available for Dreamweaver, KompoZer and Nvu. Blogger users can also read my Blogger-specific AdSense tutorial.
Related Pages
* Important Precautions to Take When Buying a Domain Name
* How Much Does It Cost to Set Up a Website?
* Free Web Statistics and Web Log Analyzers - track your site performance
* Free SSH (Secure Shell) and Telnet Clients
* Free FTP Clients, Secure FTP (SFTP) Programs
* How to Choose a Good Web Host
* Which Web Host Do You Recommend? (FAQ)
* The Beginner's A-Z Guide to Starting/Creating Your Own Website
Can't Find What You're Looking For?
Google Enter your search terms Submit search form
Web www.thefreecountry.com
www.thesitewizard.com www.howtohaven.com
Newest Pages
* Why Access Keys Are Mostly Useless for Accessibility Purposes
* How to Create a Website with Dreamweaver CS4 (Dreamweaver Tutorial)
* How to Install Apache 2.2 on Windows Vista
* Free Online Touch Typing Speed Tests
* How to Uninstall the KompoZer Web Editor from Your Windows Computer
* Free Lego Mindstorms NXT Compilers and Programming Languages
* Free Atari Emulators
* What is HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP and Perl? Do I Need to Learn Them to Create a Website?
* How Much Does It Cost to Set Up a Website?
* How to Slipstream Windows XP Service Pack 3 to Create an Integrated XP Setup Disk with SP 3
Popular Pages
* How to Create/Start Your Own Website: The Beginner's A-Z Guide
* How to Register Your Own Domain Name - how to get your own domain name
* Dreamweaver Tutorial: How to Create a Website with Dreamweaver CS3
* How to Create a Bootable Windows XP Setup CD/DVD on a Preinstalled Windows System
* Free Partitioning Software - Copy, Create, Move, Resize, Convert, Undelete Partitions
* Free Data Recovery, File and Partition Recovery, Undelete and Unformat Software
* How to Create an Emergency Windows Rescue CD
* Free DVD Authoring and Creation Software
* Free CD and DVD Burners and Copying Software
* Free Hard Disk Backup and Restore, Hard Disk Image and Cloning Utilities
Affiliate Programs: Free Sponsors and Advertisers
publishing own e-book
You may have seen them around on the Internet. Some of them are available free of charge. Others have to be bought. A couple of Stephen King's latest stories are available only in that form.
I'm talking about electronic books (or ebooks), of course. In the age of the Internet, newsletters and ezines are not the only things you can publish without recourse to a big name publisher. Now, anyone can publish their own book.
Why Should You Publish Your Own Book?
Besides wanting to immortalize your name, here are a couple of reasons why you might want to publish your own electronic book (eBook).
1.
Publicity for your website or business
Why do you think so many people on the Internet are giving away electronic books? Free ebooks, like other free things, spread fast. They become an easy way for you to publicize your website or business.
Of course, for that to happen, your Ebook needs to be more than just an advertising brochure - it really has to have something worth reading for people to bother to read and pass it on.
2.
For Sale
Electronic books for sale are becoming increasingly common on the web. As mentioned earlier, even Stephen King has taken to publishing electronically. It's becoming an acceptable medium in this age of electronic communication.
Advantages of Electronic Publishing Over Hardcopy Publishing
The beauty of publishing your book electronically is that your costs are incredibly low (relative to hardcopy publishing). You only need to get the software to create the ebook, and nowadays, you can even get that free of charge.
Whether you sell or distribute 1000 copies of your eBook or just one copy, your cost of producing the ebook remains at that same fixed cost it took to produce the first copy. In fact, once you've bought your software, you can produce any number of Ebooks without incurring any additional cost.
Another advantage is that you do not need to try to find a publisher to accept your work. You can be your own publisher and distributor.
What Should I Write?
As in the case of publishing newsletters, you should of course write on things you're familiar with. If your intention is to publicize your website or your business, your topic should be of course be related to what you're promoting. That way, people will come to see you as an expert in that field and go to your site for more information and help.
Steps To Take
1. Get the software for you to create an electronic book (see below).
2. Write your ebook.
3. Use the software to convert your document to the electronic book format.
4. Make your ebook available from your website. Note that even if you wish to sell your Ebook, you should still have a sample of your eBook available freely to whet the appetites of your prospective customers.
5. Publicize your ebook.
The Common Ebook Formats
1.
Portable Document Format (PDF)
The most common ebook format nowadays is the Portable Document Format, or the PDF. In fact, it is so widely used that even though there are no official standards for ebooks, it is virtually the de facto standard on the Internet.
The PDF format has the advantage that it can be read on any platform: there are free PDF viewers for Windows, Macintosh, Linux, Unix (various), handheld computers (PDA), etc. Although these viewers have to be downloaded separately for some systems, PDF files are so widely available and used nowadays that many people already have them on their systems. Many off-the-shelf computer systems are typically sold with the reader pre-installed.
The fact that PDF files are multi-platform means not only that users of any type of computer can read your book, but also that they can read your book on their handheld computers when travelling, etc, giving you an additional selling point for your book. Ebooks in this format function almost like a real book - they are portable.
Familiarity with the PDF is another advantage of this format. Visitors seeing that the book is a PDF file will not flinch (much) about downloading it and reading it. In fact, on a number of commercial business-to-business sites, many documents and white papers are only available in PDF.
There are many free PDF converters and editors available. If you want a reliable, commercial version, nothing beats Adobe Acrobat Professional, from the company that created the PDF format.
2.
Raw HTML Format
The raw HTML format is self-explanatory. It can be read by anyone with a web browser. The major disadvantage of this method is that if you require more than one file for your book, some readers may become confused and not know which file to start with.
To create files in such format, simply use whatever software that you currently use to create your website, be it free software like Nvu and KompoZer or commercial editors like Dreamweaver. Of course, if there are multiple pages, you will probably need to distribute your ebook in some sort of archive format, like in a zip file, and give instructions to your readers how they can unpack the file, and which file to click on to start reading.
3.
Windows Executable File
Another possible format to use is the Windows executable file (EXE file). To use this format, you will need an ebook compiler that converts your document into a Windows program. When your reader runs the file, a built-in viewer will display the book for him/her to read.
This format has a couple of major disadvantages. Firstly, with the proliferation of viruses and adware on the Internet, many visitors are suspicious of having to run an executable file just to read a document. Putting your book in this format may put off such people. Secondly, your audience is restricted to Windows users.
In the past, this format had the advantage that you do not need to tell your visitors to download a specialized viewer to read the file. They can just double-click the file. Nowadays, I feel that this advantage is more than offset by its disadvantages and the fact that other formats like the PDF can also be read by most people simply by double-clicking the file, since they already have the viewer on their systems.
Probably the only remaining advantage this format has is if you want to impose some sort of protection for your ebooks. For example if you are selling ebooks, and you don't trust your buyers not to distribute it for free, ebook compilers like the Activ E-Book Compiler provide features like including a serial number into every ebook and password-protecting pages. If you want your ebook to do more things, like run a program when the user clicks a link, read and write files, or generate new pages dynamically, then this format may provide an additional advantage for you.
How to Increase Sales of Your Ebook: Create a 3D Image of your Book
After creating your book and putting it online, you may also want to consider creating a picture of your ebook. Although your publication is not a physical product like a printed book, having a 3D image of your ebook serves many purposes:
Picture of a 3D ebook hardcover book
*
It gives you a relevant picture to display for your e-publication. Since yours is an electronic product, you don't really have a picture to show for it. A 3D book cover image is as good a pictorial representation as any.
*
It makes your product seem more tangible in people's minds. Although they know that they'll be getting an ebook, a photo of it somehow makes your book more like a worthwhile purchase.
*
It helps people to associate your product with things usually connected to a printed book: something that may contains useful content that they can learn from or be entertained by.
At present, the best 3D ebook cover image maker I've come across is the commercial Box Shot 3D. To my knowledge, there aren't any free 3D ebook image software at the moment, although if you are willing to spend the time and have some artistic talent, you can simply create an image yourself using software like Photoshop or any other free drawing program. The photo reflection of your book on the surface that Box Shot 3D produces (see example picture) may require a bit more work to to create, though.
Is It Worth The Effort?
Publishing electronic books can provide you with an additional revenue stream (if you're selling them) and a means of promoting your website (there's nothing like a freebie to attract people to your site or business). In an era when millions of sites are competing for the same audience, every little bit helps.
I'm talking about electronic books (or ebooks), of course. In the age of the Internet, newsletters and ezines are not the only things you can publish without recourse to a big name publisher. Now, anyone can publish their own book.
Why Should You Publish Your Own Book?
Besides wanting to immortalize your name, here are a couple of reasons why you might want to publish your own electronic book (eBook).
1.
Publicity for your website or business
Why do you think so many people on the Internet are giving away electronic books? Free ebooks, like other free things, spread fast. They become an easy way for you to publicize your website or business.
Of course, for that to happen, your Ebook needs to be more than just an advertising brochure - it really has to have something worth reading for people to bother to read and pass it on.
2.
For Sale
Electronic books for sale are becoming increasingly common on the web. As mentioned earlier, even Stephen King has taken to publishing electronically. It's becoming an acceptable medium in this age of electronic communication.
Advantages of Electronic Publishing Over Hardcopy Publishing
The beauty of publishing your book electronically is that your costs are incredibly low (relative to hardcopy publishing). You only need to get the software to create the ebook, and nowadays, you can even get that free of charge.
Whether you sell or distribute 1000 copies of your eBook or just one copy, your cost of producing the ebook remains at that same fixed cost it took to produce the first copy. In fact, once you've bought your software, you can produce any number of Ebooks without incurring any additional cost.
Another advantage is that you do not need to try to find a publisher to accept your work. You can be your own publisher and distributor.
What Should I Write?
As in the case of publishing newsletters, you should of course write on things you're familiar with. If your intention is to publicize your website or your business, your topic should be of course be related to what you're promoting. That way, people will come to see you as an expert in that field and go to your site for more information and help.
Steps To Take
1. Get the software for you to create an electronic book (see below).
2. Write your ebook.
3. Use the software to convert your document to the electronic book format.
4. Make your ebook available from your website. Note that even if you wish to sell your Ebook, you should still have a sample of your eBook available freely to whet the appetites of your prospective customers.
5. Publicize your ebook.
The Common Ebook Formats
1.
Portable Document Format (PDF)
The most common ebook format nowadays is the Portable Document Format, or the PDF. In fact, it is so widely used that even though there are no official standards for ebooks, it is virtually the de facto standard on the Internet.
The PDF format has the advantage that it can be read on any platform: there are free PDF viewers for Windows, Macintosh, Linux, Unix (various), handheld computers (PDA), etc. Although these viewers have to be downloaded separately for some systems, PDF files are so widely available and used nowadays that many people already have them on their systems. Many off-the-shelf computer systems are typically sold with the reader pre-installed.
The fact that PDF files are multi-platform means not only that users of any type of computer can read your book, but also that they can read your book on their handheld computers when travelling, etc, giving you an additional selling point for your book. Ebooks in this format function almost like a real book - they are portable.
Familiarity with the PDF is another advantage of this format. Visitors seeing that the book is a PDF file will not flinch (much) about downloading it and reading it. In fact, on a number of commercial business-to-business sites, many documents and white papers are only available in PDF.
There are many free PDF converters and editors available. If you want a reliable, commercial version, nothing beats Adobe Acrobat Professional, from the company that created the PDF format.
2.
Raw HTML Format
The raw HTML format is self-explanatory. It can be read by anyone with a web browser. The major disadvantage of this method is that if you require more than one file for your book, some readers may become confused and not know which file to start with.
To create files in such format, simply use whatever software that you currently use to create your website, be it free software like Nvu and KompoZer or commercial editors like Dreamweaver. Of course, if there are multiple pages, you will probably need to distribute your ebook in some sort of archive format, like in a zip file, and give instructions to your readers how they can unpack the file, and which file to click on to start reading.
3.
Windows Executable File
Another possible format to use is the Windows executable file (EXE file). To use this format, you will need an ebook compiler that converts your document into a Windows program. When your reader runs the file, a built-in viewer will display the book for him/her to read.
This format has a couple of major disadvantages. Firstly, with the proliferation of viruses and adware on the Internet, many visitors are suspicious of having to run an executable file just to read a document. Putting your book in this format may put off such people. Secondly, your audience is restricted to Windows users.
In the past, this format had the advantage that you do not need to tell your visitors to download a specialized viewer to read the file. They can just double-click the file. Nowadays, I feel that this advantage is more than offset by its disadvantages and the fact that other formats like the PDF can also be read by most people simply by double-clicking the file, since they already have the viewer on their systems.
Probably the only remaining advantage this format has is if you want to impose some sort of protection for your ebooks. For example if you are selling ebooks, and you don't trust your buyers not to distribute it for free, ebook compilers like the Activ E-Book Compiler provide features like including a serial number into every ebook and password-protecting pages. If you want your ebook to do more things, like run a program when the user clicks a link, read and write files, or generate new pages dynamically, then this format may provide an additional advantage for you.
How to Increase Sales of Your Ebook: Create a 3D Image of your Book
After creating your book and putting it online, you may also want to consider creating a picture of your ebook. Although your publication is not a physical product like a printed book, having a 3D image of your ebook serves many purposes:
Picture of a 3D ebook hardcover book
*
It gives you a relevant picture to display for your e-publication. Since yours is an electronic product, you don't really have a picture to show for it. A 3D book cover image is as good a pictorial representation as any.
*
It makes your product seem more tangible in people's minds. Although they know that they'll be getting an ebook, a photo of it somehow makes your book more like a worthwhile purchase.
*
It helps people to associate your product with things usually connected to a printed book: something that may contains useful content that they can learn from or be entertained by.
At present, the best 3D ebook cover image maker I've come across is the commercial Box Shot 3D. To my knowledge, there aren't any free 3D ebook image software at the moment, although if you are willing to spend the time and have some artistic talent, you can simply create an image yourself using software like Photoshop or any other free drawing program. The photo reflection of your book on the surface that Box Shot 3D produces (see example picture) may require a bit more work to to create, though.
Is It Worth The Effort?
Publishing electronic books can provide you with an additional revenue stream (if you're selling them) and a means of promoting your website (there's nothing like a freebie to attract people to your site or business). In an era when millions of sites are competing for the same audience, every little bit helps.
Tips to choose the domain name
Tips on Choosing a Good Domain Name
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
Before you rush out and choose your domain name or name your website, you might want to consider the following points:
1. Your Domain Name Should Be Your Website Name
Naming your site after your domain may seem obvious to some of you, but you'll be surprised to learn that not every website is named after the domain name even when the webmaster owns that domain name.
Naming a site after its domain name is important, for the simple reason that when people think of your website, they'll think of it by name. If your name is also your URL, they'll automatically know where to go. For example, when people think of thefreecountry.com, they don't have to wonder what URL to type into their browser to get there. The name of the site is also the URL.
Imagine if your business (or website) is called "Acme", but somebody else holds that domain name. Instead, you have some obscure domain name called, say, "mybusiness.com". What happens when your customers, recalling that Acme has a product they want, type "www.acme.com"? They'll wind up at your competitor's website. One lost sale.
In the modern world of the Internet, where people automatically turn to the Web for information, it pays to have a domain name that reflects your site or business. There are just fewer things for your customers or visitors to remember. Moreover, you don't seriously think that they'll try to memorise an unrelated URL just because you want them to, do you? The only people who'll memorise it are you and your competitors who want to compare your prices.
What if you cannot get the domain name of your choice? It really depends on how committed you are to that particular name. If you have an existing brand name that you're known for, you'll probably not want to ditch that name just because you couldn't get the domain name. After all, it took you a lot of time and money to establish that name. If so, you might simply want to try to buy over the domain name from the current owner. Check up the "whois" information for the domain, and contact that person listed to see if they're willing to sell it. You probably should be aware that they are likely to want to charge a higher fee than you'll normally get when buying new domains (assuming they want to sell it in the first place).
On the other hand, if you're just starting out, you might prefer the cheaper alternative of trying to obtain a domain name first, and then naming your website (or business) after the domain that you've acquired. So if you've acquired, say, the domain name "acme.com", then your website and business might be named "Acme" or "acme.com". I know this seems a bit like putting the cart before the horse, but that's the reality if you don't want to lose out on the Internet.
2. Generic Names Or Brand Name Domains?
I know that a number of people seem to think that your domain name really must be some generic name like "cars.com" if you are selling cars. Witness, for example, how much money those generic names are being sold for. But seriously, if you were looking for a car, you'll probably already have some brands in mind, and you're more like to try out things like generalmotors.com or toyota.com rather than just cars.com.
For that reason, I personally feel that a domain name that matches your brand name is very important. The very name that you use to advertise your product is the name that you will want for your domain, because that is the first thing that people will try in their browser. It is also the easiest thing for them to remember, and whatever that is easily remembered, will be more likely to be tried out than the obscure domain name.
3. Long or Short Domain Names?
Domain names can be of any length up to 67 characters. You don't have to settle for an obscure domain name like avab.com when what you mean is AcmeVideosAndBooks.com.
Having said that, there appears to be some disagreement about whether a long or short domain name is better.
Some argue that shorter domain names are easier to remember, easier to type and far less susceptible to mistakes: for example, "getit.com" is easier to remember and less prone to typos than "connecttomywebsiteandobtainit.com".
Others argue that a longer domain name is usually easier on the human memory - for example, "gaepw.com" is a sequence of unrelated letters that is difficult to remember and type correctly, whereas if we expand it to its long form, "GetAnEconomicallyPricedWebsite.com", we are more likely to remember the domain name.
Some of these arguments are actually academic. It's increasingly difficult to get short meaningful domain names. I have not checked, but I'm fairly certain that names like "getit.com" and "good.com" have long been sold. If you manage to get a short domain name though, the key is to make sure it's a meaningful combination of characters and not the obscure "gaepw.com" in my contrived example above.
Long domain names that have your site keywords in them also have an advantage in that they fare better in a number of search engines. The latter give preference to keywords that are also found in your domain names. So, for example, if you have a site on free C++ compilers with a domain name like freecpluspluscompilers.com, it might fare better in a search for "free C++ compilers" than my other site, thefreecountry.com.
Which would I go for? I'd go for the shorter name if I can get a meaningful one, but I'm not averse to longer names. However, I would probably avoid extremely long names verging on 67 characters. Aside from the obvious problem that people might not be able to remember such a long name, it would also be a chore typing it and trying to fit it as a title on your web page.
4. Hyphenated Names?
Should you get a hyphenated name? There are a few things to consider here:
a. Disadvantage: It's easy to forget the hyphens when typing a name. Many users are used to typing things like freecpluspluscompilers.com but not free-c-plus-plus-compilers.com. They'll probably leave out the hyphens and wind up at your competitor's site.
b. Disadvantage: When people recommend your site to their friends verbally, having hyphens in your domain name leads to more potential errors than when the name does not contain hyphens. For example, how do you think your visitors will refer to your site if it is named "acme-books-and-videos.com"? They might say, "I visited Acme Book and Videos dot com yesterday. It was fabulous." Their friends, remembering that comment later, might type into their browsers "acmebooksandvideos.com". Oops.
c. Disadvantage: It's a pain in the neck to type. Enough said.
d. Advantage: Search engines can distinguish your keywords better and thus return your site more prominently in search results for those keywords occurring in your domain name.
e. Advantage: The non-hyphenated form may no longer be available. At least this way, you still get the domain name you want.
Personally, I prefer to avoid hyphenated names if I can, but I guess it really depends on your domain name and your situation.
5. Plurals, "The", and "My" Forms of the Domain Name
Very often, if you can't get the domain name you want, the domain name registrar will suggest alternate forms of the name you typed. For example, if you wanted website.com, and it was taken (of course it is), it might suggest forms like:
thewebsite.com
mywebsite.com
websites.com
and the like, if they were not already taken as well. The question is, should you take them?
My personal opinion is that if you take the "the..." and "my..." forms of the domain name, you must always remember to promote your site with the full form of the name. Otherwise, people are likely to forget to affix the necessary "the" or "my". For that reason, I always advertise my sites as "thesitewizard.com" and "thefreecountry.com" in their full domain name forms, rather than just "Free Country" or "Site Wizard" (without the article).
On the other hand, I would not take the plural form of the domain name (eg, websites.com) if I cannot also get "website.com", since the chance of the visitor failing to type the "s" in the name is very great. Think about the famous name tussle between etoys.com and etoy.com. Many people wanting to go to etoys.com were apparently going to etoy.com instead. If it happened to them, it can happen to you too.
6. COM, ORG, NET, etc?
One common question I encounter is from people who can't get the ".com" domain of their choice, but find the ".net", ".org" or other country-specific top level domains (TLDs) available (like .de, .nu, .sg, etc). Should they try for these?
The answer is not as straightforward as you might think. If your website or business caters to the local community, such as a pizza delivery business or recruitment agency or the like, then it makes sense to get a country-specific domain. You actually benefit from having such a local domain because the people in your country know that they're dealing with a local entity, which is what they want. After all, if they stay in (say) the United Kingdom, they're not likely to want to try to order pizza from pizzaparlour.com, which suggests a US or an international site. You'll have better luck calling it pizzaparlour.co.uk, ie, with a UK domain.
What if yours is a site or business that can benefit from an international audience? There are actually many schools of thought on this. I'll just mention a few common ones.
The first school of thought goes on the premise that it is better to have a domain name of your choice "myperfectdomain" even if it has a TLD of ".net", ".org" or some other country specific extension, than to wind up choosing an obscure domain name for the simple reason you can't get your first choice. Thus they would settle for domain names like "myperfectdomain.de" or "myperfectdomain.net" or whatever. Against this is the argument that if you get a country specific domain, people might think that your business only caters to that country.
Another school of thought finds that ".net" and ".org" extensions are actually quite acceptable domain names. For some, the ".org" extension actually describes the non-profit nature of their organisation. So, for example, the famous Apache web server can be found at "apache.org".
Others settle for the ".com" extension and no less. As grounds for their arguments, they cite the browser algorithms used to locate a website when a user simply types a name like "acme" into the browser. Apparently, the browser searches for a domain name "acme.com" before attempting "acme.net", etc. As such, people who do that will be delivered to your competitor's site if you do not also own the ".com" extension. Indeed, even if people do not rely on their browser to complete their typing, many simply assume a ".com" extension when they type a domain name, so if your business is "Acme", they'll just assume your domain name is "acme.com" rather than "acme.net" or some other such name.
As you can see, there are actually good grounds for accepting any of the above views. My personal footnote to the above arguments is that if you get a domain name with an extension other than ".com", make sure that you promote your business or website with the full domain name. For example, if your domain name is "dogandcatfood.net", make sure that when you advertise your site or business, call it "dogandcatfood.net" not "dogandcatfood". Otherwise people will assume a ".com" extension and travel to the wrong place.
7. In Conclusion...
In case the forest got lost in the trees (or the reverse) in my arguments here, let me reiterate the main point of this article: get that domain name before you start your site or business.
Don't make the mistake of attempting to retrofit your domain name to your business or website. thefreecountry.com did not originally start out with that name, and I encountered a huge hassle (and lost visitors) as a result of the URL changes. Don't make that mistake too.
If you need help getting that domain name, check out my other article on how to register a domain name. In that article, I also include a list of some registrars that you can use, distinguishing the well-established ones from the less established but cheap ones (so you have a wider choice, depending on what is important to you). The article can be found at http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/registerdomain.shtml
O be some other name!
What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet.
- Shakespeare
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
Before you rush out and choose your domain name or name your website, you might want to consider the following points:
1. Your Domain Name Should Be Your Website Name
Naming your site after your domain may seem obvious to some of you, but you'll be surprised to learn that not every website is named after the domain name even when the webmaster owns that domain name.
Naming a site after its domain name is important, for the simple reason that when people think of your website, they'll think of it by name. If your name is also your URL, they'll automatically know where to go. For example, when people think of thefreecountry.com, they don't have to wonder what URL to type into their browser to get there. The name of the site is also the URL.
Imagine if your business (or website) is called "Acme", but somebody else holds that domain name. Instead, you have some obscure domain name called, say, "mybusiness.com". What happens when your customers, recalling that Acme has a product they want, type "www.acme.com"? They'll wind up at your competitor's website. One lost sale.
In the modern world of the Internet, where people automatically turn to the Web for information, it pays to have a domain name that reflects your site or business. There are just fewer things for your customers or visitors to remember. Moreover, you don't seriously think that they'll try to memorise an unrelated URL just because you want them to, do you? The only people who'll memorise it are you and your competitors who want to compare your prices.
What if you cannot get the domain name of your choice? It really depends on how committed you are to that particular name. If you have an existing brand name that you're known for, you'll probably not want to ditch that name just because you couldn't get the domain name. After all, it took you a lot of time and money to establish that name. If so, you might simply want to try to buy over the domain name from the current owner. Check up the "whois" information for the domain, and contact that person listed to see if they're willing to sell it. You probably should be aware that they are likely to want to charge a higher fee than you'll normally get when buying new domains (assuming they want to sell it in the first place).
On the other hand, if you're just starting out, you might prefer the cheaper alternative of trying to obtain a domain name first, and then naming your website (or business) after the domain that you've acquired. So if you've acquired, say, the domain name "acme.com", then your website and business might be named "Acme" or "acme.com". I know this seems a bit like putting the cart before the horse, but that's the reality if you don't want to lose out on the Internet.
2. Generic Names Or Brand Name Domains?
I know that a number of people seem to think that your domain name really must be some generic name like "cars.com" if you are selling cars. Witness, for example, how much money those generic names are being sold for. But seriously, if you were looking for a car, you'll probably already have some brands in mind, and you're more like to try out things like generalmotors.com or toyota.com rather than just cars.com.
For that reason, I personally feel that a domain name that matches your brand name is very important. The very name that you use to advertise your product is the name that you will want for your domain, because that is the first thing that people will try in their browser. It is also the easiest thing for them to remember, and whatever that is easily remembered, will be more likely to be tried out than the obscure domain name.
3. Long or Short Domain Names?
Domain names can be of any length up to 67 characters. You don't have to settle for an obscure domain name like avab.com when what you mean is AcmeVideosAndBooks.com.
Having said that, there appears to be some disagreement about whether a long or short domain name is better.
Some argue that shorter domain names are easier to remember, easier to type and far less susceptible to mistakes: for example, "getit.com" is easier to remember and less prone to typos than "connecttomywebsiteandobtainit.com".
Others argue that a longer domain name is usually easier on the human memory - for example, "gaepw.com" is a sequence of unrelated letters that is difficult to remember and type correctly, whereas if we expand it to its long form, "GetAnEconomicallyPricedWebsite.com", we are more likely to remember the domain name.
Some of these arguments are actually academic. It's increasingly difficult to get short meaningful domain names. I have not checked, but I'm fairly certain that names like "getit.com" and "good.com" have long been sold. If you manage to get a short domain name though, the key is to make sure it's a meaningful combination of characters and not the obscure "gaepw.com" in my contrived example above.
Long domain names that have your site keywords in them also have an advantage in that they fare better in a number of search engines. The latter give preference to keywords that are also found in your domain names. So, for example, if you have a site on free C++ compilers with a domain name like freecpluspluscompilers.com, it might fare better in a search for "free C++ compilers" than my other site, thefreecountry.com.
Which would I go for? I'd go for the shorter name if I can get a meaningful one, but I'm not averse to longer names. However, I would probably avoid extremely long names verging on 67 characters. Aside from the obvious problem that people might not be able to remember such a long name, it would also be a chore typing it and trying to fit it as a title on your web page.
4. Hyphenated Names?
Should you get a hyphenated name? There are a few things to consider here:
a. Disadvantage: It's easy to forget the hyphens when typing a name. Many users are used to typing things like freecpluspluscompilers.com but not free-c-plus-plus-compilers.com. They'll probably leave out the hyphens and wind up at your competitor's site.
b. Disadvantage: When people recommend your site to their friends verbally, having hyphens in your domain name leads to more potential errors than when the name does not contain hyphens. For example, how do you think your visitors will refer to your site if it is named "acme-books-and-videos.com"? They might say, "I visited Acme Book and Videos dot com yesterday. It was fabulous." Their friends, remembering that comment later, might type into their browsers "acmebooksandvideos.com". Oops.
c. Disadvantage: It's a pain in the neck to type. Enough said.
d. Advantage: Search engines can distinguish your keywords better and thus return your site more prominently in search results for those keywords occurring in your domain name.
e. Advantage: The non-hyphenated form may no longer be available. At least this way, you still get the domain name you want.
Personally, I prefer to avoid hyphenated names if I can, but I guess it really depends on your domain name and your situation.
5. Plurals, "The", and "My" Forms of the Domain Name
Very often, if you can't get the domain name you want, the domain name registrar will suggest alternate forms of the name you typed. For example, if you wanted website.com, and it was taken (of course it is), it might suggest forms like:
thewebsite.com
mywebsite.com
websites.com
and the like, if they were not already taken as well. The question is, should you take them?
My personal opinion is that if you take the "the..." and "my..." forms of the domain name, you must always remember to promote your site with the full form of the name. Otherwise, people are likely to forget to affix the necessary "the" or "my". For that reason, I always advertise my sites as "thesitewizard.com" and "thefreecountry.com" in their full domain name forms, rather than just "Free Country" or "Site Wizard" (without the article).
On the other hand, I would not take the plural form of the domain name (eg, websites.com) if I cannot also get "website.com", since the chance of the visitor failing to type the "s" in the name is very great. Think about the famous name tussle between etoys.com and etoy.com. Many people wanting to go to etoys.com were apparently going to etoy.com instead. If it happened to them, it can happen to you too.
6. COM, ORG, NET, etc?
One common question I encounter is from people who can't get the ".com" domain of their choice, but find the ".net", ".org" or other country-specific top level domains (TLDs) available (like .de, .nu, .sg, etc). Should they try for these?
The answer is not as straightforward as you might think. If your website or business caters to the local community, such as a pizza delivery business or recruitment agency or the like, then it makes sense to get a country-specific domain. You actually benefit from having such a local domain because the people in your country know that they're dealing with a local entity, which is what they want. After all, if they stay in (say) the United Kingdom, they're not likely to want to try to order pizza from pizzaparlour.com, which suggests a US or an international site. You'll have better luck calling it pizzaparlour.co.uk, ie, with a UK domain.
What if yours is a site or business that can benefit from an international audience? There are actually many schools of thought on this. I'll just mention a few common ones.
The first school of thought goes on the premise that it is better to have a domain name of your choice "myperfectdomain" even if it has a TLD of ".net", ".org" or some other country specific extension, than to wind up choosing an obscure domain name for the simple reason you can't get your first choice. Thus they would settle for domain names like "myperfectdomain.de" or "myperfectdomain.net" or whatever. Against this is the argument that if you get a country specific domain, people might think that your business only caters to that country.
Another school of thought finds that ".net" and ".org" extensions are actually quite acceptable domain names. For some, the ".org" extension actually describes the non-profit nature of their organisation. So, for example, the famous Apache web server can be found at "apache.org".
Others settle for the ".com" extension and no less. As grounds for their arguments, they cite the browser algorithms used to locate a website when a user simply types a name like "acme" into the browser. Apparently, the browser searches for a domain name "acme.com" before attempting "acme.net", etc. As such, people who do that will be delivered to your competitor's site if you do not also own the ".com" extension. Indeed, even if people do not rely on their browser to complete their typing, many simply assume a ".com" extension when they type a domain name, so if your business is "Acme", they'll just assume your domain name is "acme.com" rather than "acme.net" or some other such name.
As you can see, there are actually good grounds for accepting any of the above views. My personal footnote to the above arguments is that if you get a domain name with an extension other than ".com", make sure that you promote your business or website with the full domain name. For example, if your domain name is "dogandcatfood.net", make sure that when you advertise your site or business, call it "dogandcatfood.net" not "dogandcatfood". Otherwise people will assume a ".com" extension and travel to the wrong place.
7. In Conclusion...
In case the forest got lost in the trees (or the reverse) in my arguments here, let me reiterate the main point of this article: get that domain name before you start your site or business.
Don't make the mistake of attempting to retrofit your domain name to your business or website. thefreecountry.com did not originally start out with that name, and I encountered a huge hassle (and lost visitors) as a result of the URL changes. Don't make that mistake too.
If you need help getting that domain name, check out my other article on how to register a domain name. In that article, I also include a list of some registrars that you can use, distinguishing the well-established ones from the less established but cheap ones (so you have a wider choice, depending on what is important to you). The article can be found at http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/registerdomain.shtml
O be some other name!
What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet.
- Shakespeare
Recommended web hosts
Which Web Host Do You Recommend? (FAQ)
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
Updated: 24 April 2008.
I worry a lot about this page. I originally set it up to cut down the amount of email I receive at thesitewizard.com asking me to recommend a web host. However, over time, I have found that I had to revise this page numerous times as a result of changes in the web hosting scene. The worst thing is finding out that the quality of hosting at the hosts I had earlier mentioned here had deteriorated. Naturally those hosts are no longer listed below.
The best way to treat this page is to regard the comments I make here about web hosts as merely the opinions of one person given at a particular point in time. I recommend that you investigate thoroughly any host before signing up. You can find a list of things you should look for in a web host in my other article How to Choose a Web Host.
Note that I only mention commercial and free web hosts providing shared hosting (where yours is not the only website on a particular machine). Since I have no direct experience with leasing a dedicated server or getting a virtual private server (VPS), this page will not mention any companies providing such facilities.
Commercial Web Hosts: My Personal Favourite
At present, thesitewizard.com is hosted at FutureQuest, and indeed has been on this host since 2000. So far, I have found them to be reliable, honest and competent, with the people at the helm appearing to be people who understand the software and issues that surround running web servers. Their prices are not the cheapest around, but I find that they are well worth the price. The old adage, "you get what you pay for", seems most appropriate in their case, and I would rather pay that few extra dollars for their reliability and competence than to find my sites down for long periods at a stretch, costing me more money than the few bucks I can save in hosting fees.
Things I like about them include the automatic availability of a secure shell account (SSH) without requiring me to ask for it, numerous Apache modules (including the important mod_rewrite module), Perl modules and other developer facilities. Also, no other customer with an account on the same server as you can read and copy your scripts by simply telnetting to their account and changing to your directory to read/copy them (something which, you might be surprised to learn, you can do on many other web hosts).
And then there are the intangibles, which are hard to quantify. For example, there are things like their competence which has been demonstrated in the way they manage their servers, plan ahead, etc. I also like their honesty, even in things like automatically refunding for downtimes that exceed their 99.5% uptime guarantee (not that there's much of downtime) - something which many hosts not only require you to prove (very hard to do) but often even deny. It's little things like these that increase my confidence in a host and make me willing to trust my website (and credit card number) with them.
Of course there are numerous other features in their hosting packages, but those are fairly standard among most other hosts (like a control panel to manage your email addresses, PHP, Perl, etc), so I'm not going to bother to mention them here. In fact, simply doing a feature versus price comparison of web hosts is not really very useful since most people only use a subset of all features offered (and web hosts know it, and so bloat their feature list to get customers). Far more important, in my opinion, are the above things.
Cheaper Web Hosts
Very often, when people ask me about web hosting, they want to know if I know any cheap but good web host. This particularly applies to those who are just starting their web site and are not willing to sink a lot of money into it.
My problem with this question is that although I'm willing to answer it, my experience with cheap web hosts have not been entirely favourable, so it is difficult to recommend the cheap ones where I have actually placed sites on.
As such, at this point in time, if you really want dirt cheap hosting, you will have to evaluate them for yourself. Sorry. There are a number listed in thefreecountry.com's Annotated List of Budget Web Hosts.
Free Web Hosts
I previously had a section mentioning free web hosts that I had found noteworthy. However, as I have not had a major site hosted on a free web host since 1999, my knowledge of good free web hosts quickly became dated, and is now hopelessly obsolete. Since the free web hosting scene changes even more rapidly than the commercial web hosting scene, with web hosts disappearing every now and then (sometimes even within the month they start), it is best to check out (and evaluate) for yourself any free web host you come across. A number of them can be found on thefreecountry.com's Free Web Hosts page.
Before you rush out to sign up for a free web host, you should read my article on All Those Disappearing Free Web Hosts.
Price and Web Hosting
Price is always a factor in choosing web hosts. You would be fooling yourself if you told yourself otherwise (unless you have lots of money to burn). However, higher prices do not mean that you'll get a good web host. Higher prices do, however, mean that you have a better chance of getting good support, since at least they will have the money to hire more staff if they want to.
There is always a trade-off. At least for me. There's no way I can afford to put all my sites on my "ideal" web hosts. For sites that are not so critical, I am willing to pay a cheaper price at the cost of a little more "down" time and inconvenience than my more important sites.
In general, if you run a business on the web, you will not want to take that kind of risk. Bad support and "down" times have a habit of occurring at the worse possible moments (such as during your peak ordering seasons).
One (cheap) host (not listed above) that used to house one of my non-critical "play" sites has had over a period of a few months numerous problems: repeated periods of "down" times (sometimes running even for hours with them not only unaware of the situation but also unreachable), email problems (their email system was down so mail from my visitors could not reach me), FTP problems, and so on. If you're running a business, I suggest that you weigh the costs of your site being down against the cost of paying a few dollars extra per month for a good web host. When your site is "down", you will lose your sales and customers for that period. If you're earning from your website, it may be worth your while to pay those extra dollars. After all, as long as your site is "up", you stand the chance of getting additional sales which will more than make up for the additional cost of a few bucks. Remember: no site, no sale.
As for free web hosts: you just got to swallow whatever you're dished out. Support is often non-existent for free web hosts. It never ceases to amaze me to hear from people who complain of free web hosts that have lousy service. You didn't pay a cent, so what do you expect? Frankly, I don't suggest that you run a business site on a free web host. Hobby sites and personal sites are probably okay. You might still want to consider getting your own domain name though. If you don't know why this is so, see my article, My Biggest Website Regrets.
My personal policy, however, is that if it's an important site, don't be penny-wise and pound-foolish. Saving one or two dollars per month is not worth the loss of a few hundred or a few thousand dollars when your site goes down.
Other Issues in Web Hosting
So that you do not get tricked by web hosts who are less than upfront about their packages and practices, you may also want to read these other articles:
* The Fine Print in Web Hosting: Resource Usage Limits
* The Real Meaning of "Unlimited" in Web Hosting
And Finally...
Best wishes for your site!
Copyright 2000-2008 by Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
Get more free tips and articles like this, on web design, promotion, revenue and scripting, from http://www.thesitewizard.com/
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
Updated: 24 April 2008.
I worry a lot about this page. I originally set it up to cut down the amount of email I receive at thesitewizard.com asking me to recommend a web host. However, over time, I have found that I had to revise this page numerous times as a result of changes in the web hosting scene. The worst thing is finding out that the quality of hosting at the hosts I had earlier mentioned here had deteriorated. Naturally those hosts are no longer listed below.
The best way to treat this page is to regard the comments I make here about web hosts as merely the opinions of one person given at a particular point in time. I recommend that you investigate thoroughly any host before signing up. You can find a list of things you should look for in a web host in my other article How to Choose a Web Host.
Note that I only mention commercial and free web hosts providing shared hosting (where yours is not the only website on a particular machine). Since I have no direct experience with leasing a dedicated server or getting a virtual private server (VPS), this page will not mention any companies providing such facilities.
Commercial Web Hosts: My Personal Favourite
At present, thesitewizard.com is hosted at FutureQuest, and indeed has been on this host since 2000. So far, I have found them to be reliable, honest and competent, with the people at the helm appearing to be people who understand the software and issues that surround running web servers. Their prices are not the cheapest around, but I find that they are well worth the price. The old adage, "you get what you pay for", seems most appropriate in their case, and I would rather pay that few extra dollars for their reliability and competence than to find my sites down for long periods at a stretch, costing me more money than the few bucks I can save in hosting fees.
Things I like about them include the automatic availability of a secure shell account (SSH) without requiring me to ask for it, numerous Apache modules (including the important mod_rewrite module), Perl modules and other developer facilities. Also, no other customer with an account on the same server as you can read and copy your scripts by simply telnetting to their account and changing to your directory to read/copy them (something which, you might be surprised to learn, you can do on many other web hosts).
And then there are the intangibles, which are hard to quantify. For example, there are things like their competence which has been demonstrated in the way they manage their servers, plan ahead, etc. I also like their honesty, even in things like automatically refunding for downtimes that exceed their 99.5% uptime guarantee (not that there's much of downtime) - something which many hosts not only require you to prove (very hard to do) but often even deny. It's little things like these that increase my confidence in a host and make me willing to trust my website (and credit card number) with them.
Of course there are numerous other features in their hosting packages, but those are fairly standard among most other hosts (like a control panel to manage your email addresses, PHP, Perl, etc), so I'm not going to bother to mention them here. In fact, simply doing a feature versus price comparison of web hosts is not really very useful since most people only use a subset of all features offered (and web hosts know it, and so bloat their feature list to get customers). Far more important, in my opinion, are the above things.
Cheaper Web Hosts
Very often, when people ask me about web hosting, they want to know if I know any cheap but good web host. This particularly applies to those who are just starting their web site and are not willing to sink a lot of money into it.
My problem with this question is that although I'm willing to answer it, my experience with cheap web hosts have not been entirely favourable, so it is difficult to recommend the cheap ones where I have actually placed sites on.
As such, at this point in time, if you really want dirt cheap hosting, you will have to evaluate them for yourself. Sorry. There are a number listed in thefreecountry.com's Annotated List of Budget Web Hosts.
Free Web Hosts
I previously had a section mentioning free web hosts that I had found noteworthy. However, as I have not had a major site hosted on a free web host since 1999, my knowledge of good free web hosts quickly became dated, and is now hopelessly obsolete. Since the free web hosting scene changes even more rapidly than the commercial web hosting scene, with web hosts disappearing every now and then (sometimes even within the month they start), it is best to check out (and evaluate) for yourself any free web host you come across. A number of them can be found on thefreecountry.com's Free Web Hosts page.
Before you rush out to sign up for a free web host, you should read my article on All Those Disappearing Free Web Hosts.
Price and Web Hosting
Price is always a factor in choosing web hosts. You would be fooling yourself if you told yourself otherwise (unless you have lots of money to burn). However, higher prices do not mean that you'll get a good web host. Higher prices do, however, mean that you have a better chance of getting good support, since at least they will have the money to hire more staff if they want to.
There is always a trade-off. At least for me. There's no way I can afford to put all my sites on my "ideal" web hosts. For sites that are not so critical, I am willing to pay a cheaper price at the cost of a little more "down" time and inconvenience than my more important sites.
In general, if you run a business on the web, you will not want to take that kind of risk. Bad support and "down" times have a habit of occurring at the worse possible moments (such as during your peak ordering seasons).
One (cheap) host (not listed above) that used to house one of my non-critical "play" sites has had over a period of a few months numerous problems: repeated periods of "down" times (sometimes running even for hours with them not only unaware of the situation but also unreachable), email problems (their email system was down so mail from my visitors could not reach me), FTP problems, and so on. If you're running a business, I suggest that you weigh the costs of your site being down against the cost of paying a few dollars extra per month for a good web host. When your site is "down", you will lose your sales and customers for that period. If you're earning from your website, it may be worth your while to pay those extra dollars. After all, as long as your site is "up", you stand the chance of getting additional sales which will more than make up for the additional cost of a few bucks. Remember: no site, no sale.
As for free web hosts: you just got to swallow whatever you're dished out. Support is often non-existent for free web hosts. It never ceases to amaze me to hear from people who complain of free web hosts that have lousy service. You didn't pay a cent, so what do you expect? Frankly, I don't suggest that you run a business site on a free web host. Hobby sites and personal sites are probably okay. You might still want to consider getting your own domain name though. If you don't know why this is so, see my article, My Biggest Website Regrets.
My personal policy, however, is that if it's an important site, don't be penny-wise and pound-foolish. Saving one or two dollars per month is not worth the loss of a few hundred or a few thousand dollars when your site goes down.
Other Issues in Web Hosting
So that you do not get tricked by web hosts who are less than upfront about their packages and practices, you may also want to read these other articles:
* The Fine Print in Web Hosting: Resource Usage Limits
* The Real Meaning of "Unlimited" in Web Hosting
And Finally...
Best wishes for your site!
Copyright 2000-2008 by Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
Get more free tips and articles like this, on web design, promotion, revenue and scripting, from http://www.thesitewizard.com/
Increase website revenue
Increasing Your Website Revenue from Affiliate Programs
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
So you signed up for an affiliate program, and dreamt of untold riches that comes simply with having a website. Until you got your first cheque, that is.
Earning an income from advertising on your website is often proclaimed as The Dream To End All Dreams where you earn even while you sleep (which is true). All you have to do is to set up a website and the money starts flowing in, right? As many new web designers have found out, it doesn't work quite so smoothly. Very often, the reality check comes when you get your first month's cheque.
Here are some tips to help you increase your takings from your advertisements.
1.
Time
Before you jump out of that window, you have to realise that, like many things, these things take time. In general, for many webmasters starting out with their first affiliate program, their first month's income is usually rather pithy. This is normal. The income improves as you fine-tune your site and the advertisements and banners you use.
2.
Targeting Your Advertisements
There's really no short cut to this. Unless you signed up for one of those programs that will rotate ads on your site automatically, you should try to fit the banners and links you display on your site to the audience that you expect your site to attract.
For example, if your site is about education, put up advertisements and banners that would interest people who come to your site. Think about it -- education sites would interest at least three types of people: kids, educators (teachers) and parents. Choose advertisements that would interest them. Note that this does not mean that you exclude all other types of advertisements. Some ads are general enough to appeal to many types of audience.
I know I mentioned this in my other article, "How to Make Money from Your Website" at http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/makemoney.shtml but taking the effort to do this can really make the difference between the success of your advertising and a miserable income each month. The trick of course is to figure out what your target audience will like. It's not as easy as it might seem.
3.
Ads About Free Stuff Do Better
Let's face it. When we go to a physical shop to get something, we expect to pay money for the goods we obtain. But when we go to a website, we bring with us a different mindset. We expect information, goods and services free of charge.
Because of this, advertisements about things that your visitors can obtain free will usually fare better than those about things that they have to pay money for.
If your affiliate program has free stuff on offer, try them out on your site to see how it performs.
4.
Traffic is Everything
No visitors, no money. To have people clicking on your banners and taking up the offers given there, you need to work on the traffic going through your site. There's no substitute for this. No amount of fine-tuning of your advertisements is going to help you if you have only a few visitors going to your site each day.
Remember that not every visitor is going to click on your banner. (When was the last time you clicked on a banner on another site?) So to earn any income at all, you must generate enough traffic.
If you want to learn more about promoting your site, you can check out my other articles on website promotion for more information.
5.
Content is King
I have seen many sites whose webmasters obviously decided that they'll make a quick buck by loading up their site with affiliate program links. Their site contains nothing but advertising links, along with comments that these are "fantastic offers", "great offers", "best" and whatnot. I'm sure you've seen those sites too.
If your site is like this, you should be aware that aggressive promotion may get you many visitors, but those visitors are unlikely to bookmark your site and return for more. There will be some (if not more) that will be so fed up that they won't even look at what you have to say.
My suggestion - your website must have genuine content. Unending lists of advertising links may fool some people, but not for long.
6.
Credibility
Some advertisers tell you that you should personally recommend their products, and if you do so, the advertising link will do much better. True. But unless you yourself have used their product or service, and also agree that it is what *you* claim it to be, putting such a link can be counterproductive. There is a relationship of trust between you and your visitors. People start off generally believing what you say until you demonstrate that you're just a salesperson trying to make a quick buck. My recommendation is that if you don't really know much about a product, or have not tried it, do not pretend otherwise. Of course if you're using it yourself and think the world of it, by all means, recommend it.
Basically, just be honest. Believe it or not, honesty is the best business policy.
7.
Text Links Vs Banners
You'll read on some sites that nowadays, text links fare better than banner links. Other sites claim that banners are coming into vogue again. I think that such blanket claims have to be qualified somewhat.
My experience is that text links that are part of the content of your site will generally do better than banners or other text links.
I used to think that text links that are not part of your site content need to be short and sharp in order to do well. However, I have seen some sites that have an elaborate long advertising copy for its link. The webmasters of such sites have apparently found that long stories like these work well for their type of audience. You may wish to do some testing on your own site to see which type of text advertising work for your audience.
As for banners, whether they work or not depends largely on the type of website you have, your audience and the design of the banners. Like all things, you'll just have to test them out on your site and examine the results after a few months.
8.
Rotation and Weeding
If you don't use an advertising program that automatically puts the most relevant ads on your website, you will need to manually manage the advertisements that appear on your website.
Do this by monitoring your advertising statistics. If an advertisement does well initially, and its performance slowly drops over time, it is probably time to rotate that banner or button. If it remains too long on the page, people tend to stop seeing it. Sometimes you can prolong the life of the advertisement by simply using a different banner from the same advertiser (assuming they provide more than one banner).
Likewise, if an advertisement seldom has any takers, remove it. There are at least a couple of common reasons for this: the picture doesn't attract anyone to click on it (banners that are too wordy often have this deterrent effect); or your site's target audience is not interested in this type of service or product. Don't keep it around just because it has a high payout rate - what's the point of a high payout rate if no one ever takes it?
Above all, be patient. Keep working on improving your traffic and fine-tuning the ads that appear on your pages. After all, Rome was not built in a day.
Copyright 2000-2008 by Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
Get more free tips and articles like this, on web design, promotion, revenue and scripting, from http://www.thesitewizard.com/
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
So you signed up for an affiliate program, and dreamt of untold riches that comes simply with having a website. Until you got your first cheque, that is.
Earning an income from advertising on your website is often proclaimed as The Dream To End All Dreams where you earn even while you sleep (which is true). All you have to do is to set up a website and the money starts flowing in, right? As many new web designers have found out, it doesn't work quite so smoothly. Very often, the reality check comes when you get your first month's cheque.
Here are some tips to help you increase your takings from your advertisements.
1.
Time
Before you jump out of that window, you have to realise that, like many things, these things take time. In general, for many webmasters starting out with their first affiliate program, their first month's income is usually rather pithy. This is normal. The income improves as you fine-tune your site and the advertisements and banners you use.
2.
Targeting Your Advertisements
There's really no short cut to this. Unless you signed up for one of those programs that will rotate ads on your site automatically, you should try to fit the banners and links you display on your site to the audience that you expect your site to attract.
For example, if your site is about education, put up advertisements and banners that would interest people who come to your site. Think about it -- education sites would interest at least three types of people: kids, educators (teachers) and parents. Choose advertisements that would interest them. Note that this does not mean that you exclude all other types of advertisements. Some ads are general enough to appeal to many types of audience.
I know I mentioned this in my other article, "How to Make Money from Your Website" at http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/makemoney.shtml but taking the effort to do this can really make the difference between the success of your advertising and a miserable income each month. The trick of course is to figure out what your target audience will like. It's not as easy as it might seem.
3.
Ads About Free Stuff Do Better
Let's face it. When we go to a physical shop to get something, we expect to pay money for the goods we obtain. But when we go to a website, we bring with us a different mindset. We expect information, goods and services free of charge.
Because of this, advertisements about things that your visitors can obtain free will usually fare better than those about things that they have to pay money for.
If your affiliate program has free stuff on offer, try them out on your site to see how it performs.
4.
Traffic is Everything
No visitors, no money. To have people clicking on your banners and taking up the offers given there, you need to work on the traffic going through your site. There's no substitute for this. No amount of fine-tuning of your advertisements is going to help you if you have only a few visitors going to your site each day.
Remember that not every visitor is going to click on your banner. (When was the last time you clicked on a banner on another site?) So to earn any income at all, you must generate enough traffic.
If you want to learn more about promoting your site, you can check out my other articles on website promotion for more information.
5.
Content is King
I have seen many sites whose webmasters obviously decided that they'll make a quick buck by loading up their site with affiliate program links. Their site contains nothing but advertising links, along with comments that these are "fantastic offers", "great offers", "best" and whatnot. I'm sure you've seen those sites too.
If your site is like this, you should be aware that aggressive promotion may get you many visitors, but those visitors are unlikely to bookmark your site and return for more. There will be some (if not more) that will be so fed up that they won't even look at what you have to say.
My suggestion - your website must have genuine content. Unending lists of advertising links may fool some people, but not for long.
6.
Credibility
Some advertisers tell you that you should personally recommend their products, and if you do so, the advertising link will do much better. True. But unless you yourself have used their product or service, and also agree that it is what *you* claim it to be, putting such a link can be counterproductive. There is a relationship of trust between you and your visitors. People start off generally believing what you say until you demonstrate that you're just a salesperson trying to make a quick buck. My recommendation is that if you don't really know much about a product, or have not tried it, do not pretend otherwise. Of course if you're using it yourself and think the world of it, by all means, recommend it.
Basically, just be honest. Believe it or not, honesty is the best business policy.
7.
Text Links Vs Banners
You'll read on some sites that nowadays, text links fare better than banner links. Other sites claim that banners are coming into vogue again. I think that such blanket claims have to be qualified somewhat.
My experience is that text links that are part of the content of your site will generally do better than banners or other text links.
I used to think that text links that are not part of your site content need to be short and sharp in order to do well. However, I have seen some sites that have an elaborate long advertising copy for its link. The webmasters of such sites have apparently found that long stories like these work well for their type of audience. You may wish to do some testing on your own site to see which type of text advertising work for your audience.
As for banners, whether they work or not depends largely on the type of website you have, your audience and the design of the banners. Like all things, you'll just have to test them out on your site and examine the results after a few months.
8.
Rotation and Weeding
If you don't use an advertising program that automatically puts the most relevant ads on your website, you will need to manually manage the advertisements that appear on your website.
Do this by monitoring your advertising statistics. If an advertisement does well initially, and its performance slowly drops over time, it is probably time to rotate that banner or button. If it remains too long on the page, people tend to stop seeing it. Sometimes you can prolong the life of the advertisement by simply using a different banner from the same advertiser (assuming they provide more than one banner).
Likewise, if an advertisement seldom has any takers, remove it. There are at least a couple of common reasons for this: the picture doesn't attract anyone to click on it (banners that are too wordy often have this deterrent effect); or your site's target audience is not interested in this type of service or product. Don't keep it around just because it has a high payout rate - what's the point of a high payout rate if no one ever takes it?
Above all, be patient. Keep working on improving your traffic and fine-tuning the ads that appear on your pages. After all, Rome was not built in a day.
Copyright 2000-2008 by Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
Get more free tips and articles like this, on web design, promotion, revenue and scripting, from http://www.thesitewizard.com/
Website regrets
My Biggest Website Regrets
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
It's always helpful to learn from some others' mistakes. This is especially so in the case of web development, promotion, and e-commerce, where the entire field is so new (well, relatively anyway) that the majority of people learn things from the school of hard knocks.
Here are some of my mistakes and some possible ways which you might be able to use to avoid the same. You've probably got wind of some of these from my other articles where I've hinted of the difficulties I've faced.
1.
Not Getting A Domain Name Earlier
Over the years that thefreecountry.com (one of my other sites) has been in existence prior to getting its own domain name, I have had to move web servers some 4 times. Without my own domain name, my URL changed all 4 times. Each time it changed, I had to start getting search engine listings (the lifeline of a website) all over again. In the interim before the new site is listed, I lost an untold amount of visitors. Believe me, pages that redirect people to the new site aren't as effective as you may think! I'll tell you more in another article.
Other problems with not having a domain name include my inability to get into some good affiliate programs that required members to have their own domain. The domain name also gives my site credibility - traffic to the site increased when I got the domain name. Some search engines apparently also discriminate in favour of sites with their own domains and rank it higher. Failing to have a domain name that matched my site name meant that I lost traffic from people who remembered the various sections of my site ("Logtime", "Developer City", "eCentriCity") but did not remember the URL. These names, by the way, pre-dated my obtaining the name "thefreecountry.com". Had I managed to get the domain name earlier, I probably would not have promoted these subsection names but the main domain.
I guess like many people, when I first started, I was not willing to spend any money on something that might turn out to be a failure. And, like many people, I associated getting a domain name with having to pay for commercial web hosting.
If you labour under that fallacy too, dismiss it. Many free web hosts will actually host your domain name free of charge. Indeed, some of them will even allow you to have unlimited email addresses, like anyname@your-domain.com, for your domain. So the cost of the domain name is only the registrar fees. Most registrars nowadays charge something in the region of $10 a year - which means a cost of less than $1 per month. That's very affordable!
Besides, even if the site turns out to be a failure, you'll still have your own domain name as your email address. I'm sure that counts for something. So it isn't a total loss.
If you need help on how to register your domain name, as well as a brief review and listing of some registrars, check out my article on How to Register Your Domain Name at http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/registerdomain.shtml
You can also find some tips on choosing a good domain name from http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/domainname.shtml
If you want free web hosting that will allow you to host your domain name, you can start your search at thefreecountry.com's Free Web Hosting pages at http://www.thefreecountry.com/webhosting/freewebhosts.shtml.
2.
Not Joining An Affiliate Program Earlier
Now that my site has had advertisers for some time, I really regret not having started earlier. I guess, like many people, I assumed that you had to be a big company or something to get advertisers for your site. All those wasted years. Sigh.
Anyway, you don't have to make the same mistake here. You can read up on my tutorials on how to get sponsors for your website, even if your site is only just starting out.
*
How to Earn Income from Your Website
http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/makemoney.shtml
*
Increasing Your Revenue from Affiliate Programs
http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/moremoney.shtml
*
How to Add Google Advertisements (Google AdSense) to Your Blog or Website
http://www.thesitewizard.com/revenue/google-adsense.shtml
Or you can go straight to the Affiliate Programs listing at http://www.thefreecountry.com/webmaster/affiliate.shtml and start signing up.
3.
Not Starting A Newsletter Earlier
If you are surprised at this, then you don't appreciate the value of a newsletter for your website. A newsletter or ezine benefits both you and your visitors. It allows you to inform your visitors of new stuff at your site, thus bringing them back, and it allows your visitors to be informed of those things that they're interested in. It's one of those mutually beneficial arrangements that I did not tap into (for lack of knowledge) until my site had a few years of history behind it.
You can read my article on this, as well as tips on starting your own newsletter or ezine, at http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/newsletter.shtml
4.
Not Promoting The Newsletter Enough
Nowadays, when you visit thefreecountry.com and its younger sibling, thesitewizard.com, you'll see boxes for people to sign up for the free newsletter on every page.
When I first started the newsletter, I set up a separate page for signups, and put a link to it from my main page.
Needless to say, the rate of signing up was small (relative to now). If you put a link on your site and expect people to click on it, you lose the majority of your audience who either fail to see the link or can't be bothered to click on it.
The general rule of making things convenient for your visitors applies here as well. Put the signup box on your main page. Better still, put it on every page. When I did that, the signup rate for the newsletter jumped manifold. Some people even recommend that you put the signup box at the top and bottom of every page.
If you only have a signup page, try this, and you'll be surprised at the results.
5.
Not Promoting the Website Enough
I'm still guilty of this error. Promoting your website is not something you do when you first launch your site. It's a daily, weekly, monthly process. It's a great hassle, but the payback is that your site has an increased number of visitors.
Promotion means more than submitting your site to search engines. It means making your pages search-engine-ready, so that they appear on the first few pages of the search results of certain keywords. It means asking other relevant sites for links to your site. It means announcing your site at places like newsgroups, announcement lists, your local newspapers, etc.
It means a lot of work. That's why I never seem to do enough of it. I think I spend more time writing articles (like this) and adding content to the site. It should be both adding content AND promoting the site, not just one or the other.
You can get some tips on website promotion from some of my other articles at thesitewizard.com. Many of them can be found from the Website Promotion and Search Engine Optimization index at http://www.thesitewizard.com/sitepromotion/index.shtml
6.
Putting My Email Address on My Site
Yes. I actually regret putting my email address on my website. However, unlike the preceding items in this article, this "mistake" is not really a mistake, and you should not simply wipe out your email address from your site. It's just my personal regret. Read this entire section first before you take action.
When I first started my site, I did what everyone else does - put my email address as a hyperlink for anyone who wanted to contact me. I soon found out that the people who wanted to contact me most were spammers! Somehow, these email spammers actually send out "robots" that spider your site, grabbing any email addresses it can find and adding them to their database.
Before you rush out to eliminate your email address, you should probably be aware of a few things. If you are a business concern, expecting people to go to your site and buy your goods and services, publishing your email address, business address and telephone number is mandatory. Failing to do so makes your site look like a fly-by-night operation that many people will not dare trust with their money. Hence if you sell anything at all on your site, this section probably does not apply to you.
Otherwise, what can you do about this problem? As it turns out there are actually a few ways to minimize it.
Putting up email addresses like "webmaster@example.com" or "sales@example.com" used to help. For some reason, such generic email addresses used to attract less spam. It doesn't seem to be the case nowadays though, and many people have found that any email address they display will be subject to spam.
If you are willing to put up with some inconvenience to your visitors, you can try what thesitewizard.com and thefreecountry.com do (at least, at the date of this writing). Don't put any email addresses on any page. Everywhere where an email address is appropriate, put a link to your feedback form. I must admit that it doesn't entirely eliminate spam, but it forces spammers to manually send spam. For example, I get spammers going to the feedback form and submitting their advertisements there!
If you take this route, you should also modify your CGI feedback script so that your email address is embedded in the script itself, and not in a hidden field on your form (spiders can always read those fields). The free feedback form script generated by thesitewizard Feedback Form Wizard does this automatically. Of course if you use a CGI-hosted service, this is likely to be outside your control.
One of my newsletter readers has also suggested another alternative: you can always put your email address in a graphical image (such as a GIF) file and put it on your web page. Since it is unlikely that the spam spiders would go through the trouble of using an OCR to read the text on your images, your email address will probably be safe from their prying eyes. However, if you use this route, you should probably also have a feedback form somewhere so that visitors who rely on speech software to "read" your page (such as the visually impaired) can still contact you.
Another method is to use JavaScript to write your email address to your web page, forming it from its components. For example, if you wish to put "sales@example.com" on your site, you might use a JavaScript snippet to write three separate strings, "sales", "@" and "example.com", onto your web page without intervening spaces. The downside to this approach is that visitors who disable JavaScript in their browsers will not be able to see your address at all.
Conclusion
I hope this article helps you. At the very least, you can minimize the amount of things you need to "regret" later by learning from my omissions and commissions!
Copyright 2000-2003 by Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
Get more free tips and articles like this, on web design, promotion, revenue and scripting, from http://www.thesitewizard.com/
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
It's always helpful to learn from some others' mistakes. This is especially so in the case of web development, promotion, and e-commerce, where the entire field is so new (well, relatively anyway) that the majority of people learn things from the school of hard knocks.
Here are some of my mistakes and some possible ways which you might be able to use to avoid the same. You've probably got wind of some of these from my other articles where I've hinted of the difficulties I've faced.
1.
Not Getting A Domain Name Earlier
Over the years that thefreecountry.com (one of my other sites) has been in existence prior to getting its own domain name, I have had to move web servers some 4 times. Without my own domain name, my URL changed all 4 times. Each time it changed, I had to start getting search engine listings (the lifeline of a website) all over again. In the interim before the new site is listed, I lost an untold amount of visitors. Believe me, pages that redirect people to the new site aren't as effective as you may think! I'll tell you more in another article.
Other problems with not having a domain name include my inability to get into some good affiliate programs that required members to have their own domain. The domain name also gives my site credibility - traffic to the site increased when I got the domain name. Some search engines apparently also discriminate in favour of sites with their own domains and rank it higher. Failing to have a domain name that matched my site name meant that I lost traffic from people who remembered the various sections of my site ("Logtime", "Developer City", "eCentriCity") but did not remember the URL. These names, by the way, pre-dated my obtaining the name "thefreecountry.com". Had I managed to get the domain name earlier, I probably would not have promoted these subsection names but the main domain.
I guess like many people, when I first started, I was not willing to spend any money on something that might turn out to be a failure. And, like many people, I associated getting a domain name with having to pay for commercial web hosting.
If you labour under that fallacy too, dismiss it. Many free web hosts will actually host your domain name free of charge. Indeed, some of them will even allow you to have unlimited email addresses, like anyname@your-domain.com, for your domain. So the cost of the domain name is only the registrar fees. Most registrars nowadays charge something in the region of $10 a year - which means a cost of less than $1 per month. That's very affordable!
Besides, even if the site turns out to be a failure, you'll still have your own domain name as your email address. I'm sure that counts for something. So it isn't a total loss.
If you need help on how to register your domain name, as well as a brief review and listing of some registrars, check out my article on How to Register Your Domain Name at http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/registerdomain.shtml
You can also find some tips on choosing a good domain name from http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/domainname.shtml
If you want free web hosting that will allow you to host your domain name, you can start your search at thefreecountry.com's Free Web Hosting pages at http://www.thefreecountry.com/webhosting/freewebhosts.shtml.
2.
Not Joining An Affiliate Program Earlier
Now that my site has had advertisers for some time, I really regret not having started earlier. I guess, like many people, I assumed that you had to be a big company or something to get advertisers for your site. All those wasted years. Sigh.
Anyway, you don't have to make the same mistake here. You can read up on my tutorials on how to get sponsors for your website, even if your site is only just starting out.
*
How to Earn Income from Your Website
http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/makemoney.shtml
*
Increasing Your Revenue from Affiliate Programs
http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/moremoney.shtml
*
How to Add Google Advertisements (Google AdSense) to Your Blog or Website
http://www.thesitewizard.com/revenue/google-adsense.shtml
Or you can go straight to the Affiliate Programs listing at http://www.thefreecountry.com/webmaster/affiliate.shtml and start signing up.
3.
Not Starting A Newsletter Earlier
If you are surprised at this, then you don't appreciate the value of a newsletter for your website. A newsletter or ezine benefits both you and your visitors. It allows you to inform your visitors of new stuff at your site, thus bringing them back, and it allows your visitors to be informed of those things that they're interested in. It's one of those mutually beneficial arrangements that I did not tap into (for lack of knowledge) until my site had a few years of history behind it.
You can read my article on this, as well as tips on starting your own newsletter or ezine, at http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/newsletter.shtml
4.
Not Promoting The Newsletter Enough
Nowadays, when you visit thefreecountry.com and its younger sibling, thesitewizard.com, you'll see boxes for people to sign up for the free newsletter on every page.
When I first started the newsletter, I set up a separate page for signups, and put a link to it from my main page.
Needless to say, the rate of signing up was small (relative to now). If you put a link on your site and expect people to click on it, you lose the majority of your audience who either fail to see the link or can't be bothered to click on it.
The general rule of making things convenient for your visitors applies here as well. Put the signup box on your main page. Better still, put it on every page. When I did that, the signup rate for the newsletter jumped manifold. Some people even recommend that you put the signup box at the top and bottom of every page.
If you only have a signup page, try this, and you'll be surprised at the results.
5.
Not Promoting the Website Enough
I'm still guilty of this error. Promoting your website is not something you do when you first launch your site. It's a daily, weekly, monthly process. It's a great hassle, but the payback is that your site has an increased number of visitors.
Promotion means more than submitting your site to search engines. It means making your pages search-engine-ready, so that they appear on the first few pages of the search results of certain keywords. It means asking other relevant sites for links to your site. It means announcing your site at places like newsgroups, announcement lists, your local newspapers, etc.
It means a lot of work. That's why I never seem to do enough of it. I think I spend more time writing articles (like this) and adding content to the site. It should be both adding content AND promoting the site, not just one or the other.
You can get some tips on website promotion from some of my other articles at thesitewizard.com. Many of them can be found from the Website Promotion and Search Engine Optimization index at http://www.thesitewizard.com/sitepromotion/index.shtml
6.
Putting My Email Address on My Site
Yes. I actually regret putting my email address on my website. However, unlike the preceding items in this article, this "mistake" is not really a mistake, and you should not simply wipe out your email address from your site. It's just my personal regret. Read this entire section first before you take action.
When I first started my site, I did what everyone else does - put my email address as a hyperlink for anyone who wanted to contact me. I soon found out that the people who wanted to contact me most were spammers! Somehow, these email spammers actually send out "robots" that spider your site, grabbing any email addresses it can find and adding them to their database.
Before you rush out to eliminate your email address, you should probably be aware of a few things. If you are a business concern, expecting people to go to your site and buy your goods and services, publishing your email address, business address and telephone number is mandatory. Failing to do so makes your site look like a fly-by-night operation that many people will not dare trust with their money. Hence if you sell anything at all on your site, this section probably does not apply to you.
Otherwise, what can you do about this problem? As it turns out there are actually a few ways to minimize it.
Putting up email addresses like "webmaster@example.com" or "sales@example.com" used to help. For some reason, such generic email addresses used to attract less spam. It doesn't seem to be the case nowadays though, and many people have found that any email address they display will be subject to spam.
If you are willing to put up with some inconvenience to your visitors, you can try what thesitewizard.com and thefreecountry.com do (at least, at the date of this writing). Don't put any email addresses on any page. Everywhere where an email address is appropriate, put a link to your feedback form. I must admit that it doesn't entirely eliminate spam, but it forces spammers to manually send spam. For example, I get spammers going to the feedback form and submitting their advertisements there!
If you take this route, you should also modify your CGI feedback script so that your email address is embedded in the script itself, and not in a hidden field on your form (spiders can always read those fields). The free feedback form script generated by thesitewizard Feedback Form Wizard does this automatically. Of course if you use a CGI-hosted service, this is likely to be outside your control.
One of my newsletter readers has also suggested another alternative: you can always put your email address in a graphical image (such as a GIF) file and put it on your web page. Since it is unlikely that the spam spiders would go through the trouble of using an OCR to read the text on your images, your email address will probably be safe from their prying eyes. However, if you use this route, you should probably also have a feedback form somewhere so that visitors who rely on speech software to "read" your page (such as the visually impaired) can still contact you.
Another method is to use JavaScript to write your email address to your web page, forming it from its components. For example, if you wish to put "sales@example.com" on your site, you might use a JavaScript snippet to write three separate strings, "sales", "@" and "example.com", onto your web page without intervening spaces. The downside to this approach is that visitors who disable JavaScript in their browsers will not be able to see your address at all.
Conclusion
I hope this article helps you. At the very least, you can minimize the amount of things you need to "regret" later by learning from my omissions and commissions!
Copyright 2000-2003 by Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
Get more free tips and articles like this, on web design, promotion, revenue and scripting, from http://www.thesitewizard.com/
Collecting credit cardas
Accepting Credit Cards on Your Website
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
Are you thinking of selling things on the web? If so, you will probably also be considering some way in which you can accept credit cards on your site. Since new webmasters who visit thesitewizard.com often ask me about how they can get started accepting payments in this form, this article provides some basic information on adding credit card payment facilities to your website.
Why Do It?
Credit card payments allow you to take advantage of the following types of customers:
1. Impulse buyers. After reading your advertisements and hype on your site, buyers would be all fired up about your product. If they have a means of making a purchase immediately, you've secured that sale. If you only allow cheque payments, the additional time it takes for them to get their cheque book and mail out the cheque may be a deterrence. They may also have second thoughts later.
2. International customers. Credit card payment is a tremendous convenience if your customers are overseas. It automatically takes care of the problems of currency differences as well as the time it takes for a cheque to travel to the vendor. You will lose a large number of overseas customers if cheque payment is the only way you can accept payment.
Methods of Accepting Credit Card Payments
There are actually two ways in which you can accept credit cards on your site.
1. Using Your Own Merchant Account. To do this, you will need a bank that will allow you to open a merchant account. Requirements for this will vary from country to country, and you should check with your local banks for more information on this.
2. Through a Third Party Merchant. There are numerous companies around that are willing to accept credit cards payments on your behalf in exchange for various fees and percentages.
Which Method Should You Use?
The initial costs of opening your own merchant account is usually higher than when you use a third party merchant. Indeed, some third party merchants have no setup fee at all.
However, the transaction fee (which is what you pay the bank or third party merchant for each sale) is much higher when you use a third party as compared to when using your own merchant account.
A third party merchant is usually convenient to use when you don't know if you can actually make much out of your product or service. If you just want to test the water to see how things are, this is usually a good way to start. It is also convenient in that the merchant takes care of everything for you. You just get a cheque at the end of each payment period (if you have earned enough) and concentrate on your products, services and customers.
Having your own merchant account accords your business with a certain amount of professionalism. And, as mentioned earlier, your transaction costs are usually much lower. However you have to be careful to minimize your credit card risks since you'll be processing the credit card payments yourself. This is not to say that there are no risks attendant in using a third party merchant.
Some Third Party Merchants
Here's a list of some third party merchants that you might want to consider if you're looking for ways to accept credit card payments. Except for PayPal, I have not tried any of them myself (as a vendor) so I cannot vouch for any of them. Check them out carefully and use them at your own risk.
Note that rates and stuff that I publish below were correct at the time I investigated these vendors. It may have changed by the time you read this since the merchants tend to modify their rates from time to time according to market conditions. Make sure that you check the current (up-to-date) details from their site before making any decision.
The list is arranged alphabetically.
CCBill: There are no setup fees. Transaction fees vary (I can't find the schedule though) depending on the volume of sales in each accounting period. According to their website, "these fees are never more than 13.5% of revenues charged during this one-week period for CWIE hosting clients and 14.5% for non-hosting clients".
CCNow: This is only for people who ship tangible, physical products. There is no setup fee, and they charge 9% per transaction except in the November and December where the fees are 8% per transaction (yes, lower).
Clickbank: There is a one time setup fee (US$49.95) and a transaction fee of US$1 plus 7.5% of sale price. There are no other monthly fees. This is only for people who sell services or deliver products over the internet (not for those who need to ship physical products).
Kagi: Kagi's fees seem to vary according to the order size, type of item sold and the type of payment (credit card, cash, money order) used by your customer.
PayPal: This well-known service allows you to set up a Premier or Business account (you can't receive credit card payments using a Personal account). The charges range between 1.9% + $0.30 USD to 2.9% + $0.30 USD for each transaction if you are in the US. Non-US users are charged different amounts according to the country. From experience, I find this service easy and fast to setup.
PayPoint This UK service provides either a payment gateway or a complete solution. For those who don't have a merchant account, their "Fast Track" plan (as well as their "Bank Enterprise" plan) lets you set up an online shop with just your own website. The rates does not appear to be published on their site, but you can request a quote tailored to your situation or ask them to call you back (there are buttons for this in the rightmost column of their main page).
ProPay: A new competitor to PayPal (see elsewhere on this page) that currently only caters to US residents. Depending on the type of account you sign up for, you have to pay an annual fee (starting from $34.95) as well as transaction fees of 3.5% + $0.35 USD. However, to accept cards like American Express and Discover, you have to use their more expensive plans.
RegNow: Designed for software authors to sell their ware, this merchant charges a one-time activation fee of $19.95 USD plus a transaction fee of 6.9% plus $1 USD per unit for their commission (minimum $2 USD charge). They also provide you with facilities that allows you to easily set up an affiliate program.
Trying It Out
Whichever you choose, if you are selling things on the Internet, you really have not much choice but to accept credit cards. You probably don't know what you missed until you try it out.
All the best in your business!
Copyright 2000-2008 by Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
Get more free tips and articles like this, on web design, promotion, revenue and scripting, from http://www.thesitewizard.com/
If you find this article useful, please consider making a donation.
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
Are you thinking of selling things on the web? If so, you will probably also be considering some way in which you can accept credit cards on your site. Since new webmasters who visit thesitewizard.com often ask me about how they can get started accepting payments in this form, this article provides some basic information on adding credit card payment facilities to your website.
Why Do It?
Credit card payments allow you to take advantage of the following types of customers:
1. Impulse buyers. After reading your advertisements and hype on your site, buyers would be all fired up about your product. If they have a means of making a purchase immediately, you've secured that sale. If you only allow cheque payments, the additional time it takes for them to get their cheque book and mail out the cheque may be a deterrence. They may also have second thoughts later.
2. International customers. Credit card payment is a tremendous convenience if your customers are overseas. It automatically takes care of the problems of currency differences as well as the time it takes for a cheque to travel to the vendor. You will lose a large number of overseas customers if cheque payment is the only way you can accept payment.
Methods of Accepting Credit Card Payments
There are actually two ways in which you can accept credit cards on your site.
1. Using Your Own Merchant Account. To do this, you will need a bank that will allow you to open a merchant account. Requirements for this will vary from country to country, and you should check with your local banks for more information on this.
2. Through a Third Party Merchant. There are numerous companies around that are willing to accept credit cards payments on your behalf in exchange for various fees and percentages.
Which Method Should You Use?
The initial costs of opening your own merchant account is usually higher than when you use a third party merchant. Indeed, some third party merchants have no setup fee at all.
However, the transaction fee (which is what you pay the bank or third party merchant for each sale) is much higher when you use a third party as compared to when using your own merchant account.
A third party merchant is usually convenient to use when you don't know if you can actually make much out of your product or service. If you just want to test the water to see how things are, this is usually a good way to start. It is also convenient in that the merchant takes care of everything for you. You just get a cheque at the end of each payment period (if you have earned enough) and concentrate on your products, services and customers.
Having your own merchant account accords your business with a certain amount of professionalism. And, as mentioned earlier, your transaction costs are usually much lower. However you have to be careful to minimize your credit card risks since you'll be processing the credit card payments yourself. This is not to say that there are no risks attendant in using a third party merchant.
Some Third Party Merchants
Here's a list of some third party merchants that you might want to consider if you're looking for ways to accept credit card payments. Except for PayPal, I have not tried any of them myself (as a vendor) so I cannot vouch for any of them. Check them out carefully and use them at your own risk.
Note that rates and stuff that I publish below were correct at the time I investigated these vendors. It may have changed by the time you read this since the merchants tend to modify their rates from time to time according to market conditions. Make sure that you check the current (up-to-date) details from their site before making any decision.
The list is arranged alphabetically.
CCBill: There are no setup fees. Transaction fees vary (I can't find the schedule though) depending on the volume of sales in each accounting period. According to their website, "these fees are never more than 13.5% of revenues charged during this one-week period for CWIE hosting clients and 14.5% for non-hosting clients".
CCNow: This is only for people who ship tangible, physical products. There is no setup fee, and they charge 9% per transaction except in the November and December where the fees are 8% per transaction (yes, lower).
Clickbank: There is a one time setup fee (US$49.95) and a transaction fee of US$1 plus 7.5% of sale price. There are no other monthly fees. This is only for people who sell services or deliver products over the internet (not for those who need to ship physical products).
Kagi: Kagi's fees seem to vary according to the order size, type of item sold and the type of payment (credit card, cash, money order) used by your customer.
PayPal: This well-known service allows you to set up a Premier or Business account (you can't receive credit card payments using a Personal account). The charges range between 1.9% + $0.30 USD to 2.9% + $0.30 USD for each transaction if you are in the US. Non-US users are charged different amounts according to the country. From experience, I find this service easy and fast to setup.
PayPoint This UK service provides either a payment gateway or a complete solution. For those who don't have a merchant account, their "Fast Track" plan (as well as their "Bank Enterprise" plan) lets you set up an online shop with just your own website. The rates does not appear to be published on their site, but you can request a quote tailored to your situation or ask them to call you back (there are buttons for this in the rightmost column of their main page).
ProPay: A new competitor to PayPal (see elsewhere on this page) that currently only caters to US residents. Depending on the type of account you sign up for, you have to pay an annual fee (starting from $34.95) as well as transaction fees of 3.5% + $0.35 USD. However, to accept cards like American Express and Discover, you have to use their more expensive plans.
RegNow: Designed for software authors to sell their ware, this merchant charges a one-time activation fee of $19.95 USD plus a transaction fee of 6.9% plus $1 USD per unit for their commission (minimum $2 USD charge). They also provide you with facilities that allows you to easily set up an affiliate program.
Trying It Out
Whichever you choose, if you are selling things on the Internet, you really have not much choice but to accept credit cards. You probably don't know what you missed until you try it out.
All the best in your business!
Copyright 2000-2008 by Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
Get more free tips and articles like this, on web design, promotion, revenue and scripting, from http://www.thesitewizard.com/
If you find this article useful, please consider making a donation.
earn
How to Make Money From Your Website
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
Now that you've created a website, how do you make money from it? There are at least two ways in which sites can make money:
1. Advertising Revenue
2. Selling Goods and Services
I shall deal with the second case, "Selling goods and services", in another article. In this article, I will address the issue of how your site can actually make money from advertising.
Making Money From Advertising
If you look at many websites, you will probably notice that there are banner advertisements displayed on most pages. If you are a newcomer to the scene, you might think that you must either be a company or that your site must be famous before you can get advertisers, just as it is the case in hardcopy publications.
In reality, anyone with a website can get advertisers. While it is true that if your site is well-known, you may get companies contacting you to offer to advertise on your site, you can get advertising revenue even if you are just starting out and your site is relatively unknown.
The way to do this is to join as an "affiliate" of various sites, either directly, or through an affiliate network. An affiliate network is simply an intermediary where you can select from a variety of advertisers.
Payment Schemes
Before joining any program, you should probably be aware of the different payment schemes available.
1.Pay Per Impression (CPM)
Here, you are paid according to the number of times the advertiser's banner is displayed on your site. The amount you earn is typically calculated based on the number of thousand impressions of the banner (impressions = number of times the banner is displayed), often abbreviated CPM (cost per thousand, with the M being the Latin numeral for thousand). That is, $5 CPM means that you get paid $5 for 1,000 displays of the banner. In general, the amount paid is usually small, but it is easy to earn since everytime a visitor loads the page, you earn. This is known as a "high conversion rate". Needless to say, this method will allow you to automatically earn more if your site attracts a lot of visitors.
2.Pay Per Click (PPC)
When you are paid per click, you are only paid when visitors click the advertiser's banner on your site. The amount paid is usually higher than the pay per impression scheme. Whether you get a high conversion rate here depends on the banner (whether it attracts people to click it), although in general, it has a higher conversion rate than the pay per sale method. A high traffic site will probably enjoy a higher click rate than a lower traffic site, although you will probably get better results if your banners are carefully selected to suit the target audience of your site.
3.Pay Per Sale or Lead
While you will probably get the highest payment rates with this method, it has the lowest conversion rate of the three schemes. You will only earn if your visitors click through the banner and either purchase an item from the advertiser or take some other prescribed action (eg, sign up for a service). Like the Pay Per Click method, you get much better results if you carefully select your advertisers to suit the target audience of your site.
In general, to avoid wasting resources in issuing cheques for very small amounts, advertisers will usually accrue the amount owing to you until it reaches a certain level (such as $25) before they pay you.
Where to Find Affiliate Programs
You can find a list of affiliate programs and affiliate networks on thefreecountry.com's Affiliate Program page at http://www.thefreecountry.com/webmaster/affiliate.shtml
To join an affiliate network or program, simply go to the site and complete their online application form. Some programs will give you instant approval while others require a human to check out your application before it is approved. Once it is approved, you'll be given some HTML code which you can cut and paste into your web page. Note that some affiliate networks and programs will not accept you unless you have your own domain name. If you are planning to earn from your site, you should seriously consider registering your own domain name.
How To Choose An Affiliate Program
How should you choose an affiliate program? My suggestion is not to choose a program according to the payment scheme, but rather according to the kind of people who are likely to visit your website. For example, if you are targeting parents on your site, links to affiliates with educational software, books and the like may generate more revenue than banners that link to web hosting companies. The most important rule of choosing an affiliate program is to know your target audience.
Another point to consider is whether you really want to join every single affiliate program that comes your way. Some studies suggest that sites that make the most money from affiliate programs are affiliates of only a small handful of programs. Furthermore, concentrating your advertisements from one network may allow you to be paid faster. If you advertise for hundreds of different affiliate networks on your site, you may wind up earning only (say) a few dollars per month from each network. If your advertiser's minimum payment amount is higher than what you can earn each month, it may take you a long time before you accrue enough to be paid.
On the other hand, that formula does not necessarily hold true for every site (or every page on your site, for that matter). For example, if your site has a particular theme, and an affiliate network only supports one or two suitable advertisers, you might want to sign up for a few affiliate networks so as to get a greater number of relevant advertisers. After all, advertisements that are relevant to your audience are more likely to be taken up than general advertisements. (What's the point of putting banners from only one affiliate if nobody is going to click them?)
Automated Context-Sensitive Advertising
One of the latest trends in website sponsorship is to sign up with an advertising network like Google AdSense The advertising network automatically checks your web page and determines the most relevant advertisement for the page. As a result, without much additional effort from you, you get advertisements targeted at the interests of your visitors. As mentioned earlier, targeted ads tend to result in better performance and returns.
Get Started
Advertising revenue is one of the most effortless way to earn money from your site. You merely have to put the banner there and wait for the money to roll in. (Well, okay, not quite. You will still need to have some visitors first before you can make anything.)
Why wait? If you already have a website, let it earn even while you sleep (literally). Every day you let your site "idle" without advertising is a day of lost opportunity.
All the best in your endeavour! Remember also to check out our other article, Increasing Your Affiliate Program Income, for more tips on earning from your website: http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/moremoney.shtml
Copyright 2000-2007 by Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
Get more free tips and articles like this, on web design, promotion, revenue and scripting, from http://www.thesitewizard.com/
If you find this article useful, please consider making a donation.
You are here: Top > Website Revenue: Earning Money from Your Site > How to Make Money From Your Website
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Please Do Not Reprint This Article
This article is copyrighted. Please do not reproduce this article in whole or part, in any form, without obtaining my written permission.
Related Pages
* How to Collect Credit Card Payments from Your Website
* Is Your Website Design Driving Away Your Customers? Some Basic Usability Tips for Commercial Websites
* How to Choose a Good Web Host
* Step by Step Guide to Getting Your Own Domain Name
* Which Web Host Do You Recommend? (FAQ)
* The Beginner's A-Z Guide to Starting/Creating Your Own Website
* Free Customized Feedback Form (PHP / Perl Script) (Wizard)
* How to Create a Search Engine Friendly Website
New Pages
* Why Access Keys Are Mostly Useless for Accessibility Purposes
* How to Create a Website with Dreamweaver CS4 (Dreamweaver Tutorial)
* How to Install Apache 2.2 on Windows Vista
* How to Uninstall the KompoZer Web Editor from Your Windows Computer
* How to Create a Rectangular Box to Contain Your Text/Pictures with CSS
* Why Don't You Use the Keywords Meta Tag on Your Website?
* How to Add a Background Image to Your Web Page in KompoZer and Nvu
* What is HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP and Perl? Do I Need to Learn Them to Create a Website?
* How Much Does It Cost to Set Up a Website?
* How to Design a Two Column Layout for Your Website Using CSS
Popular Pages
* How to Start / Create Your Own Website: The Beginner's A-Z Guide
* Tips on Choosing a Good Domain Name
* How to Create a Search Engine Friendly Website
* How to Create a Website with Dreamweaver CS4 (Dreamweaver Tutorial)
* How to Design and Publish Your Website with KompoZer (free WYSIWYG web editor)
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
Now that you've created a website, how do you make money from it? There are at least two ways in which sites can make money:
1. Advertising Revenue
2. Selling Goods and Services
I shall deal with the second case, "Selling goods and services", in another article. In this article, I will address the issue of how your site can actually make money from advertising.
Making Money From Advertising
If you look at many websites, you will probably notice that there are banner advertisements displayed on most pages. If you are a newcomer to the scene, you might think that you must either be a company or that your site must be famous before you can get advertisers, just as it is the case in hardcopy publications.
In reality, anyone with a website can get advertisers. While it is true that if your site is well-known, you may get companies contacting you to offer to advertise on your site, you can get advertising revenue even if you are just starting out and your site is relatively unknown.
The way to do this is to join as an "affiliate" of various sites, either directly, or through an affiliate network. An affiliate network is simply an intermediary where you can select from a variety of advertisers.
Payment Schemes
Before joining any program, you should probably be aware of the different payment schemes available.
1.Pay Per Impression (CPM)
Here, you are paid according to the number of times the advertiser's banner is displayed on your site. The amount you earn is typically calculated based on the number of thousand impressions of the banner (impressions = number of times the banner is displayed), often abbreviated CPM (cost per thousand, with the M being the Latin numeral for thousand). That is, $5 CPM means that you get paid $5 for 1,000 displays of the banner. In general, the amount paid is usually small, but it is easy to earn since everytime a visitor loads the page, you earn. This is known as a "high conversion rate". Needless to say, this method will allow you to automatically earn more if your site attracts a lot of visitors.
2.Pay Per Click (PPC)
When you are paid per click, you are only paid when visitors click the advertiser's banner on your site. The amount paid is usually higher than the pay per impression scheme. Whether you get a high conversion rate here depends on the banner (whether it attracts people to click it), although in general, it has a higher conversion rate than the pay per sale method. A high traffic site will probably enjoy a higher click rate than a lower traffic site, although you will probably get better results if your banners are carefully selected to suit the target audience of your site.
3.Pay Per Sale or Lead
While you will probably get the highest payment rates with this method, it has the lowest conversion rate of the three schemes. You will only earn if your visitors click through the banner and either purchase an item from the advertiser or take some other prescribed action (eg, sign up for a service). Like the Pay Per Click method, you get much better results if you carefully select your advertisers to suit the target audience of your site.
In general, to avoid wasting resources in issuing cheques for very small amounts, advertisers will usually accrue the amount owing to you until it reaches a certain level (such as $25) before they pay you.
Where to Find Affiliate Programs
You can find a list of affiliate programs and affiliate networks on thefreecountry.com's Affiliate Program page at http://www.thefreecountry.com/webmaster/affiliate.shtml
To join an affiliate network or program, simply go to the site and complete their online application form. Some programs will give you instant approval while others require a human to check out your application before it is approved. Once it is approved, you'll be given some HTML code which you can cut and paste into your web page. Note that some affiliate networks and programs will not accept you unless you have your own domain name. If you are planning to earn from your site, you should seriously consider registering your own domain name.
How To Choose An Affiliate Program
How should you choose an affiliate program? My suggestion is not to choose a program according to the payment scheme, but rather according to the kind of people who are likely to visit your website. For example, if you are targeting parents on your site, links to affiliates with educational software, books and the like may generate more revenue than banners that link to web hosting companies. The most important rule of choosing an affiliate program is to know your target audience.
Another point to consider is whether you really want to join every single affiliate program that comes your way. Some studies suggest that sites that make the most money from affiliate programs are affiliates of only a small handful of programs. Furthermore, concentrating your advertisements from one network may allow you to be paid faster. If you advertise for hundreds of different affiliate networks on your site, you may wind up earning only (say) a few dollars per month from each network. If your advertiser's minimum payment amount is higher than what you can earn each month, it may take you a long time before you accrue enough to be paid.
On the other hand, that formula does not necessarily hold true for every site (or every page on your site, for that matter). For example, if your site has a particular theme, and an affiliate network only supports one or two suitable advertisers, you might want to sign up for a few affiliate networks so as to get a greater number of relevant advertisers. After all, advertisements that are relevant to your audience are more likely to be taken up than general advertisements. (What's the point of putting banners from only one affiliate if nobody is going to click them?)
Automated Context-Sensitive Advertising
One of the latest trends in website sponsorship is to sign up with an advertising network like Google AdSense The advertising network automatically checks your web page and determines the most relevant advertisement for the page. As a result, without much additional effort from you, you get advertisements targeted at the interests of your visitors. As mentioned earlier, targeted ads tend to result in better performance and returns.
Get Started
Advertising revenue is one of the most effortless way to earn money from your site. You merely have to put the banner there and wait for the money to roll in. (Well, okay, not quite. You will still need to have some visitors first before you can make anything.)
Why wait? If you already have a website, let it earn even while you sleep (literally). Every day you let your site "idle" without advertising is a day of lost opportunity.
All the best in your endeavour! Remember also to check out our other article, Increasing Your Affiliate Program Income, for more tips on earning from your website: http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/moremoney.shtml
Copyright 2000-2007 by Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
Get more free tips and articles like this, on web design, promotion, revenue and scripting, from http://www.thesitewizard.com/
If you find this article useful, please consider making a donation.
You are here: Top > Website Revenue: Earning Money from Your Site > How to Make Money From Your Website
thesitewizard™ News Feed (RSS Site Feed) Subscribe to thesitewizard.com newsfeed
Do you find this article useful? You can learn of new articles and scripts that are published on thesitewizard.com by subscribing to the RSS feed. Simply point your RSS feed reader or a browser that supports RSS feeds at http://www.thesitewizard.com/thesitewizard.xml. You can read more about how to subscribe to RSS site feeds from my RSS FAQ.
Please Do Not Reprint This Article
This article is copyrighted. Please do not reproduce this article in whole or part, in any form, without obtaining my written permission.
Related Pages
* How to Collect Credit Card Payments from Your Website
* Is Your Website Design Driving Away Your Customers? Some Basic Usability Tips for Commercial Websites
* How to Choose a Good Web Host
* Step by Step Guide to Getting Your Own Domain Name
* Which Web Host Do You Recommend? (FAQ)
* The Beginner's A-Z Guide to Starting/Creating Your Own Website
* Free Customized Feedback Form (PHP / Perl Script) (Wizard)
* How to Create a Search Engine Friendly Website
New Pages
* Why Access Keys Are Mostly Useless for Accessibility Purposes
* How to Create a Website with Dreamweaver CS4 (Dreamweaver Tutorial)
* How to Install Apache 2.2 on Windows Vista
* How to Uninstall the KompoZer Web Editor from Your Windows Computer
* How to Create a Rectangular Box to Contain Your Text/Pictures with CSS
* Why Don't You Use the Keywords Meta Tag on Your Website?
* How to Add a Background Image to Your Web Page in KompoZer and Nvu
* What is HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP and Perl? Do I Need to Learn Them to Create a Website?
* How Much Does It Cost to Set Up a Website?
* How to Design a Two Column Layout for Your Website Using CSS
Popular Pages
* How to Start / Create Your Own Website: The Beginner's A-Z Guide
* Tips on Choosing a Good Domain Name
* How to Create a Search Engine Friendly Website
* How to Create a Website with Dreamweaver CS4 (Dreamweaver Tutorial)
* How to Design and Publish Your Website with KompoZer (free WYSIWYG web editor)
How to Make Money From Your Website
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
Now that you've created a website, how do you make money from it? There are at least two ways in which sites can make money:
1. Advertising Revenue
2. Selling Goods and Services
I shall deal with the second case, "Selling goods and services", in another article. In this article, I will address the issue of how your site can actually make money from advertising.
Making Money From Advertising
If you look at many websites, you will probably notice that there are banner advertisements displayed on most pages. If you are a newcomer to the scene, you might think that you must either be a company or that your site must be famous before you can get advertisers, just as it is the case in hardcopy publications.
In reality, anyone with a website can get advertisers. While it is true that if your site is well-known, you may get companies contacting you to offer to advertise on your site, you can get advertising revenue even if you are just starting out and your site is relatively unknown.
The way to do this is to join as an "affiliate" of various sites, either directly, or through an affiliate network. An affiliate network is simply an intermediary where you can select from a variety of advertisers.
Payment Schemes
Before joining any program, you should probably be aware of the different payment schemes available.
1.Pay Per Impression (CPM)
Here, you are paid according to the number of times the advertiser's banner is displayed on your site. The amount you earn is typically calculated based on the number of thousand impressions of the banner (impressions = number of times the banner is displayed), often abbreviated CPM (cost per thousand, with the M being the Latin numeral for thousand). That is, $5 CPM means that you get paid $5 for 1,000 displays of the banner. In general, the amount paid is usually small, but it is easy to earn since everytime a visitor loads the page, you earn. This is known as a "high conversion rate". Needless to say, this method will allow you to automatically earn more if your site attracts a lot of visitors.
2.Pay Per Click (PPC)
When you are paid per click, you are only paid when visitors click the advertiser's banner on your site. The amount paid is usually higher than the pay per impression scheme. Whether you get a high conversion rate here depends on the banner (whether it attracts people to click it), although in general, it has a higher conversion rate than the pay per sale method. A high traffic site will probably enjoy a higher click rate than a lower traffic site, although you will probably get better results if your banners are carefully selected to suit the target audience of your site.
3.Pay Per Sale or Lead
While you will probably get the highest payment rates with this method, it has the lowest conversion rate of the three schemes. You will only earn if your visitors click through the banner and either purchase an item from the advertiser or take some other prescribed action (eg, sign up for a service). Like the Pay Per Click method, you get much better results if you carefully select your advertisers to suit the target audience of your site.
In general, to avoid wasting resources in issuing cheques for very small amounts, advertisers will usually accrue the amount owing to you until it reaches a certain level (such as $25) before they pay you.
Where to Find Affiliate Programs
You can find a list of affiliate programs and affiliate networks on thefreecountry.com's Affiliate Program page at http://www.thefreecountry.com/webmaster/affiliate.shtml
To join an affiliate network or program, simply go to the site and complete their online application form. Some programs will give you instant approval while others require a human to check out your application before it is approved. Once it is approved, you'll be given some HTML code which you can cut and paste into your web page. Note that some affiliate networks and programs will not accept you unless you have your own domain name. If you are planning to earn from your site, you should seriously consider registering your own domain name.
How To Choose An Affiliate Program
How should you choose an affiliate program? My suggestion is not to choose a program according to the payment scheme, but rather according to the kind of people who are likely to visit your website. For example, if you are targeting parents on your site, links to affiliates with educational software, books and the like may generate more revenue than banners that link to web hosting companies. The most important rule of choosing an affiliate program is to know your target audience.
Another point to consider is whether you really want to join every single affiliate program that comes your way. Some studies suggest that sites that make the most money from affiliate programs are affiliates of only a small handful of programs. Furthermore, concentrating your advertisements from one network may allow you to be paid faster. If you advertise for hundreds of different affiliate networks on your site, you may wind up earning only (say) a few dollars per month from each network. If your advertiser's minimum payment amount is higher than what you can earn each month, it may take you a long time before you accrue enough to be paid.
On the other hand, that formula does not necessarily hold true for every site (or every page on your site, for that matter). For example, if your site has a particular theme, and an affiliate network only supports one or two suitable advertisers, you might want to sign up for a few affiliate networks so as to get a greater number of relevant advertisers. After all, advertisements that are relevant to your audience are more likely to be taken up than general advertisements. (What's the point of putting banners from only one affiliate if nobody is going to click them?)
Automated Context-Sensitive Advertising
One of the latest trends in website sponsorship is to sign up with an advertising network like Google AdSense The advertising network automatically checks your web page and determines the most relevant advertisement for the page. As a result, without much additional effort from you, you get advertisements targeted at the interests of your visitors. As mentioned earlier, targeted ads tend to result in better performance and returns.
Get Started
Advertising revenue is one of the most effortless way to earn money from your site. You merely have to put the banner there and wait for the money to roll in. (Well, okay, not quite. You will still need to have some visitors first before you can make anything.)
Why wait? If you already have a website, let it earn even while you sleep (literally). Every day you let your site "idle" without advertising is a day of lost opportunity.
All the best in your endeavour! Remember also to check out our other article, Increasing Your Affiliate Program Income, for more tips on earning from your website: http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/moremoney.shtml
Copyright 2000-2007 by Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
Get more free tips and articles like this, on web design, promotion, revenue and scripting, from http://www.thesitewizard.com/
If you find this article useful, please consider making a donation.
You are here: Top > Website Revenue: Earning Money from Your Site > How to Make Money From Your Website
thesitewizard™ News Feed (RSS Site Feed) Subscribe to thesitewizard.com newsfeed
Do you find this article useful? You can learn of new articles and scripts that are published on thesitewizard.com by subscribing to the RSS feed. Simply point your RSS feed reader or a browser that supports RSS feeds at http://www.thesitewizard.com/thesitewizard.xml. You can read more about how to subscribe to RSS site feeds from my RSS FAQ.
Please Do Not Reprint This Article
This article is copyrighted. Please do not reproduce this article in whole or part, in any form, without obtaining my written permission.
Related Pages
* How to Collect Credit Card Payments from Your Website
* Is Your Website Design Driving Away Your Customers? Some Basic Usability Tips for Commercial Websites
* How to Choose a Good Web Host
* Step by Step Guide to Getting Your Own Domain Name
* Which Web Host Do You Recommend? (FAQ)
* The Beginner's A-Z Guide to Starting/Creating Your Own Website
* Free Customized Feedback Form (PHP / Perl Script) (Wizard)
* How to Create a Search Engine Friendly Website
New Pages
* Why Access Keys Are Mostly Useless for Accessibility Purposes
* How to Create a Website with Dreamweaver CS4 (Dreamweaver Tutorial)
* How to Install Apache 2.2 on Windows Vista
* How to Uninstall the KompoZer Web Editor from Your Windows Computer
* How to Create a Rectangular Box to Contain Your Text/Pictures with CSS
* Why Don't You Use the Keywords Meta Tag on Your Website?
* How to Add a Background Image to Your Web Page in KompoZer and Nvu
* What is HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP and Perl? Do I Need to Learn Them to Create a Website?
* How Much Does It Cost to Set Up a Website?
* How to Design a Two Column Layout for Your Website Using CSS
Popular Pages
* How to Start / Create Your Own Website: The Beginner's A-Z Guide
* Tips on Choosing a Good Domain Name
* How to Create a Search Engine Friendly Website
* How to Create a Website with Dreamweaver CS4 (Dreamweaver Tutorial)
* How to Design and Publish Your Website with KompoZer (free WYSIWYG web editor)
by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com
Now that you've created a website, how do you make money from it? There are at least two ways in which sites can make money:
1. Advertising Revenue
2. Selling Goods and Services
I shall deal with the second case, "Selling goods and services", in another article. In this article, I will address the issue of how your site can actually make money from advertising.
Making Money From Advertising
If you look at many websites, you will probably notice that there are banner advertisements displayed on most pages. If you are a newcomer to the scene, you might think that you must either be a company or that your site must be famous before you can get advertisers, just as it is the case in hardcopy publications.
In reality, anyone with a website can get advertisers. While it is true that if your site is well-known, you may get companies contacting you to offer to advertise on your site, you can get advertising revenue even if you are just starting out and your site is relatively unknown.
The way to do this is to join as an "affiliate" of various sites, either directly, or through an affiliate network. An affiliate network is simply an intermediary where you can select from a variety of advertisers.
Payment Schemes
Before joining any program, you should probably be aware of the different payment schemes available.
1.Pay Per Impression (CPM)
Here, you are paid according to the number of times the advertiser's banner is displayed on your site. The amount you earn is typically calculated based on the number of thousand impressions of the banner (impressions = number of times the banner is displayed), often abbreviated CPM (cost per thousand, with the M being the Latin numeral for thousand). That is, $5 CPM means that you get paid $5 for 1,000 displays of the banner. In general, the amount paid is usually small, but it is easy to earn since everytime a visitor loads the page, you earn. This is known as a "high conversion rate". Needless to say, this method will allow you to automatically earn more if your site attracts a lot of visitors.
2.Pay Per Click (PPC)
When you are paid per click, you are only paid when visitors click the advertiser's banner on your site. The amount paid is usually higher than the pay per impression scheme. Whether you get a high conversion rate here depends on the banner (whether it attracts people to click it), although in general, it has a higher conversion rate than the pay per sale method. A high traffic site will probably enjoy a higher click rate than a lower traffic site, although you will probably get better results if your banners are carefully selected to suit the target audience of your site.
3.Pay Per Sale or Lead
While you will probably get the highest payment rates with this method, it has the lowest conversion rate of the three schemes. You will only earn if your visitors click through the banner and either purchase an item from the advertiser or take some other prescribed action (eg, sign up for a service). Like the Pay Per Click method, you get much better results if you carefully select your advertisers to suit the target audience of your site.
In general, to avoid wasting resources in issuing cheques for very small amounts, advertisers will usually accrue the amount owing to you until it reaches a certain level (such as $25) before they pay you.
Where to Find Affiliate Programs
You can find a list of affiliate programs and affiliate networks on thefreecountry.com's Affiliate Program page at http://www.thefreecountry.com/webmaster/affiliate.shtml
To join an affiliate network or program, simply go to the site and complete their online application form. Some programs will give you instant approval while others require a human to check out your application before it is approved. Once it is approved, you'll be given some HTML code which you can cut and paste into your web page. Note that some affiliate networks and programs will not accept you unless you have your own domain name. If you are planning to earn from your site, you should seriously consider registering your own domain name.
How To Choose An Affiliate Program
How should you choose an affiliate program? My suggestion is not to choose a program according to the payment scheme, but rather according to the kind of people who are likely to visit your website. For example, if you are targeting parents on your site, links to affiliates with educational software, books and the like may generate more revenue than banners that link to web hosting companies. The most important rule of choosing an affiliate program is to know your target audience.
Another point to consider is whether you really want to join every single affiliate program that comes your way. Some studies suggest that sites that make the most money from affiliate programs are affiliates of only a small handful of programs. Furthermore, concentrating your advertisements from one network may allow you to be paid faster. If you advertise for hundreds of different affiliate networks on your site, you may wind up earning only (say) a few dollars per month from each network. If your advertiser's minimum payment amount is higher than what you can earn each month, it may take you a long time before you accrue enough to be paid.
On the other hand, that formula does not necessarily hold true for every site (or every page on your site, for that matter). For example, if your site has a particular theme, and an affiliate network only supports one or two suitable advertisers, you might want to sign up for a few affiliate networks so as to get a greater number of relevant advertisers. After all, advertisements that are relevant to your audience are more likely to be taken up than general advertisements. (What's the point of putting banners from only one affiliate if nobody is going to click them?)
Automated Context-Sensitive Advertising
One of the latest trends in website sponsorship is to sign up with an advertising network like Google AdSense The advertising network automatically checks your web page and determines the most relevant advertisement for the page. As a result, without much additional effort from you, you get advertisements targeted at the interests of your visitors. As mentioned earlier, targeted ads tend to result in better performance and returns.
Get Started
Advertising revenue is one of the most effortless way to earn money from your site. You merely have to put the banner there and wait for the money to roll in. (Well, okay, not quite. You will still need to have some visitors first before you can make anything.)
Why wait? If you already have a website, let it earn even while you sleep (literally). Every day you let your site "idle" without advertising is a day of lost opportunity.
All the best in your endeavour! Remember also to check out our other article, Increasing Your Affiliate Program Income, for more tips on earning from your website: http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/moremoney.shtml
Copyright 2000-2007 by Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
Get more free tips and articles like this, on web design, promotion, revenue and scripting, from http://www.thesitewizard.com/
If you find this article useful, please consider making a donation.
You are here: Top > Website Revenue: Earning Money from Your Site > How to Make Money From Your Website
thesitewizard™ News Feed (RSS Site Feed) Subscribe to thesitewizard.com newsfeed
Do you find this article useful? You can learn of new articles and scripts that are published on thesitewizard.com by subscribing to the RSS feed. Simply point your RSS feed reader or a browser that supports RSS feeds at http://www.thesitewizard.com/thesitewizard.xml. You can read more about how to subscribe to RSS site feeds from my RSS FAQ.
Please Do Not Reprint This Article
This article is copyrighted. Please do not reproduce this article in whole or part, in any form, without obtaining my written permission.
Related Pages
* How to Collect Credit Card Payments from Your Website
* Is Your Website Design Driving Away Your Customers? Some Basic Usability Tips for Commercial Websites
* How to Choose a Good Web Host
* Step by Step Guide to Getting Your Own Domain Name
* Which Web Host Do You Recommend? (FAQ)
* The Beginner's A-Z Guide to Starting/Creating Your Own Website
* Free Customized Feedback Form (PHP / Perl Script) (Wizard)
* How to Create a Search Engine Friendly Website
New Pages
* Why Access Keys Are Mostly Useless for Accessibility Purposes
* How to Create a Website with Dreamweaver CS4 (Dreamweaver Tutorial)
* How to Install Apache 2.2 on Windows Vista
* How to Uninstall the KompoZer Web Editor from Your Windows Computer
* How to Create a Rectangular Box to Contain Your Text/Pictures with CSS
* Why Don't You Use the Keywords Meta Tag on Your Website?
* How to Add a Background Image to Your Web Page in KompoZer and Nvu
* What is HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP and Perl? Do I Need to Learn Them to Create a Website?
* How Much Does It Cost to Set Up a Website?
* How to Design a Two Column Layout for Your Website Using CSS
Popular Pages
* How to Start / Create Your Own Website: The Beginner's A-Z Guide
* Tips on Choosing a Good Domain Name
* How to Create a Search Engine Friendly Website
* How to Create a Website with Dreamweaver CS4 (Dreamweaver Tutorial)
* How to Design and Publish Your Website with KompoZer (free WYSIWYG web editor)
some freebyte pages
Online Business Services &
Free Financial Software E-commerce services, virtual cash systems, payment processing services, check printing, business-to-business portals, online stock trading, currency converters, free accounting software, etc.
Win Prizes Win prizes through free online sweepstakes without spending any money!
Free Business
and Office Software Free office suites, word processors, text editors, personal databases, currency converters, accounting software, calculators, document viewers, PDF utilities, etc.
Free Website Promotion Get more visitors. Free Website submission services and software, free mailing list services, free banner exchange services, web promotion tips and tutorials, search engine tips, online marketing tools, free advertising, free resources for Webmasters.
Free Home pages Publish your own Web pages for free! Find the best service to host your home page. Create your Web page without any knowledge of HTML. Free services which enable you to run your own CGI scripts (PHP, ASP, Perl, etc.).
Free Email Addresses A large listing of services that provide free but also non-free email addresses. Web based email, email forwarding, pop email, etc. Also: add email services to your domain.
Free Website Tools Free Website tools: Web counters, Web statistics, polls to put on your site, guest books to put on your site, URL forwarding services, site search engines, HTML editors, HTML and link validation tools, tutorials, resources, etc.
Free images, icons,
clipart, backgrounds,
photos Download images and clipart for free, royalty-free stock photographs, thousands of free fonts, free icons, free GIFs, animated GIFs, free backgrounds, wallpapers, etc.
Free Internet Programs Free programs to surf the Web, free email software, email virus protection, free newsgroup programs, free Internet chat, telephony and messaging applications, free telnet software, free firewalls, etc.
Free Computers Free used and recycled computers, mostly for schools, non-profit organisations and disadvantaged individuals.
Also check out these freeware programs!
TreePad Lite
Free organizer/information manager
exe-eBook Creator
Free eBook compiler
Freebyte
Backup Free backup program
Fast File Renamer
Free multiple file renaming tool
Custom Addressbook Lite Free addressbook
Disktective
Free Disk-space reporting tool
Harddisk Search and Stats
Free search engine for your harddisk
Freebyte ZIP
Free zip/unzip program
Free Financial Software E-commerce services, virtual cash systems, payment processing services, check printing, business-to-business portals, online stock trading, currency converters, free accounting software, etc.
Win Prizes Win prizes through free online sweepstakes without spending any money!
Free Business
and Office Software Free office suites, word processors, text editors, personal databases, currency converters, accounting software, calculators, document viewers, PDF utilities, etc.
Free Website Promotion Get more visitors. Free Website submission services and software, free mailing list services, free banner exchange services, web promotion tips and tutorials, search engine tips, online marketing tools, free advertising, free resources for Webmasters.
Free Home pages Publish your own Web pages for free! Find the best service to host your home page. Create your Web page without any knowledge of HTML. Free services which enable you to run your own CGI scripts (PHP, ASP, Perl, etc.).
Free Email Addresses A large listing of services that provide free but also non-free email addresses. Web based email, email forwarding, pop email, etc. Also: add email services to your domain.
Free Website Tools Free Website tools: Web counters, Web statistics, polls to put on your site, guest books to put on your site, URL forwarding services, site search engines, HTML editors, HTML and link validation tools, tutorials, resources, etc.
Free images, icons,
clipart, backgrounds,
photos Download images and clipart for free, royalty-free stock photographs, thousands of free fonts, free icons, free GIFs, animated GIFs, free backgrounds, wallpapers, etc.
Free Internet Programs Free programs to surf the Web, free email software, email virus protection, free newsgroup programs, free Internet chat, telephony and messaging applications, free telnet software, free firewalls, etc.
Free Computers Free used and recycled computers, mostly for schools, non-profit organisations and disadvantaged individuals.
Also check out these freeware programs!
TreePad Lite
Free organizer/information manager
exe-eBook Creator
Free eBook compiler
Freebyte
Backup Free backup program
Fast File Renamer
Free multiple file renaming tool
Custom Addressbook Lite Free addressbook
Disktective
Free Disk-space reporting tool
Harddisk Search and Stats
Free search engine for your harddisk
Freebyte ZIP
Free zip/unzip program
Through inline surveys
American Consumer
Opinion Get paid for sharing your opinions and ideas in online surveys. Win money in monthly drawings just for being a member. Win money in drawings when you fill out a a short questionnaire. Earn cash each time you complete a survey (a longer questionnaire).
GlobalTestMarket.com
Earn cash by filling out surveys and referring friends.
goZing surveys In return for participating in online and/or telephone surveys, you receive Amazon.com gift certificates or PayPal cash.
I-SpeakUp.com
$50 for filling out 25-minute surveys, $150 for participating in focus group panels for 30 to 60 minutes, earn free trips, free diners, get freebies given to you with each survey completed.
Online-Paid-Surveys.net
A free site where users can share experiences and learn about online paid survey opportunities. The site includes a user blog, polls, a user review section, and editorial reviews on legitimate paid market research opportunities.
Opinion Outpost Opinion Outpost is an online community where people like you can come to share their opinions by participating in survey research. In return for your valued opinion, you can earn opinion points which can be exchanged for cash and prizes.
Pureprofile
Get paid for responding to messges and participating in surveys.
SurveySavvy.com
Earn cash by filling out surveys and referring friends.
YellowSurveys.com
Over 500 survey companies offering paid surveys in cash and prizes.
Read Mails or Surf the Web
BountyCenter
Get paid to read emails, click on banners and refer friends.
Hits 4 Pay
Get paid to read emails, click on banners and refer friends.
E-Mail Paus U
Get paid to read email and for visiting Websites.
Wow Earnings
Get paid to read emails, click on banners and refer friends.
TreePad X Enterprise
384 Gigabyte Personal Information Manager and Word Processor.
Intuitive and versatile, including Website Generator, spellchecker, thesaurus, attachments, search engine, recycle bin, and much more!
Click here to get the free evaluation version.
Opinion Get paid for sharing your opinions and ideas in online surveys. Win money in monthly drawings just for being a member. Win money in drawings when you fill out a a short questionnaire. Earn cash each time you complete a survey (a longer questionnaire).
GlobalTestMarket.com
Earn cash by filling out surveys and referring friends.
goZing surveys In return for participating in online and/or telephone surveys, you receive Amazon.com gift certificates or PayPal cash.
I-SpeakUp.com
$50 for filling out 25-minute surveys, $150 for participating in focus group panels for 30 to 60 minutes, earn free trips, free diners, get freebies given to you with each survey completed.
Online-Paid-Surveys.net
A free site where users can share experiences and learn about online paid survey opportunities. The site includes a user blog, polls, a user review section, and editorial reviews on legitimate paid market research opportunities.
Opinion Outpost Opinion Outpost is an online community where people like you can come to share their opinions by participating in survey research. In return for your valued opinion, you can earn opinion points which can be exchanged for cash and prizes.
Pureprofile
Get paid for responding to messges and participating in surveys.
SurveySavvy.com
Earn cash by filling out surveys and referring friends.
YellowSurveys.com
Over 500 survey companies offering paid surveys in cash and prizes.
Read Mails or Surf the Web
BountyCenter
Get paid to read emails, click on banners and refer friends.
Hits 4 Pay
Get paid to read emails, click on banners and refer friends.
E-Mail Paus U
Get paid to read email and for visiting Websites.
Wow Earnings
Get paid to read emails, click on banners and refer friends.
TreePad X Enterprise
384 Gigabyte Personal Information Manager and Word Processor.
Intuitive and versatile, including Website Generator, spellchecker, thesaurus, attachments, search engine, recycle bin, and much more!
Click here to get the free evaluation version.
Money earning tutorials and resources
Homepage Made Easy's
Guide to Affiliate marketing What's Affiliate Marketing? How do you turn your traffic into profit? Pay-per-Click vs. Pay-for-Performance? Pay-per-Click: the need for huge traffic? Pay-for-Performance Drives Results? How do large affiliate networks function? How / when do you get paid? Why is there a minimum amount policy? What if my revenue is below the minimum amount? How do you get a sponsor? A bit on rights & duties - How free are you? The right sponsor(s) for Your Web Site - a Hot tip!
Enhance your homepage
and make money! How to create a page that is: easy to make, beautiful, interesting, and profitable!
E.g. add images and content royalty free to your pages and make money with them!
Introduction to
Earning Money
on the Web Earn Money Opportunities, Affiliate Marketing - Info + Tips, Search for one or more Sponsors for Your Web Site, Guide to Find the right Sponsors for Your Web Site, Tips for Beginning Webmasters, have a Business or Commercial Web Site? Here's an Excellent Opportunity for You, other Profitable and/or Advantageous Opportunities Available to You on our Web Site.
Free Marketing Zone
Free marketing resources for Webmasters and online entepreneurs. Free articles, free sales letters, free web-scripts, free promotion tools, etc.
How to make money
from your Website Resource for affiliate program managers aspiring to develop a best of breed affiliate program: articles, news, gossip, tutorials, case studies, reviews, interviews, press clippings, consulting services, etc.
Affiliate Cash Money Tutorial on advertisement and promotion related to making money through affiliate programs; also has a directory of affilate programs,
Guide to Affiliate marketing What's Affiliate Marketing? How do you turn your traffic into profit? Pay-per-Click vs. Pay-for-Performance? Pay-per-Click: the need for huge traffic? Pay-for-Performance Drives Results? How do large affiliate networks function? How / when do you get paid? Why is there a minimum amount policy? What if my revenue is below the minimum amount? How do you get a sponsor? A bit on rights & duties - How free are you? The right sponsor(s) for Your Web Site - a Hot tip!
Enhance your homepage
and make money! How to create a page that is: easy to make, beautiful, interesting, and profitable!
E.g. add images and content royalty free to your pages and make money with them!
Introduction to
Earning Money
on the Web Earn Money Opportunities, Affiliate Marketing - Info + Tips, Search for one or more Sponsors for Your Web Site, Guide to Find the right Sponsors for Your Web Site, Tips for Beginning Webmasters, have a Business or Commercial Web Site? Here's an Excellent Opportunity for You, other Profitable and/or Advantageous Opportunities Available to You on our Web Site.
Free Marketing Zone
Free marketing resources for Webmasters and online entepreneurs. Free articles, free sales letters, free web-scripts, free promotion tools, etc.
How to make money
from your Website Resource for affiliate program managers aspiring to develop a best of breed affiliate program: articles, news, gossip, tutorials, case studies, reviews, interviews, press clippings, consulting services, etc.
Affiliate Cash Money Tutorial on advertisement and promotion related to making money through affiliate programs; also has a directory of affilate programs,
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