How to Create a Great Website

If you want your business to be a success you must have a website, otherwise you’re missing out on a huge audience.

However any old website won’t do – it must be a usable one. So with that in mind, here are some practical tips to get you started.

1. Don’t delay.

Don’t hang around: buy your domain name now if you haven’t already and put up a holding page to let people know you’re developing the site. Get the basic bones of the site up and running and then develop it as you go along. This way you’ll build an audience right from the very beginning.

2. Focus on appealing to your ideal customers.

Do you know who your customer is? All successful websites are built on this knowledge. Keep it simple and focus on providing them with exactly what they need. Know who you are aiming to connect with before you start building the site so you are heading in the right direction.

3. Invest in a web designer to create your website.

It might be tempting to do everything yourself, but expert designers are experts for a reason. They know how to appeal to your target audience and build the website so it is easy to navigate and use. You’ll also get a much better quality website in a shorter amount of time than it would take you to create one yourself.

4. Minimise your use of images.

Images and graphics do have a place on a website. However they shouldn’t dominate the text, because ultimately people will visit your website for information rather than images. Using too many of them can also lead to a much slower loading website, and that could send some people elsewhere when they want their information quickly.

5. Make sure the site works with all browsers and screen sizes.

If you hire a web designer they’ll do this for you – taking another headache out of your list of things to do. Your site might look great for someone using Firefox but it may not appear properly for someone using another browser. You want it to look its best at all times so people don’t give up and go elsewhere.

6. Make sure you are easy to get in touch with.

A key part of developing your website is to make sure all your contact details are included. It is incredible how many people forget to do this. Make sure the information is easy to access from all parts of the website too. If someone wants to get in touch but can’t find the required information, they’ll go elsewhere.

7. Entice people to come back by letting them know what’s coming in the near future.

This is another good way to pique people’s interest. Perhaps you have a new product or service coming soon. Promote it and get people to come back for a closer look in the near future. Announce a forthcoming blog post or a new web page focusing on a new area of your business for example.

8. Link to and from your website.

You don’t want to link to competitor’s sites, but you can link to sites that provide more information on your work or business. Furthermore it is a good idea to create quality links from other sites back to your own. This can be done through promoting your website as positively and consistently as you can.

9. Submit your website to web directories.

This is one of the best ways to get indexed in the search engines as quickly as you can. While the search engines will find your site eventually, you want them to know where you are without delay. The sooner your site can be found, the sooner you will start getting traffic. Don’t forget to contact web indexers either, to ensure the URL of your website is listed in all the right places.

10. Provide strong navigation and a good linking structure.

Have you ever found yourself on a website and lost track of where you are? If you have you’ll know how important good navigation is. Make sure you provide a good linking structure between pages. Again, this is something a good quality web designer can help you with. Ensure your visitors can always find their way back to the home page or to other parts of the website.

As you can see, there are a number of techniques you can use to make sure your website is strong, easy to navigate and welcoming to your visitors. The better your website is, the more likely it is people will come back and visit again and again.

How to disable the pop-up blocker in Chrome

When Google Chrome blocks a popups a small blue and white icon with a red “X”on is displayed in the far right side of the address bar.

If you click on this icon, you can see a list of the pop-ups blocked for that page. You can click on the items in this list to view them, and you can also select the box to “Always allow pop-ups” from the site you’re on (refresh for this change to take effect).

To disable the pop-up blocker entirely,

• Launch Chrome
• go to Tools > Options > Under the Hood > Content settings… > Pop-ups

This will entirely disable the popup blocker in Chrome

If you are having trouble uploading images to your Site Builder account, please ensure that the image you are uploading does not contain any spaces in its name and is in lowercase lettering, for example,

Bad image name.Jpg

goodimagename.jpg

Also the problem could be that your images are too large and have not been resized.

Nowadays, many people upload photos from their digital cameras. As these photos get larger in size, they also become heavier and heavier in file size. Some of these images can even be many megabytes in size.

Many new webmasters are not aware that these large images take quite a long time to download when they are placed on a website. It is a common mistake to simply upload these large files and then use your local web design tool to re-size an image to size it. Even though the image displays smaller, it does not change the file size of the source image.

Here is an example:

Link 1 (Loading Slow) - This is what it looks like when a large image is resized with HTML.

Link 2 (Loading Properly) - And this is what it looks like when the image is resized before being uploaded.

To fix this, you will need to resize your images in a graphics editor (ie. Photoshop Elements, MS Paint, Gimp) before you upload the image.

Here are some links to popular image editing software:

Download 1 - PIXresizer is a photo resizing program to easily create web and e-mail friendly versions of your images with reduced file sizes

Download 2 - GIMP is a free image manipulation tool that is little tougher to use, but has almost the same feature set as Photoshop

The Site Builder purchase is a annual fee, of course you are not forced to renew the service if you do not wish to do so. We will send out your renewal email prior to expiry of your services.

Your service will not auto-renew upon its due date, if you do not wish to renew, simply select the cancel option within the renewal email to stop further renewal reminders.

You will not lose time by renewing early, and so you may also select the renew now option to renew via a different card.

If you later choose to renew your account after it has expired, then the renewal will start from the date that renewal was actually due, not the date of renewal.

It is advised to renew your services prior to the day that your service expires, otherwise if for some reason you do not renew on that day then your service will be deleted the next day!

If you later decide that you wish to purchase the Site Builder again, then there is no way to import your current site back into the Site Builder.

Please ensure you always keep your email address up to date with us, otherwise you will not receive renewal reminders.

If you purchase a Site Builder account, then you will also need webspace as this is where the site that you create will reside.

Often only Budget Hosting is required when you have a Site Builder account.

If you have a Site Builder account with UK-Cheapest then your username will be of the following format,

sb*****

Replace ***** with your account/order number (not your invoice number)

Re: Cannot login to Site Builder, Sitebuiler login doesn’t work, No access to Sitebuilder

First, if you have just ordered your Site Builder account please allow up to 24 hours for your Site Builder account details to arrive. They will arrive AFTER your domain name registration and hosting settings email.

Be sure that you are using the correct login details. Your sitebuilder username should begin with sb, for example: sb123456. If you may have misplaced your password, try submitting a Forgotten Password Request.

To be able to access the Site Builder, your computer needs to be connected to the Internet. There are no other special requirements as far as the Hardware aspect is concerned.

IMPORTANT – Browser & Firewall Settings:

1. 1. Internet Zone Security settings: Should be set to Medium or lower
2. 2. Internet Privacy settings: Should be set to Medium-high or lower
3. 3. Enable Cookies

Try the following with Internet Explorer:

1. In Internet Explorer got to Tools / Internet Options / Security click “Trusted Sites”. Take the tick out of “Require server verification https://” box at the bottom then hit the “Sites” button. Add “sitebuilder.uk-cheapest.co.uk” to the list.
2. In Internet Explorer got to Tools / Internet Options / Privacy and set the level to “Low”
3. In Internet Explorer got to Tools / Internet Options / Privacy and click “Edit” at the bottom right. Type “sitebuilder.uk-cheapest.co.uk” and click “allow”. This should allow cookies for the Site Builder.

If you are still unable to access the Website Builder, then we recommend that you try again after you disable your Firewall settings.

Common problems caused by misconfigured security/firewall software:

• Cannot log in to Site Builder
• Cannot preview my site
• My site does not preview properly
• Cannot upload images properly
• Some Site Builder functions don’t work

Applications such as Norton Security / McAfee firewall are particularly problematic if not setup properly.

You may download the Site Builder User Guide manual from the left hand menu after logging in to your Site Builder Account.

If you have problems downloading the user guide then try downloading from the here:

Download: Site Builder User Guide

This copy may NOT be the latest copy so we recommend that yuo download the copy from within your Site Builder Control Panel as soon as possible.

Your original Site Builder Login email contains an Upgrade link, use this link to upgrade your Account.

Each Site Builder account is tied to a single domain name however there are absolutely no limitations as to how many different templates you can use with the domain name.

You can change your template as often as you wish with no additional cost.