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DOTCOMOLOGY AND PROFIT GLORY
DEFINING A USABLE SITE
Good Content is Critical,
Ease of Access to Information,
Quick Access to Information,
Cleanly Designed Pages,
Download Status And
Usability Problems
BUILDING INTERACTIVITY AND PERSONALIZATION
Graphics And Web Copy.
CHOOSING A DOMAIN NAME
Using Expired Domains to Skyrocket Your Traffic, The Host
TESTING AND PERFORMANCE
Functionality Testing, Content Proofing, Monitoring and
Tracking.
TRACKING YOUR SALES
Building Credibility and Maintaining it, Provide Contact Information, Offer a Guarantee
And Provide a Brief Bio.
Choosing a Domain Name.
In the physical world, you can distinguish a business because of
its structure, window displays, or signs. You can tell that a bank
is a
bank, or a clothing store is indeed a clothing store.
In the Internet, however, it is an entirely different story
altogether. Your domain name is the only clue to your online
business.
You do not have visual clues: no location, no look, and no store
design. Instead, users have to type in a word or a set of words to
reach your site. Your prospective visitor has no way of knowing what
your site is all about until she finds it and reads its contents.
Who can
ever tell that Amazon.com sells books? Or that Excite is a search
engine?
Your domain name can spell your success on the Internet. A good
domain name is the best asset you can ever have. It can make your
business stand out in the crowd, or just float aimlessly in space.
The need to provide immediate clues to an online business led to
the prevalence of generic domain names. Generic names instantly
provide the user with an idea of what a business is all about, what
to
expect and look for in a site. For instance, Etoys.com is a toy
store.
The temptation of the generic name has been so powerful; that
some companies even paid ridiculously high prices to get the name
they want. The domains Loans.com and Wines.com were both bought
for $3 million each.
Telephone.com was acquired for $1.75 million,
while Bingo.com sold for $1.1 million.
However, generic names do not necessarily create the “buzz” that
you’d like surrounding your website. Branding has always been about
proper names: McDonald's did not name their store Hamburger. Hertz
is not called Car Rental. FedEx is not Mail Carrier. Kodak is not
Photographs. Google is not Search Engine. Microsoft is not Computer
Software.
For better branding results, your domain name should stand out
and be easy to remember. Consider the following tips when creating a
domain name:
The domain name should be short.
The domain name should be simple.
It should be suggestive of your business category.
It should be unique.
It should be easy to interpret and pronounce.
It should be personalized.
It should not be difficult to spell.
It should not be difficult to remember.
Domain names can be registered through many different
companies (known as "registrars") - a listing of these companies is
available at ICANN.org. You can register for domain names from 1 to
10 years in advance and prices can vary anywhere from $8 to $30 per
year for each registered domain.
Most website hosting companies, as
explained later, will handle the registration process for you, but
make
sure that you are properly listed as the owner of the domain when it
is
registered. If you have registered a domain name for a specific
period,
make sure you renew it in time. You’d be surprised at the number of
cases, where website owners have lost their domain name to a
competitor by not renewing it in time.
Using Expired Domains to Skyrocket Your Traffic
Domain names provide a great opportunity to make easy money.
I’m not talking about Internet real estate, where you buy up good
names and sell them on for a profit. If you didn’t get positioned in
that
market early on, you can forget about it. The bottom’s fallen out of
the
market and the best domains are long gone.
I’m talking about expiring domains.
Thousands of webmasters invest time, effort and money to
promote their site and build up traffic. Many of them then lose
interest
and move on, leaving their site active. That means that although
they
still own the domain, they’re not actively promoting it. But they
don’t
need to. All the automatic marketing systems they’ve put in place
are
still bringing in traffic. The site runs itself.
Now, at some point the ownership of those domains is going to
expire. If you snap up those domains once they come back onto the
market, you’ve got a pre-built stream of customers. You can either
rebuild the site, or redirect the traffic to your domain.
It’s that easy. In fact, websites like DeletedDomains.com
actually do all the legwork and let you reap all the rewards.
Do be careful when using other sites though. There are some
swindlers out there that will sell you subscriptions, provide you
with
outdated lists, take your money and keep the good domains for
themselves. It happens, and there’s little point in taking a risk
with
other companies when DeletedDomains.com does such a great job.
The Host
Let’s start where the Internet starts: with a host. A host is a
server that provides a home for your website on the World Wide Web.
Just as your computer contains all your files, so a host contains
all the
files needed to run your website. Why can’t you just keep all those
files on your own computer? Because that would mean visitors would
have to connect directly to your computer to see your website and
that’s not a good idea. It wouldn’t be secure and it would make your
machine run like a tired snail. With a host, you can simply upload
everything you need to the server and your users can then connect
there to see your site. It lets the site run faster and allows it to
have
all the security and extras it needs.
Selecting a host is the first important step towards building your
Internet business.
Hosting services and companies vary from totally free, shared
servers to large-scale dedicated machines. You’ll have to decide
which
is right for you and your business.
Your choice of server will depend on how much money you have
available at the beginning and how much you plan to grow in the
future. In my opinion, for commercial sites, free hosting is a waste
of
time. Your users are going to get blasted with annoying pop-ups
every
time they surf to your page, it’s going to be impossible to get a
decent
position in a search engine, and you don’t even get a real business
URL. No one’s going to remember your web address if they have to
type:
FreeWebsiteHosting.com/my_site. However, it is possible to
choose a cheaper host at the beginning and move up as your business
begins to bring in money.
NOTE: One of the most important factors in choosing a website
host is the customer service you receive once you’ve signed up.
There are many technical issues that can come up once you have your
own website, and if you don’t have a truly dedicated hosting company
to support you and help you resolve these issues when necessary, you
could, quite simply, lose your business. Trust me, I’ve seen many
thriving online businesses fall apart because they chose the wrong
hosting company. When hosting is cheap, there is a reason for it.
With website hosting, you get exactly what you pay for and you
should
never compromise when it comes to who to host your website with.
Click here to learn about my service and the website hosting
company I highly recommend to everyone who does business online.
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Next:
Testing and Performance You have designed a very usable website, you have hosted it
using a very reliable web hosting company, and you have integrated a
safe and trusted payment processing system with your website.
However, all these can prove to be useless until you know your site
is
actually working and accessible. If you want to create an accessible
website, you will need to test, test and test again. |