If you’ve recently set up your own business, you may want to create your own website. You can outsource it to web professionals, but that might cost you more than you can afford. So if you want to create your website yourself, there are a few things you need, besides patience and time. If you follow the steps below, you will learn the basics of building your own website. Good luck!

1. Work with a plan

When building your own website, you’re probably going to experience some bumps in the road. That’s completely normal, don’t worry. What will prevent you from getting frustrated, is sticking to a plan. So, the first thing you need to do when you’re going to build your own website is creating a plan. So consider the purpose of your website, decide what information you do and don’t want to share and what you want your website to look like. When you experience some bad luck during the process, you’ll always have a contingency plan.

2. Think of a good domain name

The domain name or internet address/url should make clear what kind of website visitors are entering. For example, you can use your name to create a unique url, but that doesn’t show whether you’re a business in fashion, IT or marketing. So, let’s assume you’re running a collection agency in The Netherlands. A domain name like incassobureau.nl would be perfect (incassobureau means collection agency in Dutch). Domain names like this are often no longer available, but there are still plenty of possibilities. You might think of a combination of the industry in which you operate and, for example, your name, like marketing-bureau-johnson.com. Of course, you should use the name of your brand in the url if possible.

3. Register your domain name

Like we’ve mentioned before, many domain names are no longer available. So before getting too excited, you should always check if the domain name you wish to use, is still available. Once you’ve checked, it’s time to register the domain name. A registrar can do this for you; they can also arrange a hosting package (see step 6).

4. Pick a content management system (CMS)

To create a website, you need a content management system, also known as a CMS. A CMS is a software application that helps you to manage and adapt your website anytime and anywhere you want. If you want to create a simple website, for example, because you don’t have any knowledge of development, you can use well-known content management systems like Joomla, WordPress or Magento.

5. Create a nice design and fill it with content

Once you’ve selected a CMS and created an account, you can start building your website! You can create a nice layout, decide which colors you want to use and fill your website with content. It’s important that the pages contain good quality texts, so the content helps you rank well on keywords. But that’s not all, you should keep all aspects of search engine optimization (SEO) in mind when building your website because you obviously want your new website to rank in the search engines!

6. Arrange the hosting of your website

Have you built your website in the content management system? Then the last thing you need to fix is the hosting. You need to arrange a hosting package, which buys you a spot on the server. Hostings cost money but it doesn’t have to be a lot. The price depends on the size of hosting your website needs, but the costs start at a few euros a month. There are many companies where you can purchase a hosting package, so inform yourself and make a good choice!

Hopefully, the steps above help you with building your own website. Good luck!