Setup Website: Setup Your Business for Success

Starting a business can be a very scary thing but if you are inadequately prepared, starting an Internet Business can be even more so. Where do I begin? What should I expect? How much should this cost? I hope to answer some of the common questions asked by business owners wanting to setup a website.

First you must register a domain name. This will be the address for your setup. Websites need to contain keywords but also need to be attractive to human readers, so do not get carried away by keyword1-keyword2-keyword3.com domain names. Keywords do help, but you want a name that is able to be branded as well. I register all of my domains with godaddy.com. They start at around $8 a year for a regular .com registration but sometimes you can get a good discount if you sign up for another godaddy service such as private registration. This keeps your contact information hidden from the public. If you would like to see what kind of information is publicly available, do a Google search for Who Is when ever you get the chance.

The next task is to decide where you will host your site. The two most common types of hosting are Shared Web Hosting and Dedicated Web Hosting. For most starter websites Shared Web Hosting should be sufficient, but larger websites should enjoy the added benefits of dedicated web hosting. Shared hosting is going to cost around 10.00 a month compared to dedicated hosting which can run around $75 or more a month. If you receive a large number of visitors a day, or have a fairly large database driven dynamic website, dedicated hosting is the only way to go. Most Search engine specialists will recommend a dedicated server over a shared server even for small websites due to the possibility that your site could theoretically be penalized for shady actions taken by other websites that share your sever and IP address. So if you choose to start off with shared hosting, shop around and make sure you will be sharing your sever with a reputable company that hosts reputable websites. Even though some companies offer webhosting for $3 or $4 dollars a month, it doesn