ESTABLISHING YOUR WEB SITE ONLINE

Anything after the "www", preceding the domain name, is the path used to get to that site, and anything following the domain name is the path to, and the name of the individual web page.  You can see this name displayed at the top of your browser in the address field.  As you click to different pages in a web site, or change web sites, this name changes.

Domain names are registered at a url provider, like registrars.com or northernlight.com.  These companies charge a yearly fee for you to retain the registration for that name.  This means that that exact name can not be used by anyone else.  Every domain name has a url.  This is basically the conversion of the domain name into an address or number.

You may choose to use your company's name as your domain name. This makes it easier for people who are familiar with your company to find your site on the internet without the use of a search engine. But your domain name does not have to be the same as your business name. In fact, if you are a new business that uses your surname, you may want to choose a domain name that is more descriptive of the type of product or service you offer. This may increase the probability of your site being included when there are search engine inquiries on a particular subject.

Remember though, the name must be unique. If there is already another web site with the exact same name, you may have to choose a variation of that name. So if there is already a "funcity.com", you would not be able to use that name.  The URL provider can tell you if that name is available, and if not, can suggest other similar names that are available, perhaps with a different dot extension. 

Not all web sites have their own registered domain name.  Some sites, such as this one, (http://www.nbizz.com/lyddonenterprises) are sub-hosted.  This means that this site resides within someone else's domain.  The monthly charge, if your site is sub-hosted, is usually less expensive.

Since the name "lyddon enterprises" is not a registered domain name, there could be a "registered" (http://www.lyddonenterprises.com) web site out there.  But even if there is, since this site is sub-hosted, this does not preclude us from using the name lyddonenterprises, since our domain name is actually nbizz.com/lyddonenterprises.  

Although sub-hosting may make it a little more difficult to find your site using just your company name, since the entire path with the sub-host's name must be entered, it does give you the option of still being able to use the name you choose, even if that name is already registered (unless of course, your sub-host already has someone with that name on their site.)

Selecting a Host for Your Site
A host is the server on the internet where your web site resides.  There a number of different host providers.  Often free hosting space as well as paid for hosting services are offered by Online Service Providers, such as AOL and CompServe, and ISPs (Internet Service Providers) such as AT&T and NetCom.  However, free hosting is usually limited to relatively small web sites and restricted to non-commercial use.

Most business web sites are hosted by paid service providers, and there are hundreds to choose from.  For a monthly charge, these services will "host" (provide space) for your web site.  Price, as well as the services offered, varies by provider.

In addition to price, there are a number of things to consider when choosing a host.  One of the most important things is the technical support they offer, that is, the assistance they provide getting your pages to the server, answering questions, and solving problems.

Also, what is the service's uptime?  How long are they on the air trouble free?  I'm sure you've all encountered those annoying "Having problems connecting to the server" messages.  Connection speed is also important.  How long does it take the server to make a connection, decipher the request, send the file, and end the connection?

There are also sub-hosting services (see discussion of sub-hosting under section above).  For an additional monthly fee, some sub-hosts can even provide you with your own domain name.  However, there may be contractual restrictions regarding the ownership of that name, that could hamper your ability to switch providers, so it's important to check on this before getting your own url.        

Registering Your Site with Search Engines
Once you site is completed, somehow there must be a way for people to know you're out there.  This can be done through the use of various advertising techniques, which we discuss in another section, but the most important place to start is by registering your site with search engines.

A search engine is a tool used on the internet for locating web sites or information related to a specific topic, based on the search criteria entered by the visitor.  

There are thousands of different  search engines out there, yahoo, alta vista, infoseek, excite, goto, lycos, google, web crawler, hotbot, and the list goes on.  Your ISP (internet service provider) probably also provides a search engine.  

Each of these search engines has different requirements for registering your site and conducting their search, and some are better than others for certain types of searches.  There are even some topic specific search engines, e.g. for hotels.  Internet Sleuth (www.isleuth.com) provides a searchable index of over 3000 databases by category to help you find these.

Search engines send out spiders or webcrawlers, which are programs that go out and read web pages and then collect and store the information in huge databases.  This information is then used to respond to search inquiries.  

All spiders do not work the same, but there are certain things that you can do on your web site that will improve your probability of being selected.

Search engines use keywords to conduct their search.  These are the words entered in the search inquiry.  So you need to determine what words, and what variations of these words, the majority of the people will use when requesting a search - your company or product name, the product type, maybe even a descriptive feature about the product.  Then you want to use as many of these words as possible, as often as possible, in prominent places on your site, where spiders will find them. 

Some of the most prominent places are in the home page title, which is the name that appears in the browser header bar, in the first paragraph on your page, and in the meta tag description and meta tag keywords.  The meta tags are html codes placed within a site, that are invisible to the visitor, that reference the keywords and the site description.  But your keywords should be relevant to your site.  Search engines frown upon sites that use extraneous words just to lure visitors to the site.  Also remember, pictures on a web site don't count.  Spiders don't see them, so they should not be the most prominent thing on your site. 

You not only want your site listed, you want it to be ranked as high as possible in the search results.  If the search returns several pages of listings, the visitor will probably only browse through one of two  pages, and may only select a few of those listings to actually visit.    

There are some services on the web, such as www.submit-it.com that offer free assistance for automating this process (providing mass submission to 400-1500 search engines), but it is still a good idea to separately submit your site to the larger search engines, and there are others, like Yahoo, (which is actually a directory, not a search engine) that require a separate submission.  Listing with some search engines is free.  Others charge a fee, depending on the type of listing.

Although spiders do go out and periodically revisit sites to see if there have been changes, if you make major changes or additions to your site, or refine your keywords, you will probably want to resubmit your site.

Please contact us with any questions or comments.

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