This web page is gold for brand new small business website designers because it will save you time and you will learn much in the process. Finding these websites took a lot of time, time that you can save by using them. The websites listed here have made my web life a lot easier and so should they make yours a lot easier. Since I am not that knowledgeable about many things about computers, and the internet, I have to keep things as simple as possible so I understand them and can work with them. This could be termed the idiots guide to web seo but it's not. Instead, it is meant to be a guide to small business owners (soho)who want to improve their presence on the Internet. This whole web thing that I am talking about here is like a massive maze that you can easily get lost in. "Help files" I've most often found to be generally useless because I just did not understand a lot of the terminology. I've been lost many times and stopped but then started again.  This is my way that I found for my way through the maze. I'm still on the journey.

1. Design Software for Websites

2. Photos/Images for Websites

3. Registration of Domains

4. Hosting Domains

Site created using XSitePro

1. Design Software for Small Business Websites

 A) XSitePro Version 1.6

XSitePro Review

Getting the right software to design, build and modify your websites is probably the biggest single decision you will make because whatever you do will naturally flow from that decision. Not having tried many other programs, I cannot say that XSitePro is the best on the market but I can say that it is relatively easy to use, does a very professional job and makes sure that your website is keyword, headings and content optimized for the search engines. It does an awful lot of work for you. It's easy to add photos, links, audio and RSS feeds to your website. I have used it for several years now and have never been unhappy with it. What more can I say? If you are farming out your website design work to someone else right now the software will pay for itself rather quickly. You will be in total control of your web business and the money you spend.

Not being Html literate and, not really interested in learning it, I chose a program that uses WYSIWYG "What you see is what you get". In other words, you use this program like you use Microsoft Word and the program does the html behind the scenes. The XSitePro program I use has a tab termed "source" where you can click on and see your page in all its html code glory. If you can use Microsoft Word, you will have few problems with the program. It also has an SEO tab which provides an analysis of your web page looking at about 20 criteria. If you are missing something or should improve something, it will highlight that area in red so you can fix it. Very Handy. It examines important stuff like "keyword density" , "image details", word counts and matching up page titles, page descriptions and page headings. This is really important stuff if you are a search engine spider. Consequently, it's really important to you and your website if you want high rankings.

As you complete your new page you can preview it you can see what the world will see when you publish your website. Publishing is easy provided you follow the correct procedure and fill in the boxes correctly. Once you get the first website published, you now have the template for all the other websites you may want to publish. I now have 10 websites that I have done through XSitePro. I was just starting to think this program needed more features when the company, just this month, released a new version which allows for video, voice and rss feeds. Just what I was looking for.

This is a copy of an email I received on June 11/09 when this Xsite Pro Software won the coveted PC Award

"Yaaaaahooooooo!!!! :-)

That was pretty much the noise coming from the office a little while back, when we learned we were being awarded the coveted "PC Advisor Recommended" Award for our XSitePro software.

We all clapped, and Paul did his dance from "The Office" (ok, I made up the dancing part, but there was plenty of clapping!)

It's a seriously cool piece of social proof to be able to display on your site, let me tell you, and it's definitely something that means a *lot* to anyone half-serious about buying quality software products.

Which is 100% why I'm writing this mail to you, Colm.

Armed with this great news, I'm hoping you'll be able to get in touch with your mailing list right away, and let then know that if they're looking for an award winning website design application, YOU can help them find it!

You might want to point out some of the great things the reviewer said, too, including:

"Getting a good-looking site up and running within minutes is very simple."

and...

"Where XSitePro 2.0 really stands out is by applying this ease of use to a wide range of additional features which, if coded by hand or created using Dreamweaver would be considerably more complex."

And just for good measure, you could mention that the reviewer also said:

"This is one of the most pleasant to use interfaces for web design that we've encountered."

Heck, the reviewer's practically selling the product for you! ;-)

So... why not put together a quick mailing, a swift blog-post, and a forum message or two - and be sure to include your very own affiliate redirect to the review, enclosed below:

Here's your special affiliate link:

http://www.xsitepro.com/index_r.html?p=ybltd&w=pcadvisor

2. Photos/Images for Websites

Photographs for your website In the early days, I used Google images which is ok I guess except you may get a call from someone seeking royalties. While these images appear on Google, they aren't all free although some of them might be. I have stopped using them in favour of Fotolia images which are very inexpensive and tops in quality. They are very easy to download and use. Great for people shots and people at play, at work , at the beach etc.

3. Domain Registration 

This is an area which I still not very sure about so I keep it as simple as I can which is why I use Arbor Domains. They boast "easy, fast and affordable" domain registration. I believe I have about 20 domains registered there and each one was very easy to obtain and park there. Now you can easily get domain registrations done a thousands of spots on the internet but I like this one for two good reasons.

a. I can set up domain forwarding and email forwarding very easily and change it at will and

b. I can change the domain nameservers from Arbor Domains to another hosting company very easily. No hassles. It even remembers previous nameservers that I have used .

They also remind you to renew your domain at the appropriate time. You can also register domains at Canadian Hosting if you want .ca extension and Canaca. It's up to you.

4.

A. Domain Hosting www.canadianhost.ca

This web hosting company uses the Helm control panel which is fairly easy to use. The best part for me is that there's a live person, Kevin behind the scenes. He will call me back when I have problems uploading or need a bigger package to handle more websites. The email programs are easy to set up, manage and forward to Outlook.

B. Domain Hosting www.canaca.net

This is a much cheaper hosting system using Linux technology. It's a little tougher to understand but the pricing makes it worth the effort. I had trouble uploading my websites at first but I figured I only had to get it right once, then I would be a able to upload all my websites and pay a fraction of what I was paying previously. I spent days working it out but now it pays me back everyday. Good support so far.