My Adventure
in Building a Website

How a Rocky Beginning Turned Into a Smooth Road

I can truthfully say, my adventure in website building began about eight years ago. My boss volunteered me to manage the website he built using the templates provided by our service provider. That was around the same time I was elected “company marketing department". Yep, the whole department. But that's another story. The first thought about the company website? Awful! After dabbling with the site, it's not too bad, but making those changes was a royal pain in my backside.

As I learned more about online marketing, things like blogs, ezines and email capture, RSS feeds, and online ordering became options I wanted to use for the company website. Only thing is -- their service provider doesn't offer many of those options and the ones they do offer would be at an additional cost.

Many choices out there - but no perfect fit

When I decided to build my very own website, I did a lot of searching. Sure, there are plenty of providers who sell domain names and template built websites for $5 to $10 per month. Not bad. At least, not until I started asking about blogs, web stores, storage limits and limits on the number of pages you can have.

Then the price went up, up, up. They call them "add ons".

Besides, as an offline graphic designer, I didn't like the idea of being tied to templates or required to write my own html. Like I said, I am an "offline" designer, a designer for print. I own a copy of Dreamweaver, but darned if I know how to use it. But I can design my own elements in PhotoShop and Illustrator. I wanted a partner who will let me combine those elements into their templates.

The truth is – I don’t have the time right now to learn HTML and CSS. Eventually, I would like to round out my design skills with web design, but there’s just no time right now. I wanted to find a provider who would get my site up and running – then later when I’ve developed my HTML skills, let me take control.

I found the perfect fit for me

Before I tell you what company turned out to be the perfect fit for me, here's the "small type" I feel morally obliged to write. Several weeks after purchasing my site through this company, I signed up for their affiliate program. It's simple - anytime someone clicks on my particular url leading to their website - if that person ends up purchasing - I get a commission.

I didn’t sign up initially because I didn’t know how much I would like the company. But, the moment I thought about posting something about my new website and this company on Twitter, I thought, wait. Let me sign up for the affiliate program just in case someone actually makes a purchase because of me. How cool is that? Wouldn't you do it, too?

Still, your needs may not be the same as mine.

If you would like to read my reasons for going with the company I chose, click on the link to the article: My Reasons For Choosing This Company

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