After your blog is installed, and you've made a few posts, go to http://technorati.com/, sign up and "claim" your blog.  There are instructions for doing that there.  Hint: For both online and hosted blogs, the easiest way is to make the post, then delete it when confirmed, not edit your code.

Next, go to http://www.feedburner.com/fb/a/home, and "burn your feed".  This is another previously independent company that has been bought by Google, so this should help get you blog indexed.  You'll need the actual address for the "feed" from your blog to do this.  It may auto detect it, but you can find out what it is if your template includes an orange RSS button, or a link at the bottom called "Entries (RSS)".  Just click the button or link and look in the address bar.  You should see an address that looks something like this; http://www.cheapprowebsite.com/blogversion/feed/.  This is the feed for the WordPress version of this web site. 

If you've taken my advice, and are using WordPress, there are a number of plug ins available for it that can help with automatically making your blog more SEO friendly.  I've compiled a group of them in a compressed file you can download through this link - Plug-in Pak.  Just click, then choose Save File.  After you unzip and open the file, simply copy each individual file that's inside, into the plugins file in the wordpress installation on your web site.  The plugins file is in the wp-content file.  To do this, you'll need ftp software.  The best one I've found is Filezilla.  It's simple to set up, easy to use and it's free.  You can get it here - Filezilla Install. 

Content Management Systems (CMS)

With these, you'll have to set up a database first, just like with a self hosted blog, using the easy instructions provided by your web host.   Remember to write down the the database name (DB_ NAME), database user (DB_USER), database password, (DB_PASSWORD), and find out from your hosting company the name of the database host (DB_HOST).  These are the only values you change for most installations.  At some hosts, the database host doesn't change.  If you are using www.hostjacker.com for your hosting, it's easy.  The DB_NAME and DB_USER are both the same. (your username)_(name you choose for the database).  The path to the database (DB_HOST) is

supremecenter54.com

If you've decided to use a different hosting company, these may all be different.  Your user name  and database name may not be the same thing, and you may not have to change the path to your database, or if you do, it will definitely be something different.  Check with your host to find out.

These normally don't change as often as blogging software, but it is still a good idea to get the latest stable version form the software's main web site, or upgrade your web host's one click version before you start adding content.  Those sites are listed  on the Additional Resources page.

There are quite a few quirks and tricks to using each of the CMS packages.  Depending on which one you use, I'd really suggest you save yourself a lot of time and headaches and buy the appropriate guide and tutorials.  I'd already built dozens of web sites using HTML and CSS, and installed dozens of blogs, when I tried building my first web sites using Joomla and Drupal.  The video tutorials were invaluable, and the few hours spent watching them probably saved me dozens of hours I would have spent figuring it out on my own (not to mention all of the frustration!).  I plan on exploring Mambo in the future, but I've read that it has it's own particular issues, and I haven't yet found a good guide to it yet.  You can get a really big discount on an excellent Joomla package here - Ready Made Joomla, and the Drupal tutorials can be purchased here - The Ultimate Guide to Drupal. 

Specialized Programs

Flash, DreamWeaver, FrontPage, NetObjects Fusion, etc.  Expensive, steep learning curve, problems with easy SEO with some of them, limited hosting options, etc.  My best tip for using one of these to build your first web site is simple, use something else.  Even learning to code raw HTML using NotePad is probably going to be quicker and easier for you.  Enough said...

WYSIWYG Editor

Although it isn't as easy as using an online blog or hosted blog, if you want to build a large, professional looking e-commerce web site, this is the best choice.  There are many free and paid WYSIWYG software packages out there, but the one I chose after checking out dozens of them is low cost, and out performs any of the free ones, and all of the other paid ones I tried.  The one which I found really easy and intuitive to use is the 123 WYSIWYG HTML Editor .  It can handle both html and css templates, and it comes with a complete users manual and email support.  It also comes with over 100 fast load templates that you can use and modify to build your web site, and a half dozen other bonuses to help you build and optimize your web site, including a copy of Filezilla, the ftp software I've been using for years.  You can use the link above to find out more, see a video showing how to quickly build a page using it, and get a $50 discount off the regular price.  Hint:  Hit the "Back" button, once you reach the page, to save an additional $20 .  If you decide to go this route, here are some tips on building a web site this way.

Stick to either HTML, XHTML or CSS templates.  If you use the 123 Editor, you'll already have over 100 to choose from, but you can get an even larger assortment of free ones, and access to all of their premium ones for one flat fee, by clicking on this link - Website Templates.  Most sites charge a per template fee for their premium templates, but TemplatesBox gives you access to all of them, for less than most others charge for just one.

The good thing about using a CSS template is that you can change the whole look of your web site by just changing the CSS template file, instead of having to re-build each individual page.  Something to consider if you plan on building a huge website, or you plan on configuring your shopping cart software to exactly match your web site.

Once you choose your template, create a new folder to put your website in.  Try not to name it the same thing or put it in the same directory as the folder with all of information for your site, since you don't want to confuse the two of them.  For example, if the content you've already assembled is in your "My Documents" folder and called "frankswebsite", create a new folder next to My Documents called "My WebSites".  Open that folder and create a new file called "franks" to store the actual files and pages for your web site.

If your e-commerce web site is going to be selling a number of products, and your going to be using a shopping cart software to do it, install it on your website first, before you start building your pages.  This way you'll know the exact link you need to use to send your customers to, when they click on your "Shop Now" or shopping cart button or link.  Many hosting companies, including HostJacker, include an easy insatll of this software as a bonus.  You'll need to sign up for a payment processor, and PayPal is an excellent choice for a beginner.  Make sure to get a Premiere account.  It's free, the processing fees are reasonable (if you don't sell anything, you don't pay anything) and its a trusted, dependable online way to accept all major credit cards for payment.  You can sign up through this link - PayPal Premiere.  Another good option for a payment processoris Power Pay.  If you're going to be selling a wide variety of products, it can't hurt to sign up for both.  They both have excellent information on how to set up the payment processing for your products.   

Before you start building each individual page, open the template you've chosen in your WYSIWYG editor, and immediately save a copy of it in the new folder called "franks".  Choose the option to save pictures in the same location as your files (or copy the img or image file from the template file into the "franks" file), and call the saved file template.html.  Now, modify that page to add all of the elements you want to be on every page of your web site.  Menus and their links, changes to color schemes, pictures, links along the bottom, copyright notice, privacy policy and terms of service links, etc.  You should have all of this already mapped out in the hand written site map you completed in Step 4 .  Don't forget to put a prominent "Buy Now" or "Shop Now" button or link that leads to your shopping cart, at the top and bottom of the page.  If you plan on adding a blog to your web site, now or in the future, decide on a name for it now (something simple, like "news" or "NewProducts"...you can use upper case letters, but no spaces) and put in a link to it as well.  That link will be formatted like this.

 http://www.yourdomainname/yourblogname  

Once you have everything you want to be common to all of your pages coded into your template.html, you can start building each individual page.  Before you start, make a copy of your template.html file in another separate folder, called templatefile.  If you goof up the one in your website's folder (franks), you'll still have a clean copy you can use, stored elsewhere. 

The first thing you should as you build each page is open your template.html, them immediately choose "Save As" (not "Save") and save it as the link name for the page you're building (i.e. index.html for your home page) in the same folder (franks) as your template.html file.  Now you can copy all of the content (and pictures) you created for that page, and stored in NotePad files in your content folder, into the html document.  Then just edit and tweak it however you want, and your page is done.  Save the file, open your template.html file, choose "Save As" to save it as your next page name, and repeat fior each page.  I actually prefer to choose "Save As" numerous times from the template.html to start, and save a copy of the template named for all of the pages for my web site first.  Then just open each page to edit in the content.  Preview each of your pages after you build them.  Make sure they look good in your browser, and check to make sure the links function after the very last page is built. 

Once you have all of the main pages built, you can upload them to your website.  For this, you'll use the Filezilla ftp software.  If you bought the 123 WYSIWYG HTML Editor, there was a free copy of it in that package.  If not go to Filezilla Install to get a free copy.  Install it, and then configure it for your website.  This is really easy, just choose Site Manager from the File menu.  Click on the "New Site" button, then choose a name your site, and edit in your Host (www.yourdomainname.com, skip the http://), and the username and password you use to log into your hosting account.  Everything else stays the same for almost all hosting companies, including HostJacker.  Once it's configured, just click the "Connect" button. 

You'll see your websites files come up on the right hand side of the split screen, and your computers files are shown on the left.  Just navigate to the folder where you stored your web site on your computer, open the folder, and copy each individual file (except template.html) from it on to your website.  You can do this by clicking on each file, or by highlighting all of them using the Shift key, and then right clicking on them and choosing the "Upload" command, or simply click and hold on each, and Drag and Drop it over to the right hand side.  Once they have uploaded, choose "Disconnect" from the File menu to log off. 

The last step is to go visit your web site using your browser.  Make sure all of the pages look good, and check that all of your links work (especially the one to your shopping cart or your PayPal button).  If you haven't already done so, add your products to your cart, and set up the payment processing using your PayPal Premiere or  Power Pay accounts.  Don't forget to try and use your keywords in your product descriptions, whenever possible.  If you have a link to a blog that you haven't installed yet, install it now (see above), and make one simple "Coming Soon" post to it.  Your site doesn't have to be perfect to launch it, and you can keep editing the pages and uploading them as often as you need to.  If you used CSS to build your site, you can even change the whole look and feel of it, and add or delete pages or links, by simply updating your template.

Pre-Built Site Software

If you decided to go this route, at least to begin with, I really don't have too many tips to give you.  Hopefully, this is just a starting point for you, and you're going to upgrade your web site to a more professional, unique one in the near future.  One thing both of the software packages I suggest do very well is walk you through building and setting up your pre-built site.  Just follow instructions, and you should have no problem.  There are links in the set-up that will lead you to signing up for all of the services you'll need (Clickbank, Adsense, etc.) in order to make money off of them. 

To integrate one of these sites, once you've built a more traditional site to replace it, you'll have to change the name of the index.html file that these programs create.  Simply name it something different (like addinfo.html) using Filezilla (right click on the file, then choose Rename).  Then put a link to that page on your new site and call it "Additional Information".  Your internal links from the pre-generated site will still work, except the Home link will send visitors back to your new home page, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.     

If you're using this software to focus on affiliate, Adsense and Clickbank revenue, the key is to find a lot of good articles to add to web site (search the article directories) and to focus on crating a large number of web sites.  Sign up for the "Unlimited Domains" account at HostJacker, and set up a large number of sites in different niches.  This way each site only costs you about $10 to set up, and you can have a whole slew of them, each generating a small amount of income.

Those are my tips and tricks for each method of setting up your web site.  Now that it is set up, you're going to want to promote and market it.  Thats not really the focus of this web site, but I am going to be posting tips, tricks and the latest news about internet marketing and promotion in a blog connected to this site.  If the link below this is active, then the blog will be up and running.  If not, just bookmark this page and check back here, it will be up soon. 

You already have the basics, if you've set up your web site according to the plan outlined here.  You have already;

• Decided on your market
• Found the Keywords they use to look for products
• Found products to sell to them
• Compiled content around those keywords
• Built a SEO optimized site using that content and featuring those products 

In the meantime, to get you started, I'd recommend Cody Moya's free internet marketing courses.  You can join for free, although the offer you'll see after joining is a really good deal, and I can definitely recommend it.  The main feature of the free membership for a beginner is that you get access to a whole series of internet marketing instruction that you can download immediately.  You will get a few emails with the course info included, so sign up using an email address you check frequently, but that won't fill up your personal email box.  To get these free courses, click on this link - Free Internet Marketing Courses.

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