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Tips on Starting out on the Internet

By admin | June 14, 2008

I have been thinking about how I should structure my posts on here to help you and to help me as well! I have writtten a bit about my experiences, but I dont want to bore you( assuming you aren’t already!)

My thought is to kind of do a few posts about getting started on the internet, from basic stuff to a bit more of the technical stuff,which I have found difficult. I think there are possibly 6 basic stages

I have looked at getting a product or at least an idea for a product. So I am going to look at domain names. You might not even know what they are.I didnt 12 months ago. Its simply the bit that goes between the www and the .com or .co.uk. Like www.thisisme.com or www.thisisyou.com.Its that bit in the middle.
So how do you go about choosing a domain name and how much does it cost? One of the best pieces of advice was to register my own name.Unfortunately it came too late as someone else had got there first! If you have an unusual name its probably much easier but as you can see mine is not unusual and I havent even got a middle name to distinguish it. If you cant get your name try and get it with online on the end like what I have done!! The other piece of advice is if you see a name you like get it immediately,dont prevaricate.I ignored this only recently when my name came up for sale. I had looked into it and it was registered until a particular date.I forgot about it and looked again sometime after that date and there it was,for sale again! Well I was tired,hadnt set up an account at the domain name place and left it until the following morning When I logged back on,armed with my credit card it had gone again! The moral is,dont mess around!

So thats the first domain name you might want to register.What about another at the same time? Have you thought about what you migh be wanting to promote?

I have read a load of stuff about choosing domain names ( something else I got bogged down in). I think it boils down to a few essential elements.

When you or I are looking on the web,we are looking for information or how to solve a problem.So if I was promoting a product on say, I dont know,say furniture restoration,then I would want to get a domain name with that in,furniture restoration tips say furniture restoration info or help or whatever. That way,in theory anyone going onto google looking for tips on how to restore furniture might come across your site more easily than if it were called www.Ilovemymum.com for example. The name has to relate to the product in some way.

So once you have thought of a name (or better still a few names with various permutations as your first choice might have been taken) you need to think about registering it. What do you do? Well you could get a hosting account and get the domain names through that. I think that is probabaly easier if I am honest but its not the way I have done it.I have a separate hosting account and a separate domain name account. I did it because I think its cheaper. I wrote in an earlier post about having 3 separate hosting accounts and I have,by accident but the most expensive ones have been those where the domain has been bought through the hosting account.

The benefit of having the domain through the hosting account is that a bit of the technical stuff is done for you and as a beginner you might feel happier about that. I suppose if I were starting from new,having some of that technical stuff done would have been a bonus.Its horses for courses,more expense measured against having more time to do other stuff rather than getting bogged down in the technicalities.

So you know what a domain is but you might not know what a hosting company is?This is the company that provides you with the space to put your website on. You have to pay for it but its not a huge expense.
So you know what a domain is, you know what a host is. You decide if you want a separate domain and hosting company or all together depending on what you want spend. My estimate is that you are probably talking double to have the domain registered through your hosting company,but we arent talking big bucks. Ii costs me $10 or a fiver in the UK to my hosting company per month and $10 or a fiver for each domain name per year. You might think then that its not going to be that expensive to set up the host and then buy the domains through it and you might be right. You choose

My hosting company is hostgator and I buy my domains through godaddy.You can set up the hosting through hostgator and buy the domains through them.Its a bit more expensive that way but as I say its perhaps an easier way for the technically challenged. Another host to look at is Kiosk.

In my next post I am going to assume that you have gone for the cheaper option and show you how to do that technical stuff.Learnt through trial and error I can tell you!

Regards

Jane

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