Having a personal website is very important these days. The main reason so many people have a personal website is that it allows them to find a job more easily, establish their personal brand and promote their business, among other things.
Moreover, if you plan on operating in the online market, you won’t get far without a website. Think of your website as your very own spot on the Internet. Your website address leads people to that spot and helps them find you in the sea of other websites. However, building a website is the tricky part. It’s not difficult to do but it is, in fact, time-consuming.
That being said, you’ll have to make an effort to make a website, especially if you want that website to work in your favor exceptionally well. With that in mind, here are a few steps to helping you build a personal website.
Choose the right hosting provider
A hosting service is what every website needs so that it can operate online. Without a hosting provider, you’d have to build an infrastructure to support your website on your own, and that’s quite expensive and unnecessary. There are numerous hosting providers that offer a wide variety of services for a reasonable price. You just have to opt for a service that suits you the most. That said, here are a few examples:
- Shared hosting
- Dedicated hosting
- VPS (Virtual Private Servers)
- Managed hosting
For instance, managed hosting is the most efficient but also the most expensive service. With this type of hosting service you get a personal server with dedicated resources just for it. Moreover, you also get a support staff that will manage your website and its features while you focus on building your business or personal brand.
Choose the right domain name
Another reason why choosing a hosting provider is important is that they can also provide you with the right domain name for your website. Simply put, your domain name is also your website address. This is how your audience will be able to find and recognize your website.
A unique domain name is especially important for a personal website if you plan on developing a personal brand. In that case, you can use your own name and last name as a domain name. If you don’t plan on building a brand, it’s still advisable to opt for a unique domain name should you reconsider later on.
Moreover, your hosting provider can also set your website up with a top-level domain (TLD). TLDs are the dot extension at the end of your website address, such as .com, .org, .info and so on and so forth. Therefore, a good domain name and a reliable TLD will give your website more exposure and credibility in the online world.
Design your website the right way
The key to every successful website is proper design. When people land on your website, they expect a seamless browsing experience. If you want to provide your website visitors with such an experience, you’ll have to work on your website design.
After all, online consumers have specific needs, demands and expectations when it comes to browsing websites. If you’re unable to meet their expectations, they’ll bounce off before you know it. That said, here are some of the most important factors related to website design:
Visuals
- Pick the right colors for your website layout
- Use stunning imagery and videos
- Create awesome content
- Use various forms of graphics to visually enrich your content
Functionality
- Categorize and organize your content
- Ensure seamless navigation
- Include a well-designed search bar
- Optimize for both user and mobile-friendliness
- Enhance website security
Performance
- Improve overall website speed and page loading time
- Leverage AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages) to improve loading speed on mobile devices
- Reduce HTTP requests
- Minify the code
- Get rid of unnecessary plug-ins (WordPress users)
Optimize your website
Website optimization is of vital importance for improving visibility, brand awareness, exposure, credibility and authority. Fortunately, you can manage all of those things and more with the help of SEO. SEO helps you optimize both your website and individual pages for search engines so that they can properly crawl, index and rank your website.
SEO is a cost-effective marketing strategy that is basically necessary if you want your website to stand out in such a crowded and highly competitive market like the online one. Here are a few ways SEO can help your website:
- Technical SEO – Helps with website functionality and performance
- On-page SEO – Helps with optimizing your website for search engines
- Off-page SEO – Helps with building credibility and authority for your website
Once your personal website is well-optimized and properly designed, you can start promoting it. This will help you get noticed and also help you generate the right amount of organic traffic. So, whether you use your personal website for business purposes or to help you land an amazing job, your website will be up to the task.
Raul is a B.Sc. in Innovative entrepreneurship and has a lot to say about innovations in all aspects of digital technology and online marketing. While he’s not enjoying travel, football and great food, you can find him on Technivorz.com