14 Free Resources To Help You Build Your Own Website

This post is a guest post by Lin Edwards

Did you know that the majority of customers use the internet to research before they purchase? Did you know that online purchases are one of the fastest growing parts of our economy?

Every business or organization needs a website ­ a professional digital presence. But for many small businesses, it’s hard to justify hiring a web design firm ­ they need a low-cost or free way to create their website.

If you are looking for free resources to help you build your own website, here are 15 of the best available ­and they won’t cost you a penny.

Free Website Solutions

These are all-in-one packages that include a tool to design your website, a subdomain or subdirectory website address, and free web hosting.

Weebly

http://www.weebly.com

This website provides an easy-to-use drag-and drop interface you can use to build your website. You can choose from 70+ custom templates or customize your own. Highly recommended.

WordPress.com

http://wordpress.com

Setup a blog or website in just a few minutes with this handy blogging software.

Webs.com

http://www.webs.com

This is another services that allows you to create a website for free. It offers over 300 templates, plus robust add-ons and premium features.

Google Sites

https://sites.google.com

Google also offers a free service you can use to create a website, called Google Sites. Frankly, we don’t think their templates are quite as nice as the other sites we listed above, though. On the plus side, they do offer some handy options for sharing and accessing content.

Free Blogging and CMS Software

These software packages are most suitable if you have your own domain name and hosting, and you are already familiar with building or running a website. Each of these uses a template system that a designer can use to create a completely custom design for your website.

WordPress

http://wordpress.org

This is the same software used on WordPress.com, but since you download and install it on your own domain, you have much more control over your website. You can install plugins and themes to add features or change how your website looks or functions. WordPress is a perfect CMS to use for any blog or simple website.

Drupal

http://drupal.org

If you need a CMS that is more robust than WordPress, Drupal is a great option. It is a full featured CMS, with plenty of modules you can add to further customize it.

Joomla

http://www.joomla.org

Joomla has a similar feature set to Drupal ­ whether you use Joomla or Drupal is largely personal preference. It is also a full featured CMS, with plenty of modules you can add to further customize it.

Free Tutorials and Help

Digital Point

http://forums.digitalpoint.com

Digital Point has one of the largest online forums dedicated to websites and online business. You’ll find help on topics ranging from web design to Google SEO.

W3Schools

http://www.w3schools.com

Need to lookup an HTML tag or find out how to change a simple PHP script? W3Schools has excellent courses on most web technologies – you can use the tutorials to learn a new language, or just to help you resolve an issue.

Warrior Forum

http://www.warriorforum.com

An online community of webmasters and business owners. Join in the discussions to learn from others and get your questions answered,

Free Graphics Resources

Photoshop Express

http://www.photoshop.com/tools

If you haven’t purchased PhotoShop, you can use the online web app version for free.

Gimp

http://www.gimp.org

If you need something more robust that the free online PhotoShop app, you can download Gimp, an open source photo editing program.

Icon Finder

http://www.iconfinder.com

This website is a wonderful source for free icons and graphics, with about 150,000 icons in their collection.

Other Free Stuff

Google Analytics

http://www.google.com/analytics/

This free and easy to install program will provide you with detailed reports on what visitors are doing on your website.

Lin Edwards the chief content and technical writer for SmallBusiness-Domain.com, a website offering articles and reviews related to domain names and web hosting. They also offer a directory of coupons and discounts, including Yahoo website promo codes.