Having a website is fast becoming the most important consideration for businesses in a market driven by increased online activity.
It acts like a permanent advert, increasing your visibility to potential customers and providing all the information they need about the company. Selling products is also much easier with a website, especially as millions people now choose to do their shopping online.
With the benefits of having a website so endearing it would be easy to assume buying and maintaining one would be expensive. This isn’t necessarily the case however, especially if you are only setting up a few basic pages with straightforward content. In fact, there is the chance to find companies online who offer free web domain and hosting services.
It may sound too good to be true, a free website without the need to pay hosting or design charges, and quite often it is. Many adverts claiming to offer free website creation will undoubtedly be hiding additional charges further down the line somewhere or other. In other cases, these free sites will soon be classified as spam and deleted from search page results, hence taking away a massive chunk of your advertising potential.
They are not ideal for all businesses, especially those that require complex images, sounds, videos and buying facilities incorporated into their pages. However, there are some companies who do offer competent free websites that satisfy the needs of an individual or small business.
Blogging Websites
It is generally easier to get a free website if all you wish to do is blog. Blogging is a concept where an individual or small group write down their thoughts and experiences on a particular subject. Web publishing tools known as blog software have made it relatively simple for anyone to achieve.
These software programs have management systems which allow individuals to produce content, edit and publish it with a function for comments to be included as well. There are various blogging websites which offer a free service although WordPress, Tumblr, and Nucleus are the most widely used.
WordPress in particular is the most popular blogging tool on the internet and used on more than 60 million websites worldwide. You can also use the WordPress website to create your own blogging account, build up a fan base and publish work on pretty much anything you feel necessary.
Free Websites
By entering a search phrase of ‘create a free website’ will reveal thousands of results. As noted earlier, some will be more suitable than others. Below is a run through of the most widely used free websites.
Weebly – One of the most well known free services for creating your own website is through Weebly, although to access all its features you do need to pay a subscription fee. It is ideal for smaller businesses and individuals who use a lot of photos on their site.
Wix – Wix is a popular multi-page web building site with some fantastic templates to help you get started. However, the free service they offer will also require you to feature external adverts on your pages. In addition, your address will always start with the www.wix.com preface. The service also has some issues with SEO, having an necessarily complicated system that tries to use a work-around to serve Google content.
Webs – Another useful free site to check out is via Webs. The catch here though is that your domain name will end with web.com instead of the usually desired .com or .co.uk. Many people commend Webs for the smart design layout it offers although some of the more advanced templates are reserved for upgraded customers.
Jimdo – Jimdo is a web-building site that is recommended if you wish to input an e-commerce facility into your pages. The extensive tools for this and large community forums make it a favourite with many users. Payment information is not required when selecting the free site creation option with Jimdo.
