Tyson-Faulkner.com
Online Marketing Training

Welcome to the List Building Crash Course…Step #3! Now that you are in the business mindset (step #1) and know your market (step #2) it's time to establish your online presence.

So here's the key question…Do you have a website that acts as your business hub?

I don't suspect you would start a brick & mortar business without having a place of business, so why would you start an online business without having a hub that is your online place of business?

I know you may not want to spend any money because you were told on the internet "You can make money for free!" which I guess is true, but it's so much harder. Plus, all your work affiliate marketing is not building on something you will ultimately benefit from. Remember, we are trying to build a business, not just make a few bucks online.

And a normal part of any business is expenses. But unlike the old brick and mortar businesses, it only costs like $20 to start a business online, instead of paying thousands of dollars a month to pay for a building and all the physical things you need in the traditional business.

By having your own website, you can point all your marketing efforts to that site, getting your business name out there and known instead of promoting some other site like Squidoo or Hubpages like crazy. It's much more effective to build your own site in the long run, and actually not that much less effective in the short-term.

Sure Hubpages will rank higher and faster right out of the gate, but you don't control those properties, which makes them hazardous to your income. If they decide your content doesn't fit their site all of a sudden you're sunk. But if you've got your own site your good to go.

So I hope, by now, you are convinced that  you definitely need your very own website. So go get one! It's so easy to get your first website up and running that I'm going to give you some simple steps to do it right now, no more procrastinating!

Your First Website Up and Running In 1 Hour Or Less
ACTION STEPS

Step #1: Go to Namecheap.com and register a domain name. If you've already got a clever business name or something grab that. Or you can do something similar to what I did and register your-name.com or something similar. Just make sure it isn't something that you'll hate in the near future and you're good to go. This step will cost you a whopping $9.69.

Step #2: Go to Hostgator.com and buy a hosting plan. The one I use is called the "Baby plan" and is only $10/month, talk about low business expenses! I would avoid getting the smallest plan because it only supports 1 domain, and in the future (maybe right now) you will want to be able to easily add new domains. If you're feeling real professional and want a toll free number for your visitors to be able to call go for the "Business plan." 

All of Hostgator's plans are pretty good, they give you unlimited disk space and bandwidth so, in my opinion, it's the best option for your first hosting plan.

Step #3: Login to Namecheap.com, go to "manage domains," and click on the domain you just purchased. Then go to modify Domain Name Servers (DNS) and point the DNS of your new domain to your Hostgator account. You can find the DNS in the welcome email that Hostgator will send to you. (They look like this: ns###.hostgator.com)

Step #4: Install WordPress onto your new domain. This is insanely easy with Hostgators cpanel setup. Type in this address into your browser: http://www.yourdomain.com/cpanel. This will take you to your new website's cpanel. From there click on the little Fantastico icon, then scroll down to WordPress and select that. Then just click "New Installation" and follow the simple steps to instantly install WordPress onto your website.

Step #5: Customization. You've now got a website up and running, but it's probably using a default WP theme and doesn't look very good. So what you want to do is browse through some themes and find a good one that you like and fits your business. Don't spend too much time on this step, you could literally customize your site for hours, but it won't do much for your business, so try to stick to productive activities.

Another important customization step is adding plugins to your new site. You can find them by logging into your wp admin area, then navigating to "Plugins" then "Add New." This will give you a search box where you can enter keywords to find the plugins you want to install. Here's my top 10 list that I install on every site I make:

• All-in-one SEO (Great little SEO plugin)
• All-in-one Webmaster (to make integrating with Google webmaster easy)
• Contact Form 7 (easy contact form so I don't have my email published)
• Google Analytics for WP (web tracking is a must)
• Google Web Optimizer (split testing made easy)
• cbnet ping optimizer (so your blog does ping spam SE's)
• prettylink (easy link customization/redirection/cloaking)
• smart sharing (adds the cool floating share window. Can't find this through WP site, get it here
• Exclude Page From Navigation (So I can create squeeze pages and not have them on my WP menu)
• Google XML sitemaps (auto uploads sitemap to Google)

There are a ton more plugins, but I try to keep things as simple as possible. Start with these 10 and get them all set up and operational, including Akismet that is already installed on your site.

Step #6: Create Some Pages. Your website should be pretty good-looking now, so you've got an official business hub on the internet, congratulations!

Now you can create some content pages like an About Me, Contact, Privacy Policy, all that stuff, and maybe even write a couple small blog posts about your business and where you're headed.

You're now set to start getting visitors to YOUR website, and can now create squeeze pages and host download pages and everything you need to run an online business. See you in step #4 where we discuss autoresponders, why you need one,  and what you should and shouldn't be looking for in one.