Startup Toolbox

In today’s marketplace, it’s pretty much mandatory that a business has a website. Personally, I go to the web first before I ever think about pulling out my clunky old yellow pages and I can’t tell you how many times my patronage to a business has been influenced by whether or not they had a website.

Trying to choose a restaurant…is their menu online? What are the hours of that new clothing store downtown? What was that gardening class that I saw at the nursery?

Those kinds of questions can’t be answered by the phone book and I’m not likely to get in the car and drive over to find out. Sadly, I’m also the type that doesn’t like picking up the phone and having to call. Well, I might to find out a store’s hours, but if i was seeking more than just basic information, chances are that I won’t call.

If you’re like me, you’re not a web guru. And being a small business person, I don’t have a whole chunk of money allocated to web development. I also don’t have a lot of time to self-educate on the latest software or coding methods. I’ve done the chore of browsing through hundreds of templates but never quote find one that fits the bill. I always want to tweak something or change a color or a texture and then you start racking up fees for customization for ONE site. If you have more than one site, you have to go through the whole thing all over again. Refer back to the chunk of money comment. It goes quick, doesn’t it?!

So, what’s to be done?

I have been noticing that there are some wonderful (and affordable!) software tools that are specifically designed to make web design easy.

One tool I have personally used for this site is Artisteer. It is especially great for creating designs for WordPress. The software will make design suggestions and then you can go in and adjust the colors, layout and graphics. It’s very easy and intuitive to use. It is available for download and comes in two different versions based upon export options and some expanded graphics elements.

www.Artisteer.com - $49.95 – $129.95

If you’re looking for the added simplicity of wrapping design/hosting/domain registration into one tidy package, there are a couple of options available.

GoDaddy has their Website Tonight® tool. I’ve used this tool, too and it’s very easy to use. I especially like the ability to go in and make changes and publish to the web with one click. They offer a variety of templates that are virtually plug and play with you just inputting your own text and graphics. While there are several color options for each template, you are limited to those specific colors and layouts.

www.GoDaddy.com – Each plan includes hosting and ranges from $3.99 – $12.99 per month based on size needs and payment plans.

Another tool that looks really nifty is one at Yola that I read about in my latest Entrepreneur magazine. It looks to be quite similar to GoDaddy’s tool but they also offer a free version. Yes, you read that right, I said FREE! For the free version, you would have a subdomain of their site (for example: www.YourSiteName.YolaSite.com). They also have the option of having a custom design created for $349.

www.Yola.com – FREE to $49.95 per year. $349 for custom design.

Intuit also has a website template service. Like GoDaddy and Yola, you simply have to choose a template, plug in your information and click to publish with their hosting. They also offer a 30-day free trial if you want to test it out.

www.Intuit.com – $4.99 per month.

These are just a handful of tools in an ever increasing number of options. I’m personally hoping for a marriage between the design portion and the hosting/one click publishing portion and more of the functionality for those of us that market and sell products online – shopping carts, autoresponders, list management, affiliate management. But it’s getting closer and closer all the time. But for now, you just need to get out there and online. With tools like these, you can make that happen in a couple of hours with just a couple of clicks.

What are you waiting for??

Happy Entrepreneuring!

Katherine

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