It’s very easy nowadays to get a free website. Whether you want to start a small online business or just want to share your opinions with the rest of the world, you can get a website of your own with just a few clicks of the mouse. Before getting that site, however, you first need to answer the question, what do you want to do with your website?
If you just plan to share stuff with others online, you should probably go with a blog. A blog allows you to post articles, pictures, videos as well as links to other web sites, and it requires little technical knowledge. Visitors are also allowed to write and upload comments about what you’ve posted, and you can manage them, editing certain comments and deleting others you find inappropriate.
If you would like to establish a reputation for expertise on a particular subject so you can build a career as a freelance consultant, a blog is the ideal solution. A hosted blog service allows you to set up a blog in a matter of minutes. You can easily design your blog using the site’s pre-designed templates and write and post entries using its text editors. An alternative is to use free content articles from content generating sources other than yourself.
If you would like to restrict access to your blog to family and friends, you can create your blog using an online diary service or a tumblelog. Tumblelogs are essentially online scrapbooks or journals where you can upload pictures, video clips, text entries as well as links to other sites. They can also be used to social network through an online community.
On the other hand, if you’re setting up a website to do business, you will want to go with a free hosting service to set up your site. A free web host allows you to put e-commerce features on the site such as a shopping cart, multiple e-mail accounts and online payment solutions.
Unfortunately, there are a lot of disadvantages to using free web hosting. For example, many hosts will offset hosting costs by placing their own advertising on your free site. Your URL will not be a unique domain name, but will include the name of the hosting service, which might make the site seem unprofessional. And the amount of bandwidth you are allocated is limited, which means that if you start to get a lot of visitors, many of them may not be able to access your site once you have exceeded your allocation. If these limitations don’t bother you, go ahead and set up your site on a free web host. You can always upgrade to a paid web host once your business starts to take off.
Before selecting the web host to get your free web site, here are some criteria you should consider.
One, what is the amount of web space the host will give you? If you intend to put a lot of pictures, video clips and sound files, the allocation may not be enough for your needs. You also need to consider that you’ll want to have room to expand your site for future needs.
Two, does the web host allow FTP access, so you can upload pages you’ve designed yourself once you’ve learned how?
Three, what is the maximum file size and what are the kinds of files the web host allows you to upload to your free web site?
Four, is the web host reliable and fast? Many sites on free web hosts are often down or load slowly, which may cost you customers, since they will likely visit another site if they can’t access yours.
Five, is the bandwidth allocated to you by the free web host enough for your need? One to three GB of bandwidth allocation should be enough if you’re just starting your e-commerce site.
To reiterate, it is very easy to get a free website; what’s hard is designing and operating a memorable one that will inspire many return visits.