Starting a new website can be daunting, particularly if you’re working hard to get your business off the ground at the same time. Your website is vital to your online success, so it pays to get it right from the start. But where do you start?
In this article, we’ll cover website building options and go through an example of how to build a website using one of the top website builders available today.
Step 1: Deciding on a site-building method
The way that you choose to create a website depends on how much time you have to spare and how much money you’re willing to spend. Building a website from scratch could mean writing every line of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript code by hand, but unless you’re a computer science student interested in learning every detail of how a website ticks, this is too slow. Website development knowledge is useful, but there’s little point in re-inventing the wheel.
The next option is to use a content management system (CMS) like WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, Magento, or Shopify. You install the CMS on your web hosting space, and it gives you a framework to build a website on. CMS are getting increasingly versatile, but each one usually has strengths that make it best suited to certain industries. Shopify, for example, is great for ecommerce websites.
Even more versatile are website builders. A website builder aims to be a tool that you can use to create any type of website without touching a line of code. The best website builders do let you add in your own website code if you want something specific, though. Top choices today include Weebly, Wix, and Format, but in this guide, we’ll look at the website builder from Squarespace. Other website builders follow a similar process, they just have different interfaces.
Step 2: Choose a site category
Squarespace, like most website builders, has an on-boarding wizard that enables you to set up your website with a default look and feel that matches your industry. Choose a site category by describing your business or selecting from the list.
You’ll also be asked about your top goals for your website. The selections you make will populate your website with a few default options. For example, if you select that you want to collect donations online, your website will start with a donation button.
Step 3: Select a template
Choose from the list of designs for your website. There are hundreds of templates from which to choose. This template will be a framework for your website, but you can change all text, images, and pages.
Step 4: Create an account and name your website
If you don’t already have a Squarespace account, it’s time to sign up. You can use Google, Apple, or Facebook logins or sign up with your email. Another wizard will take you through the steps of naming your website once you’ve signed up.
Step 5: Change fonts, colors, and animations
Squarespace’s tools are found on the left-hand side of the page. Click on Design, and explore the options available to you. Changes here are global, so they’ll be reflected on all pages. You can choose a new color palette, the global text types of your website, and the animation style of site elements as they appear on the page.
If you want to, you can change the style and shape of buttons, the look and feel of your site’s products, and the 404 page that visitors see if they arrive at a page that doesn’t exist. There’s a huge list of customization options, and you can use custom CSS if you need to make style changes that aren’t available in the Squarespace interface.
When you’re happy with the changes you’ve made, click Save.
On any page, click on Edit, move your mouse to the top of the page, and choose Edit Site Header. Here, you can upload your own logo and change the title of your website. You can also choose the elements that appear in your header. Note that in our example, because we specified that we wanted to take donations online, the header has already been populated with a Donate button.
Step 7: Replace text and images
Browse through your entire website, and click Edit on each page you want to change. In Edit Mode, you can click on any text, image, or page element to edit it. You can change the style and formatting of text, and replace the template images with your own. Squarespace has a built-in image editor that you can use to adjust the brightness, contrast, and saturation of images. It’s also easy to choose different layouts for your images, such as collages or lightboxes.
Step 8: Add and remove pages
By clicking on the Pages menu item, you can add new pages to your website. You don’t have to start with a blank page either. You can add a designer page layout, a blog, a store, a portfolio, or an events page.
Pages can be organized into folders, and you can specify which pages don’t appear on the navigation menu.
Step 9: Set or connect a domain
Click on Settings and choose Domains. You’ll see the built-in Squarespace domain where your website is available, even if you don’t own your own domain name yet. Click on your Squarespace domain, and choose a more user-friendly URL for your website.
You can also buy a top-level domain from Squarespace, transfer your existing domain name to Squarespace, or point your domain name to Squarespace without changing the domain registrar.
Step 10: Publish your website
To publish your website, you need to upgrade to a paid plan. Every website builder has different pricing. Squarespace starts at $12/month if you pay annually. Payment is made by credit card.
Once you’ve paid for the plan, your website can be published by clicking on Settings and choosing Public from the Site Availability menu.
Summary
There is more than one way to build a website from scratch. One of the easiest, fastest, and most versatile methods is using a website builder. In this article, we showed you how to get a website off the ground quickly by using Squarespace, but there are many other top website builders you can use. Try out a few, and see which feels the most intuitive to you.