So let’s move to the next secret and that’s Right Tools, The Right Way… How To Choose The Right Hosting, Editorial Theme & Other Critical Components For A Peace Of Mind.
Would that be interesting to learn?
Before we get there, I would want to tell a story of 2 business owners. Just like you, these two business owners, also knew, launching a website will help their business grow.
The first one thought, ‘Ah! It’s just a website, I will be able to handle it all by myself.
I know there are themes available in the market, I will learn and create a website exactly the way I wanted’.
His self-employed attitude crept in.
So like any self-employed, he lost focus on why he started his business? what his business goals are?
He started learning all the technical aspects of the websites.
Spent a ton of time, and eventually got burnt out.
The Second business owner, on the other hand, thought, ‘why should I pay a premium for a website?’
And hired an unknown free-lance web developer simply because this business owner allotted ridiculously low budgets for marketing, just like any self-employed professional.
Basically, the web developer, that he hired, was working in a corporate and quoted a low price just to work on part time – freelance basis. Later, this freelance web developer abandoned the website project halfway because he was transferred to another city with additional responsibilities in his full time job.
The common thing about both the business owners is that, they were frustrated at the end and dropped the whole plan of creating a website. They now have a bitter belief that websites don’t work in their industry.
Their website is a big mess now!
There goes the quote that, “A Bad website is like a FLAT Tire, you can’t go anywhere until you change it”.
So let’s deep dive into the Second Secrets of a Stunning Editorial Site.
STEP#1, the right hosting service. There are a couple of good hosting services for websites, out of them the top 3 are GoDaddy, BlueHost and SiteGround. All these hosting services offers two types of hosting, one – Linux and second – Window. Out of which Linux Hosting is more robust, fast, stable and has great user interface. So even an amateur will be able to handle the backend with minimal knowledge.
Linus supports CPanel with One Click Install for Content Management Systems, which is, with just one click you will be able get a basic decent looking website.
The Hosting Service should have awesome tech support. GoDaddy and BlueHost has tech support teams in India, so you can call the tech team for any help as well as you will be able to mail them. On the other hand, SiteGround will take your questions only through mail, however they are very prompt and reply queries within 2 hours.
When we compare price GoDaddy has a competitive price for One Website Hosting. So if you are only going to have One Editorial Site and One Company Website, then GoDaddy is best for your pockets. Alternatively, BlueHost and SiteGround are cost effective when you have 4 website or more. Some business owners choose to have many website as their online marketing strategy and BlueHost or SiteGround suits them the best.
STEP#2, why do we use content management system in comparison to any other web technology? Before answering this question, we need to know what a content management system is. A content management system is a website platform where the web agency creates all the structural part of the website. The Client later can change all or parts of the content through an easy interface. The content can be title, text, images, audios or videos. Content management systems are best because the client need not depend or pay a web agency for any content addition or modification work. Since it is easy and intuitive, they will be able to maintain it on their own. Of all the content managements system, 23% percent of the world’s website is run on WordPress. The Number one reason why WordPress is popular is Google loves WordPress. Search Engine Optimization or SEO in WordPress is way better than any other technology. WordPress is highly secure and easily scalable, that is, if your magazine site goes viral and you want to take the website to the next level, WordPress will be stable for any amount of traffic. Some of the famous website done on WordPress are Sony Music, BBC America, Indian Express, Time Inc and Facebook Newsroom. WordPress websites can be turbo boosted to a lot of functionalities with plugins. Editorial Site are best with WordPress CMS.
STEP#3, a theme in WordPress, gives the design and structure to the website. There are a lot of free themes available in WordPress. Some of them may look good, but the team behind it may not be trusted source, codes can be bulky, and they may lack regular updates making your website vulnerable to hackers. The best themes are paid themes, they are Avada, Genesis and Thesis. These three themes are flexible, SEO friendly and secure. When you add page builder plugin to these theme, you will be able to drag & drop and create any design of your choice. You don’t need to know coding or design skills, just drag and drop the section you need in the places you want. The best page builder plugins are Divi, Site Origin and Beaver Builder. The most important plugin are SEO Plugin. When you add them to your website, you will be able make you content SEO Rich. The best of them are Yoast SEO and All in One SEO.
When the three best themes are rated with respect to light weight, security, SEO friendly code and Mobile responsiveness, Genesis Framework came the First for themes and Beaver Builder for Page Builder.
No wonder, Matt Cutts former Google SEO Head uses Genesis Framework for his own blog site. If you want to learn SEO from him, you will find a lot of his videos in YouTube Google Channel.
Again, let recap on Secret #2: Right Tools, The Right Way: “How to Choose the Right Hosting, Editorial Theme & Other Critical Components for a Peace of Mind”. Step#1, have the right hosting service. Step#2, choose WordPress, the right CMS platform for Editorial Site and Step#3, install the right theme and plugins.
