Have you ever wanted to build a website? Or perhaps you already have and want to build another? Whatever your situation, through the use of this guide we would like to help you learn how to build a website from scratch. Websites are now commonplace, they have only been around for about 20 years, but too many it was as if we have always had websites.

There are many questions you will need to ask yourself before starting out on your project. Be clear of your objectives, from the start.

Why are you building the website? Is it:

1. To make money
2. To write about a subject you are passionate about
3. To help out a charity or a good cause
4. To learn a new skill
5. Or maybe it is for another reason not listed above

A website project can be daunting, this is why we have broken the guide down into three steps. These should provide you with all the answers you need on how to build a Website from scratch, the steps are:

1. Step 1: Website project initiations
2. Step 2: Tools needed to build the website
3. Step 3: Building the Website

Budget - You will need to decide on a budget. Make sure this budget is realistic. Do your utmost to keep to this budget, without compromising the quality of the project.

Timescales - The following points should be considered on timescales:

1. Decide on your timescales.
2. Is the website urgent or can you take your time?
3. Create a task list with everything necessary to complete the project.
4. Be realistic about your own time, especially if you have a full-time job (your family might like to see you sometimes).
5. Do you intend to use other people on the project, if so this would reduce timescales

Technical skills Consider the following:

1. Do you have the experience to complete the project
2. Are you fully aware of the entire project lifecycle or do you need some help

Content - You will need content for your website. Where is this to come from. If you are to produce this yourself, unique content takes a long time to produce. Avoid plagiarism, this will not make you popular with your visitors if they find out and also you maybe subject to legal threats/action and complaints if other websites realise what you have done.

Graphical design - This is the “look and feel“ of the website. The color scheme, imagery, fonts, styling, imagery, etc This is something that generally you can either do or cannot do. If you have no experience of graphical design you will either need to get some training and/or subcontract this to another person.

Navigation Structure – Plot out the navigation of the website. Try to list every page in the site and structure into logical groupings (e.g. level 1 (e.g. Animals), level 2 (Dogs), level 3 (Afghan Hound), etc Once you know your navigation structure you will feel like you have a project and you will also be able to accurately work out the content required for the website.

Links to website - If you wish to have external links to your website it would be ideal to identify these and create a library of links as soon as you can in the project.

Integrated Search engine - Are you intending to add an integrated search engine within your website? Or instead will the users have to find their way around by working through the navigation areas. If you intend to add a search engine, this will add some complexity but this is possible..

In step 2 we consider the tools you will need to build the website.

Graphical Design Software - If your website has (A) A graphical design requirement and (B) You intend to do this yourself, then you will need Graphical Design Software. Some software is freeware but most of the packages are fee paying (e.g. Corel Draw, Adobe Flash, etc)http://download.cnet.com/windows/graphic-design-software/

HTML Editing Software - To create a Website you need to write in HTML, a software language that can be interpreted by a web browser. There are two main ways of achieving this:

1. HTML Editing Software – Applications like Coffee Cup, EvfSoft offer competitively priced HTML Editing software solutions. There are hundreds of these tools on the market, ranging from freeware to $500+. With all of these tools though, a knowledge of HTML and associated web languages is required to some extent.
2. Blog tool and publishing platform – Applications like Blogger and Wordpress allow website solutions to be built rapidly with minimal/no knowledge of HTML and associated languages. These tools are ideal for the website author who has no coding experience and have lead to a large number of additional websites being created on the internet.

HTML Code Book - If you intend to write a website yourself and have taken the HTML Editing Software route it is advisable that you gain access to HTML training resources. There are plenty of HTML resources on the internet, but from personal experience I also think a book is well worthwhile. A book I have used is – HTML, XHTML & CSS Sixth Edition by Elizabeth Castro, published by Peachpit Press, available for $23 on Amazon.http://www.amazon.com/HTML-XHTML-Sixth-Elizabeth-Castro/dp/0321430840/ref=dp_cp_ob_b_title_1

FTP Software - File Transfer Protocol (FTP) Software is needed to transfer your website solution from your computer to your Internet Service Provider (ISP). In a lot of cases your ISP will provide a solution as a part of your hosting package. FTP Software tends to be relatively straightforward to use, examples of FTP Software available for free include Cute FTP and Coffee Cup FTPhttp://www.coffeecup.com/free-ftp/.

Templates - Template design will include:

1. Choosing the styling, fonts, etc for the website
2. Determine how many templates you need (different pages may require different template formats) and then designing each template
3. Choose a color scheme that suits your branding
4. Add any photography/imagery that you wish to be incorporated into your template

Development - Development will consist of many parts:

1. Implementation of an internal search engine (if applicable)
2. Implementation of navigation schemes and associated pages
3. Implementation of a database (if applicable)
4. Insert any code from external websites (e.g. Google Adsense to add adverts to earn you money or Google Analytics which provide visitor statistics)

Add Content

1. Progressively add the content into each page, apply spell checking and formatting checks

SEO and marketing

1. Ensure that during content process as many keywords as possible are used, this will increase the search engine position of your web pages for certain search terms
2. Market your site as actively as you can, there is no point of a website without visitors

ISP/FTP transfer software

1. Transfer the web pages using the FTP Software to your ISP