If you happen to be a programmer, you don ’ t need us to tell you how to build your site, at least not in terms of technical skills, but please do read this section carefully for the marketing information.

If you are an average, nontechnical person, the actual physical construction of your site can be done in one of several ways. First, if you are using the web host we recommend, at Www. CashMachine Domains. com, you have access to an excellent site building tool. This is known as a WYSIWYG (pronounced “wizzy-wig”) tool, which stands for “ what you see is what you get. ” In other words, you do not need to know hypertext markup language (HTML), which is the

Programming language used on web sites, to dictate instructions on arrangement of text and function. Although it looks much like standard English and is not very diffi cult to learn, it is no longer necessary for you to be conversant in HTML to build a good basic site.

Another very popular web site building software is Microsoft ’ s FrontPage. FrontPage is part of the basic software package installed on most Windows - based personal computers. If you are familiar with Microsoft Word, you will fi nd FrontPage fairly easy to use. A more complicated but still popular web site building software is Dreamweaver.

We focus on blogs in the next chapter, but this is a good time to introduce you to WordPress. WordPress is an open source (free) software most often used for blogs. Its technology is very attractive to the search engines, and there is a growing trend to design entire sites using WordPress. For example, Jillian and her family operate a number of affi liate sites built in WordPress. Finally, another alternative in constructing your site is to buy a ready - made template (built in FrontPage or WordPress) and then personalize it.

Neither of us is particularly technical in orientation, although of course we have acquired some technical skills along the way. Nevertheless, Jillian builds most of her sites herself in FrontPage. Joe contracts with a webmaster who builds and maintains his sites. As you can imagine, both approaches have their advantages. The best thing about building and maintaining your own site is the ability to make changes instantaneously, without having to wait upon the convenience of another person.

A good middle ground is to hire a contractor to build you a web site template with a variety of different page layouts, perhaps fi ve or six. Then you can simply replace or update text as needed, or change out photographs or graphics to create new pages. You may want your template to include a custom - made header, which can be produced with Adobe PhotoShop, based on ideas you provide.

Rent A Coder ( Www. RentaCoder. com ) is a wonderful resource for the small business owner. You can visit this site and set up an account in a matter of minutes, and look at sample work from contractors in all areas. At Rent A Coder you can hire writers, graphic artists, web site builders, software coders, and experts with a multitude of other skills. These contractors live all over the world. As you probably know, there

Are very highly skilled technical personnel in India, Pakistan, Romania, Argentina, and a number of other countries where the economies are depressed and jobs are in short supply. Many of these people have organized small companies and cottage industries to bid on jobs through Rent A Coder and similar sites. They do great work at very low cost, and pool their profi ts to provide good incomes for themselves, relative to their local economies. They often speak excellent English, and it is very easy to communicate with them. Of course, we have also used Rent A Coders from less exotic lands such as Virginia and New Mexico.

To solicit bids from Rent A Coder, simply write a clear explanation of the work you want done, and post it on the site. You can invite specifi c contractors to bid, or you can offer it for general bidding. You will usually begin receiving bids almost immediately. At Rent A Coder, you can probably have your template pages designed and built for under $50 U. S.

Other Internet businesses provide similar services, such as eLance (Www. eLance. com) and Guru (Www. Guru. com ), but in our experience, Rent A Coder has the lowest overall rates. The best thing about using these services is the ability to see samples of the contractor ’ s work, and to check their ratings from previous jobs. At the end of your job, both you and the contractor will also submit ratings on each other, so of course it is important for you to be professional, courteous, and fair in your dealings with the contractors you use.