Frequently Asked Questions about web sites
Glockler.com
- www.glockler.com
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Answered by Chris Glockler
Glockler.com no longer designs web sites. Some of this information may be out of date.
Why is glockler.com no longer doing web sites?
Glockler.com was a side-business when Chris was single and living in an apartment.
A lot has changed since then, and we just have no more time.
| What do I need to have my own web site?
There are basically only three things you need to have your own web site:
- A domain name -
Usually mybusinessname.com, a distinctive name that people
will be able to remember to visit your site. This costs
anywhere from $15-30 per year.
- Domain hosting account -
When people type in a domain name, they are pointed to a computer
on the internet. You have to pay money for disk space on this computer
to put your web pages and pictures. Different companies that host domain
names offer different services and prices.
You should expect to spend $15 or more for a good service.
- A Web Site -
Now that you have the domain and disk space, you need to actually
put together web pages and pictures to make your web site. This expense
varies on what you want in your site and which web site designer you choose.
| Where should I host my site?
You can host your domain wherever you wish. Here are some questions you
may want to check before
committing yourself to anything, though.
Immediately following are a few respectible sounding services that glockler.com has found.
- Service / General
- Is the server Windows or UNIX based?
(Server script type is based on what type of server you have-
Glockler.com prefers Windows)
- Which version of the Windows Server are they running? (Windows Server 2003 is best, anything less than 2000 should be avoided)
- Is the .net Framework installed? (Not necessary, but glockler.com is migrating to ASP.NET over straight ASP)
- Is ColdFusion installed (if you need it)
- What is the maximum disk space?
(10-20MB is usually more than enough, unless you have a lot of pages/graphics)
- E-Mail
- How many POP Accounts?
- What is the maximum message size?
- What is the maximum mailbox size?
- Is e-mail purged after a specific amount of time?
- Can you set up unlimited redirects?
(forward e-mail address without using a POP account)
- Is there a "catch-all" mail account?
(mail sent to anyone@yourdomain.com be delivered to your default e-mail account)
- Do they offer user defined mailing lists? (can be used instead of redirects)
- Do they offer subscribable mailing lists?
- Do they offer webmail to check mail when away from home?
- What is the maximum traffic per month?
(good places start at 1GB/month, 10GB/month is usually more than enough for a new site)
- When can you contact the Support Staff? (You want 24/7/365)
- Where is the company physically located?
This does not matter, but it's nice if you have custom server
scripts that use the server time in the same time zone as you.
Glockler.com can get around this with ASP.NET
- Other Services that you may be interested in
(if you want more than just standard static web pages)
- Are Front Page extensions installed on the server?
(Glockler.com is migrating to FrontPage)
- Is Perl 5 installed on the UNIX or Linux Server?
(to run UNIX based Perl CGI scripts)
- Do you have access to a database?
(Windows Servers can use an MS Access database, UNIX cannot)
- Windows Server (IIS)? (for .asp / .aspx pages)
- MySQL? (for .cgi pages)
- Do they offer a secure server?
Is there an extra cost?
(for sensitive data in internet transactions, not usually required)
- Do they offer an Anonymous FTP account?
(not usually necessary)
- Do they offer telnet access to your account?
(usually only needed to debug perl scripts, etc)
- What web usage server logs are available?
- Are password protected web directories available?
- Price
- What is the monthly fee? Is there a discount for paying multiple months in advance?
- What is the setup fee?
- Is there a 30-day money back guarantee?
(better services offer this)
- Do you have to pay by credit card?
- Do you have to pay for several months at a time if you pay by check?
(this should not be a big deal)
- Are there one-time fees charged after the initial setup?
(adding POP3 accounts, etc)
- What happens for exceeding the maximum:
- Monthly hits/transfers
- Disk space
Support is a very important issue, so you may want to consider services that charge
around $15 - 20 and offer 24/7 support. After all, You don't want your site to be
down for a whole weekend when you can't tell anyone.
Following are a few web hosting companies that you can start looking at:
We've been with Timehost, Burlee/Interland, and 1planhost/webhostplus,
but with all of the problems we kept switching and are currently with
HostExcellence.
Specifically I recommend their professional plan.
Also note that some hosting companies offer free registration. I recommend that you not
take advantage of that offer. If you have a problem with your hosting company, transferring the domain
registration might be a hassle. Do yourself a favor and just register through
GoDaddy for $7-9per year. Search for
GoDaddy promotion codes
for the lowest price.
If you don't want to spend a lot on a domain and the hosting platform does not
make a difference, here are some cheaper alternatives. Their support will
not be as good as the above places and will not offer as many services.
I do not recommend using these services for primary business hosting. But, for
personal web sites, you can't beat these prices:
- GoDaddy &
SiteFlip.com -
$7+12/year, $0 setup, 100MB, perl, unlimited e-mails, 3000MB/month transfer, and subdomain redirects/masks!
- DotEasy -
$25/year, $0 setup, 100MB, perl, 10 e-mails, 1000MB/month transfer
...but be prepared. At these prices, they may go out of business and you'll need to find a new hosting company.
| How much will it cost?
There is really no way we can answer this without knowing what you want for a site.
Some designers charge by the hour, some by the project
Other than designer fees, you need a domain name and a hosting service.
It usually costs
$60 or less
to register a domain name for two years. Once you have your domain registered, you need
a hosting service. While we have seen services that charge $10 per month with a
$10 setup, you might want to spend more to be with a company that offers 24/7
tech support. See the section above.
| How do I get my own domain?
Fortunately, getting your own domain is not as hard as you might think.
The easiest way to register your
own domain name is to let your hosting company register it for you at the
time you sign up with them.
This will allow you to skip an often confusing step down the road, and save a few days.
To see what domains are available, go to
Network Solutions,
one of the companies that registers them.
Once there, click on the "whois" link at the bottom of the page. When you find a domain
that does not already exist:
- If you have found a web hosting company and are prepared to start paying
monthly fees, stop there, go to your web hosting company to sign up for
service and let them register your domain name for you.
- If you are not ready for a web site or
haven't found a hosting company but want to make sure no one else
takes your domain name, continue the purchase the domain.
Remember: There is a small fee for purchasing a domain name
Most hosting companies will register new domains for you when you sign up for
hosting. This is easiest.
Here are some Places to register your domain with:
| What is the difference between hosting & domain registration fees?
I just renewed my domain for two years, what is this bill for hosting?
This is perhaps the most confusing aspect of having your own web site with your
own domain (.com, .net, etc). Other than web design, there are two administrative
fees involved with having your own domain. You have to pay for the right to have
your own domain in the form of registration fees, but you also have to
pay hosting fees so that you can actually use the domain name.
- Domain Registration - This fee buys the actual domain name and
is usually $15-35 a year.
This fee just ensures that no one else can use
this domain name. It belongs to you.
- Hosting Fees - This is a fee that enables you to use the actual
domain name put web page(s) on it, and is usually $15-20 per
month
The best example that we can come up with to compare the difference between
domain registration & hosting fees involves your car.
| Web site Domain |
Your Car |
|
You pay a few dollars a year to register your domain name so that
you can legally use it.
|
You pay a few dollars a year to register your car with
the Department of Motor Vehicles so that you
can legally drive it.
|
|
You pay a domain hosting company several dollars a month so that you
can actually use your domain and put web pages on it.
|
You pay gas stations, etc several dollars a month so that you can
actually use your car and drive it.
|
To further confuse matters, if you have multiple domain names,
you have to pay registration fees for each name.
However, hosting fees may be consolidated to save you some money as
you can point multiple domain names to the same hosting account.
| How can I save money?
When choosing a web site, here are some ways to save money
- Set up your domain hosting service yourself.
(this also means that you don't have to share your credit card number with me)
- Type your own content and e-mail it to me.
- Take photographs / scan images yourself. However, if your scanned images aren't very sharp,
glockler.com suggests you let us scan them.
- Think of how you want your site to look and tell me what you want. Is there
a web site that looks similar to what you want?
- Keep your site simple. Back-end programs may require maintenance
from time to time, and can take a long time to develop.
However, do not sacrifice usability to save a few dollars . . . you may lose more
than you save! OR...
- Design the site yourself. There are a lot of powerful web site designing
tools available, including FrontPage, etc. These all allow you to design
static pages, and offer some tools for dynamic content, such as mailforms, etc.
If you want an online storefront, there are a lot of tools available which you
can set the site up yourself. shopping.yahoo.com for example. They're a little
expensive from what I hear, but they have a lot of visibility.
| | What are keywords and descriptions? (META tags) | How and When will I have a successful web site?
Registering your site with Search Engines is not all you have to do to have a successful site. You have to
promote your site. List your domain name (URL) with other popular web sites that list sites like yours.
Include your URL on all correspondences, advertise your site in as many places as you can.
Also remember that if you have a catchy address people will remember it.
You really must keep spending advertising money in order to have a successful web site.
There are marketing firms that enhance your web page so that search engines will
find it more often, but you must advertise using other means.
Nothing is free anymore.
| Why can I not find my site with a search engine?
If all search engines worked in the same manner, explaining why you can't find your site might
be a little easier. However, all engines operate differently, so this is very difficult to
explain. Here's a quick list of things that can lead to not finding your site.
- Recent Registration
- Poor keyword selection in META tags
- Important keywords not used in the domain name, file name, document title,
or opening paragraph.
- The site is not updated too often - some engines rank non-active sites lower.
- Ranked at/near the bottom of the list:
- User keywords are not specific enough
- Unpopular site
- New site
- Old site
Recent Registration
Most search engines (like Altavista) have an automated registration process and your site
should be posted in 2-5 days. Other sites, like Yahoo, are manually updated and report that
your site should be posted in 2-5 weeks.
Poor keyword selection in the META tags
The META tags should contain every possible keyword that someone could search on. What is
a META tag you ask? See the META section of this page.
This is a common problem
Ranked at/near the bottom of the list
User keywords are not specific enough
You really can't do anything to solve this problem, but for your information keywords
should be as specific as possible, and use quotes whenever possible. For instance,
if you were looking for me, your keywords should be: "chris glockler"
Poor keywords
would be chris or glockler or even chris glockler without the quotes.
This is a very common problem
Unpopular site
Many search engines rank sites on how popular they are and put them at the top of the list.
Popularity can be gauged by how many visitors go to your site from their engine, but more
commonly by how many other sites link to your site. When glockler.com registers our sites,
we register to 900+ engines, directories, and lists to maximize a site's visibility.
Regardless, it will take some time to pull your ranking up. How long?
Another tough call.
This is a common problem
New site
Some engines list new sites at the bottom of the list.
Not too many still do this, but there are a couple.
Old site
Some engines list new sites at the top of the list so that new content has a higher
visibility. Once again, this is not done too often, and it is likely not the problem
you are having.
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