You’ve decided on the company you want to build your business with. They have a great product and a solid Compensation Plan. They have a good training and support system. Best of all, you get a state of the art website to market with. It has all the bells and whistles you could need to get prospects to buy your product or join your business, once they land on your site that is.

You’ve done everything you need to do to set up your company replicated website, you’re ready to make some sales. OK, so where are your customers? They should be here by now, right?

Have you told them where you are and how to find you?

Location, Location, Location

When you start a new business in the off-line world your told you need three things to start a profitable business, location, location, location. You have your location, you’ve taken out ads for your business, you may even have a little map to help new customers find your place.

In the “Real World” there only so many ways to get from point A to point B. On-line there are no clear-cut paths to anywhere. You can go to any website from any website. No street markers, no one way signs, just go where you want to go.

To get prospects to want to go to your site they have to know about it first.

Your Own Web Address

What you need is a lead-in site, your own personally branded website to educate your potential customers and business partners about your product and opportunity. You also need to demonstrate why they join with you rather than one of the thousands of other company distributors.

You have probably just made an investment to get started and are on a budget. You need to get good value for your promotional efforts.

Free  Website Hosting

You can get a free website from several different places, but there are some disadvantages you need to consider:

1. You have to follow their rules and regulations. You can’t anything you want.
2. For the “free” hosting you will have ads on your site that you don’t control.
3. Your site could be deleted without warning, months of work con disappear in an instant.
4. You get a more generic URL, not as personally brand-able

That being said there are definite benefits to free sites:

1. It’s free
2. It’s a good way to practice.
3. It can be set up faster.

Two places you can get a free website are Squidoo.com and WordPress.org.

Squidoo lets you set up a Lens about almost anything and you can customise it somewhat.

WordPress sets you up with a free WordPress blog and is more customisable.

Paid Website Hosting

Paid hosting is a better alternative and costs less than $10.00 a month.

Two things your hosting account MUST  have are cPanel and Fantastico De Luxe. CPanel is how you control your website and Fantastico De Luxe let’s you set up a blog on your site with just a few mouse clicks.

Having multiple domains and unlimited bandwidth are useful to have farther down the road, but don’t worry, your hosting can grow with you.

Setting Up Your Website

Step 1.  Choose your domain.

This is one of most crucial decisions you will make, be sure you pick something for the long haul.

If you can get http://YOURNAME.com. It’s a good way to let people know it’s YOU, not some faceless company. If you can’t get your name try to get it with hyphens or last name first.

Another good choice would be to use your product name in your URL, if your company allows it. Something that connects you and your product.

Most hosting accounts will include one free domain registration with your purchase. To save time you can use GoDaddy to check on the availability of your domain name. If your choice is already taken they will suggest viable alternatives.

Step 2. Get Your Hosting Account

Google “hosting” and pick your provider. I currently use BlueHost as my provider. It has everything I need for $8.95 a month, paid yearly.

Another good choice is HostGator. Their Hatchling plan starts out at $4.95 a month. You only get a single domain but you can always upgrade later when you need to.

Whichever hosting company you decide on make sure they have cPanel and Fantastico De Luxe.

Step 3. Setting Up Your Blog

Log on to your cPanel account.

Scroll down to software services and click the blue smiley face Fantastic De Luxe.

Look for WordPress on the left side of the page, click it.

Fill in the required information and click the “install WordPress” button. You now have your own blog.

Here is a free video Blogging For Beginners that covers the basics.

Step 4. Customise Your Blog

Go to your newly created blog and click the log in link on the left. Look for the Appearance tab, click to expand, click add new themes.

Find a theme you like and install it.

Step 5. Add Unique Content To Your Blog

Not so easy at first, the more you do the better you get.

I like using free resources, when they are of high quality. Here is one with 15 content creation ideas to get you started, no opt-in required