Learning Web Design, HTML, graphic design, and cloud based web design tools
It varies a lot from person to person on what it takes to learn the tools necessary to build a nice website. This article provided an overview of what it takes, but is not a comprensive step by step guide. If you want to build just a very basic website, you can use the All in one web based tools like Square or Wix. While most of these sites look nice in the commercials, almost every FYI web design projects I have seen has turned out pretty bad. It’s difficult to make a site look nice with these tools., and they are not Search Engine Friendly. If all you need is a basic cheap site and want to go down that road, I recommend using Godaddy as they are a one stop shop, cheap, and most important you can call them on the phone. Also be cautious about using other smaller shops and buying your domain name thought them. Some of them will only “rent” you the domain name after you “buy” it from them, and sometimes won’t let you transfer your domain off their system.
Let’s say you decide to FIY Web deign it the fancy way, and build a website. Where do you begin.
- You have to know how buy a domain name and setup and hosting account with a company like Godaddy, HostGator, BlueHost or a handfull of other hosting providers. I prefer one of the 3 previously mentioned.
- You can either build your site with HTML and FTP, or you can use WordPress
- You need to know the basics of graphic art design and web based images, with a Program like PhotoShop
- You need to know how to use and integrate 3rd Party Cloud systems include but not limited to Google Analytics, PayPal,
Tasks to Build a Website
Building your logo
You need to build your logo and graphics, I use Photoshop. I would say it takes about 8 hours to get the basics down of this tool. Once you learn it, It’s all sorts of fun to make cool graphics. Photoshop is the tool I enjoy most on a computer. You can actually build your entire website in Photoshop, and have that program export it html. But the html is not SEO friendly, nor does is it responsive and won’t look nice on a phone phone. You need to know how to size graphics appropriate for the web, have a decent understanding of aspect ratio, then if you know layers and layers styles you are pretty much set.
HTML or WordPress
WordPress is probably the way to go for most DIY Web Designers. You can build a WordPress site without know hardly any HTML or CSS, thought those skills are helpful. Learning the basics of HTMl and CSS takes a fraction of the time it takes to learn most other computer languages, but it’s still at least a month of hard work for most people.
Tips for DIY Web Design:
- Keep the deign simple.
- Visit some of the template stores for ideas, or if budget permitting buy one and start from there.
- Make sure you build a responsive deign website. Responsive design websites change how the look and the browser gets smaller. They “respond” to the screen size. This is a must in today mobile first Internet.
Cloud Provider for DYI Design
Gooday Website builder
Google Website builder
Wix
Quickbook’s system
Good Coding Tutorials: – Coming Soon
Good luck to all you DIY Web Designers. And if you get tired of it, contact the Webmasters to build you a nice website for a reasonable cost.