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Building DIY Websites For Dummies
Create an attractive website that draws in visitors – no coding required!
There’s more to building a website than just picking a theme and dropping in text and images. Creating a site that attracts visitors and turns those visitors into customers requires some professional insight and a few tips and tricks. Building DIY Websites For Dummies guides non-designers through the steps of creating an attractive and effective website using today’s top web-based tools. This book helps you launch or improve your website designed to boost your entrepreneurial endeavors, small business, or personal passion. With this easy-to-follow Dummies guide, you can skip learning the complicated coding that runs a site and focus on the parts that attract visitors (and search engines). Grab this book and get expert insight on how to craft a usable design, create site content, improve site findability, and convert browsers into buyers.
Discover how to select hosting services, email providers, and beginner-friendly website creators Build your own website without needing to learn any code Learn how to create an attractive design, develop content, and present it all in a way that will appeal to your target audience Improve your site’s search engine findability and resonate with your target customer This Dummies guide is an excellent choice for non-designers who want to create a website without hiring someone to do it for them. Learn the ropes, follow the best practices, and launch your site!
There’s more to building a website than just picking a theme and dropping in text and images. Creating a site that attracts visitors and turns those visitors into customers requires some professional insight and a few tips and tricks. Building DIY Websites For Dummies guides non-designers through the steps of creating an attractive and effective website using today’s top web-based tools. This book helps you launch or improve your website designed to boost your entrepreneurial endeavors, small business, or personal passion. With this easy-to-follow Dummies guide, you can skip learning the complicated coding that runs a site and focus on the parts that attract visitors (and search engines). Grab this book and get expert insight on how to craft a usable design, create site content, improve site findability, and convert browsers into buyers.
Discover how to select hosting services, email providers, and beginner-friendly website creators Build your own website without needing to learn any code Learn how to create an attractive design, develop content, and present it all in a way that will appeal to your target audience Improve your site’s search engine findability and resonate with your target customer This Dummies guide is an excellent choice for non-designers who want to create a website without hiring someone to do it for them. Learn the ropes, follow the best practices, and launch your site!
364 pages, Kindle Edition
Published February 27, 2024
9 people are currently reading
9 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
July 15, 2024
Great Web Builder Book
I liked this book by DeRosa.
I found it a good basic introduction to DIY website creation.
As I am helping teach coding, this is a great guide to assist with new frontend developers.
Check it out if this interests you.
3.8/5
I liked this book by DeRosa.
I found it a good basic introduction to DIY website creation.
As I am helping teach coding, this is a great guide to assist with new frontend developers.
Check it out if this interests you.
3.8/5
January 29, 2025
Useful, comprehensive guide to building your own website. It's aimed at DIYers, not web pros. It covers more topics than I expected, including creating buyer personas and copywriting.
It's worth reading even if you're working with a company to build your site, because you'll be more informed about what makes a good website, and better able to contribute.
Notes
Resonating with Visitors
Buyer Persona Template (under Downloads)
Buyer persona basics
• Age
• Working status, job title
• Education status
• Marital status, children, if any
• Employer size and dynamics
• Timeline of typical day (tells about priorities, pain points)
Buyer persona worries
• Do they lack time?
• Do they lack money?
• Do they lack expertise?
• Do they care about their reputation?
• Are they worried about doing a good job or keeping their job?
• Are they worried about health and well-being of family?
Customers' motives may have nothing to do with your products/services.
Buyer persona roles, goals, challenges
• Role (volunteer, parent, manager, caretaker, CEO, etc.)
• Goals
• Challenges (pains, obstacles to goals, etc.)
Create buyer personas for your least favorite customers, to help determine why you appeal to them. You'll be better able to stop marketing to those types, and spot potential bad fits when they contact you.
When people land on your site, you want them to think, “Yes! I've found what I'm looking for!”
Create list of emotions site should evoke
• Relief, serenity
• Trust, confidence
• Satisfaction, happiness
• Excitement
Modern design techniques
• Professional photos (not stock)
• Collages layering images, shapes
• Hand-drawn illustrations
• Videos
• Full-width rows
• Oversized typography
• Typographic heroes (single, static, strong image that fills entire row, overlayed with strong message)
• Parallax scrolling
Problem-solution spreadsheet
• Problem People Have
• Problem in Detail
• Benefits of Our Solution
• How We Address This Problem
• Features
Reference problem-solution spreadsheet for pages, blog posts, social media, ads, brochures, videos, etc.
Nailing SEO Basics: Search Engine Optimization
On-page SEO
• Provide unique, quality content
• Include relevant keywords
• Cite high authority backlinks
• Use internal links to link within site
• Include structured data markup
• Check page speed
How to get backlinks
• Link to site from social media
• Get listed in association directories (chambers of commerce, networking groups, associations, etc.)
• Guest post for reputable sites in your industry
• Ask local, regional, or national paper to do a story on your company
• Write excellent, complete how-to guides or other content, and ask other sites in industry to link to them.
• Publish free guides or tools
• Look for unlinked mentions of your brand, and ask those sites to add links
• Ask suppliers or customers to link to you.
• Apply for industry awards that include backlinks
• Identify broken links on industry sites, create excellent alternative content, and ask sites to link to it.
• If your business is local, get in local directories and citations
• Submit content via HARO (Help a Reporter Out)
• Ask influencers to link to you, or use influencer brokers
• Interview people and post interview on your site; they'll likely link to it
Killing It with Keywords
Tools to check domain authority
• https://moz.com/domain-analysis
• https://ahrefs.com/website-authority-...
• https://lp.semrush.com/Metrics-for-Si...
• https://loganix.com/domain-authority-...
Finding seed keywords
• Search for phrases customers would use to find you or competitors. Record those with results that include competitors.
• Check "People also search for" and record relevant searches.
Keyword tools
• Moz
• Ahrefs
• Semrush
• Google's Keyword Planner (free)
Blog post idea tools
• Answer the Public
• Ubersuggest
• Google Trends
SpyFu tells what competitors are ranking for.
A Place for Everything and Everything in Its Place
Pages almost all sites have
• Home
• About
• Contact
• Privacy policy
• Terms of service
Common pages
• Page for each product/service
• Page for each product/service category
• Blog
• News
• FAQ
• History
• Team
• Partners
• Events
• Success stories
• My account
• Cart
• Features
• Pricing
For ecommerce, put product categories as top-level menu items (unless you have too many).
For ecommerce, include Customer Service menu in footer, containing My Account, Returns, Shipping, Contact.
Check competitors' sites for ideas for menus, pages, sitemap.
Main menu should focus on your company and products/services.
Top menu (at very top of site) may contain links to social media profiles, contact you, locate you.
Common footer menu items
• Contact
• About
• History
• Board of Directors or Team
• Employment or Careers
• Terms of Service
• Privacy Policy
• Returns Policy
Put in footer pages that aren't about your products/services.
Page titles
• Include keyword
• Make interesting, intriguing
• Make relevant to search intent
Content Scaffold: Supporting Your Website’s Information
Service pages
• Pain points, features, benefits
• Testimonials
• Numbers, statistics
• FAQ
• Explainer video
• Relevant news, posts
• Case studies
• Team members (if visitors choose a specific provider)
• Links to other services
Testimonials are more likely to be viewed when integrated into pages than on their own Testimonials page (though that's still worth having).
Support pages for nonprofits
• Header/hero row should contain strong message (compelling why that addresses visitor’s motivation for donating) and strong image or video
• Donation form
• Mission/impact statement
• Story about how org has helped someone
• Details about corporate giving or matching
• FAQ
• Social sharing links
• Other ways to support
Allowing donors to dedicate donation to someone encourages donation.
Redirect donor to quality thank-you page and send follow-up email. Give heartfelt thanks, tell how donation will be used, link to relevant info, give your contact info, give tax info.
About page
• Overview of purpose, activities (mission statement or description of products/services)
• Differentiators
• Video explaining what you do
• History (qualifications, background)
• Bios, headshots
• Story of how products/services have helped others (in text, photos, and/or video)
• Education, certifications, achievements, distinctions, awards
• Stats (e.g., number of customers, products/services sold, locations, employees)
• Testimonials
• Volunteer work
• Press/media mentions
Product titles
• Brand name
• Model name
• Product name
• Feature
• Material
• Product type
• Size
• Color
Brief product description: immediately address pain points product solves, mention benefits, describe how product is better than others.
Long product description: give more details; address remaining customer concerns, encourage buying.
Blog posts should be at least 300 words; over 1,200 is better.
Homepage
• Compelling headline that conveys value proposition, what you offer, why visitor should choose you; base on customer's pain points, motivations
• Links to other pages and content, based on order of importance
• Video (background or standalone)
• Social proof (ratings, reviews)
• Awards, accolades
• Specific numbers (stats, achievements)
• Galleries, portfolios that convey what makes you unique, your offerings, benefits
• Features, benefits
• Lead magnet (ebook or other downloadable, free consultation or demo, mini course, etc.)
• Recent blog posts
• Upcoming events
5 main ideas for site
• Build trust with visitors
• Resonate with visitors
• Let visitors know your offering
• Give visitors same info in multiple places
• Don't make visitors think much; make site intuitive
Preparing Your Site’s Content
Generating copy
• Write 1-8 sentences for each of main points on outline. Explain service, problem, and/or solution.
• Convert main points into descriptive, friendly, strong, emotion-evoking headlines.
• Include keyword in a few places; aim for keyword density of 0.5 - 3%.
To see Google results without filtering applied, append &filter=0 to end of the search results URL.
WebP works well for photos with rich colors, line art, animations, images with transparency. Most current browsers support it.
When naming images, use lowercase only, and hyphens instead of spaces and underscores.
Stock video sources: Shutterstock, Adobe Stock, Storyblocks, Pond 5, iStock, VideoHive
Deconstructing the Anatomy of Web Pages
WordPress page builders
• WPBakery is compatible with many themes and plugins, and has many add-ons. It uses shortcodes, which make it difficult to switch to another page builder or theme. Its interface is slightly less intuitive than other page builders. It can cause bloat that affects load times.
• Divi's visual editor allows real-time design and previews. It has many pre-made layouts and ability to customize many details. It has a large user community. It has many additional modules and child themes. It has a steeper learning curve than other builders. It uses shortcodes, which make it difficult to switch to another page builder or theme.
• Elementor offers WYSIWYG real-time editing and instant previews. It has many features. There are many 3rd-party modules.
• Beaver Builder provides smooth and intuitive drag-and-drop that integrates with most themes. It includes real-time front-end editing. It outputs clean code, making it easier to switch to another page builder or theme. There are many modules, but some require premium add-ons like PowerPack or Ultimate Addons. It's the author's top choice.
Make logo max of 150 px tall so header isn't too tall.
Avoid sliders. Visitors don't like waiting to watch series of images or videos. It's better to have a separate section on page for each message. Have one main message at top of page with picture, video, form, button, etc. so visitors see most important info right away.
Generating Leads from Your Website
Form anti-spam (try, in order)
1. Honeypot
2. Put math problem in form, and hide Submit button until problem is correctly answered.
3. reCAPTCHA
4. 3rd party anti-spam service (e.g., Akismet)
Calls to action (CTAs)
• Headline: compelling, concise, telling benefit to visitor
• Subheading: 1-2 short, specific sentences with context or details (e.g., save money, make things easy)
• Button or link with specific, actionable text (verb on button)
Optimizing Each Page for Search (On-Page Optimization)
Optimizing URLs
• Use keywords in order
• Make all words lowercase
• Use hyphens between words
• Make URL short
• Nest pages or products under categories
• Remove stop words (a, an, and, of, the, etc.)
High-quality external links can help your SEO because they signal that your site is authoritative and trustworthy, but excessive external linking can seem spammy.
Securing Your Website
Author likes BlogVault and MalCare for WordPress backups.
Author likes MalCare for WordPress anti-malware (scanning and cleaning).
Keeping Up with the Joneses: Measuring What You Built and Making It Better
FTC rules say you can't trade anything or offer payment for a review in any way, unless reviewer clearly states they were compensated.
It's worth reading even if you're working with a company to build your site, because you'll be more informed about what makes a good website, and better able to contribute.
Notes
Resonating with Visitors
Buyer Persona Template (under Downloads)
Buyer persona basics
• Age
• Working status, job title
• Education status
• Marital status, children, if any
• Employer size and dynamics
• Timeline of typical day (tells about priorities, pain points)
Buyer persona worries
• Do they lack time?
• Do they lack money?
• Do they lack expertise?
• Do they care about their reputation?
• Are they worried about doing a good job or keeping their job?
• Are they worried about health and well-being of family?
Customers' motives may have nothing to do with your products/services.
Buyer persona roles, goals, challenges
• Role (volunteer, parent, manager, caretaker, CEO, etc.)
• Goals
• Challenges (pains, obstacles to goals, etc.)
Create buyer personas for your least favorite customers, to help determine why you appeal to them. You'll be better able to stop marketing to those types, and spot potential bad fits when they contact you.
When people land on your site, you want them to think, “Yes! I've found what I'm looking for!”
Create list of emotions site should evoke
• Relief, serenity
• Trust, confidence
• Satisfaction, happiness
• Excitement
Modern design techniques
• Professional photos (not stock)
• Collages layering images, shapes
• Hand-drawn illustrations
• Videos
• Full-width rows
• Oversized typography
• Typographic heroes (single, static, strong image that fills entire row, overlayed with strong message)
• Parallax scrolling
Problem-solution spreadsheet
• Problem People Have
• Problem in Detail
• Benefits of Our Solution
• How We Address This Problem
• Features
Reference problem-solution spreadsheet for pages, blog posts, social media, ads, brochures, videos, etc.
Nailing SEO Basics: Search Engine Optimization
On-page SEO
• Provide unique, quality content
• Include relevant keywords
• Cite high authority backlinks
• Use internal links to link within site
• Include structured data markup
• Check page speed
How to get backlinks
• Link to site from social media
• Get listed in association directories (chambers of commerce, networking groups, associations, etc.)
• Guest post for reputable sites in your industry
• Ask local, regional, or national paper to do a story on your company
• Write excellent, complete how-to guides or other content, and ask other sites in industry to link to them.
• Publish free guides or tools
• Look for unlinked mentions of your brand, and ask those sites to add links
• Ask suppliers or customers to link to you.
• Apply for industry awards that include backlinks
• Identify broken links on industry sites, create excellent alternative content, and ask sites to link to it.
• If your business is local, get in local directories and citations
• Submit content via HARO (Help a Reporter Out)
• Ask influencers to link to you, or use influencer brokers
• Interview people and post interview on your site; they'll likely link to it
Killing It with Keywords
Tools to check domain authority
• https://moz.com/domain-analysis
• https://ahrefs.com/website-authority-...
• https://lp.semrush.com/Metrics-for-Si...
• https://loganix.com/domain-authority-...
Finding seed keywords
• Search for phrases customers would use to find you or competitors. Record those with results that include competitors.
• Check "People also search for" and record relevant searches.
Keyword tools
• Moz
• Ahrefs
• Semrush
• Google's Keyword Planner (free)
Blog post idea tools
• Answer the Public
• Ubersuggest
• Google Trends
SpyFu tells what competitors are ranking for.
A Place for Everything and Everything in Its Place
Pages almost all sites have
• Home
• About
• Contact
• Privacy policy
• Terms of service
Common pages
• Page for each product/service
• Page for each product/service category
• Blog
• News
• FAQ
• History
• Team
• Partners
• Events
• Success stories
• My account
• Cart
• Features
• Pricing
For ecommerce, put product categories as top-level menu items (unless you have too many).
For ecommerce, include Customer Service menu in footer, containing My Account, Returns, Shipping, Contact.
Check competitors' sites for ideas for menus, pages, sitemap.
Main menu should focus on your company and products/services.
Top menu (at very top of site) may contain links to social media profiles, contact you, locate you.
Common footer menu items
• Contact
• About
• History
• Board of Directors or Team
• Employment or Careers
• Terms of Service
• Privacy Policy
• Returns Policy
Put in footer pages that aren't about your products/services.
Page titles
• Include keyword
• Make interesting, intriguing
• Make relevant to search intent
Content Scaffold: Supporting Your Website’s Information
Service pages
• Pain points, features, benefits
• Testimonials
• Numbers, statistics
• FAQ
• Explainer video
• Relevant news, posts
• Case studies
• Team members (if visitors choose a specific provider)
• Links to other services
Testimonials are more likely to be viewed when integrated into pages than on their own Testimonials page (though that's still worth having).
Support pages for nonprofits
• Header/hero row should contain strong message (compelling why that addresses visitor’s motivation for donating) and strong image or video
• Donation form
• Mission/impact statement
• Story about how org has helped someone
• Details about corporate giving or matching
• FAQ
• Social sharing links
• Other ways to support
Allowing donors to dedicate donation to someone encourages donation.
Redirect donor to quality thank-you page and send follow-up email. Give heartfelt thanks, tell how donation will be used, link to relevant info, give your contact info, give tax info.
About page
• Overview of purpose, activities (mission statement or description of products/services)
• Differentiators
• Video explaining what you do
• History (qualifications, background)
• Bios, headshots
• Story of how products/services have helped others (in text, photos, and/or video)
• Education, certifications, achievements, distinctions, awards
• Stats (e.g., number of customers, products/services sold, locations, employees)
• Testimonials
• Volunteer work
• Press/media mentions
Product titles
• Brand name
• Model name
• Product name
• Feature
• Material
• Product type
• Size
• Color
Brief product description: immediately address pain points product solves, mention benefits, describe how product is better than others.
Long product description: give more details; address remaining customer concerns, encourage buying.
Blog posts should be at least 300 words; over 1,200 is better.
Homepage
• Compelling headline that conveys value proposition, what you offer, why visitor should choose you; base on customer's pain points, motivations
• Links to other pages and content, based on order of importance
• Video (background or standalone)
• Social proof (ratings, reviews)
• Awards, accolades
• Specific numbers (stats, achievements)
• Galleries, portfolios that convey what makes you unique, your offerings, benefits
• Features, benefits
• Lead magnet (ebook or other downloadable, free consultation or demo, mini course, etc.)
• Recent blog posts
• Upcoming events
5 main ideas for site
• Build trust with visitors
• Resonate with visitors
• Let visitors know your offering
• Give visitors same info in multiple places
• Don't make visitors think much; make site intuitive
Preparing Your Site’s Content
Generating copy
• Write 1-8 sentences for each of main points on outline. Explain service, problem, and/or solution.
• Convert main points into descriptive, friendly, strong, emotion-evoking headlines.
• Include keyword in a few places; aim for keyword density of 0.5 - 3%.
To see Google results without filtering applied, append &filter=0 to end of the search results URL.
WebP works well for photos with rich colors, line art, animations, images with transparency. Most current browsers support it.
When naming images, use lowercase only, and hyphens instead of spaces and underscores.
Stock video sources: Shutterstock, Adobe Stock, Storyblocks, Pond 5, iStock, VideoHive
Deconstructing the Anatomy of Web Pages
WordPress page builders
• WPBakery is compatible with many themes and plugins, and has many add-ons. It uses shortcodes, which make it difficult to switch to another page builder or theme. Its interface is slightly less intuitive than other page builders. It can cause bloat that affects load times.
• Divi's visual editor allows real-time design and previews. It has many pre-made layouts and ability to customize many details. It has a large user community. It has many additional modules and child themes. It has a steeper learning curve than other builders. It uses shortcodes, which make it difficult to switch to another page builder or theme.
• Elementor offers WYSIWYG real-time editing and instant previews. It has many features. There are many 3rd-party modules.
• Beaver Builder provides smooth and intuitive drag-and-drop that integrates with most themes. It includes real-time front-end editing. It outputs clean code, making it easier to switch to another page builder or theme. There are many modules, but some require premium add-ons like PowerPack or Ultimate Addons. It's the author's top choice.
Make logo max of 150 px tall so header isn't too tall.
Avoid sliders. Visitors don't like waiting to watch series of images or videos. It's better to have a separate section on page for each message. Have one main message at top of page with picture, video, form, button, etc. so visitors see most important info right away.
Generating Leads from Your Website
Form anti-spam (try, in order)
1. Honeypot
2. Put math problem in form, and hide Submit button until problem is correctly answered.
3. reCAPTCHA
4. 3rd party anti-spam service (e.g., Akismet)
Calls to action (CTAs)
• Headline: compelling, concise, telling benefit to visitor
• Subheading: 1-2 short, specific sentences with context or details (e.g., save money, make things easy)
• Button or link with specific, actionable text (verb on button)
Optimizing Each Page for Search (On-Page Optimization)
Optimizing URLs
• Use keywords in order
• Make all words lowercase
• Use hyphens between words
• Make URL short
• Nest pages or products under categories
• Remove stop words (a, an, and, of, the, etc.)
High-quality external links can help your SEO because they signal that your site is authoritative and trustworthy, but excessive external linking can seem spammy.
Securing Your Website
Author likes BlogVault and MalCare for WordPress backups.
Author likes MalCare for WordPress anti-malware (scanning and cleaning).
Keeping Up with the Joneses: Measuring What You Built and Making It Better
FTC rules say you can't trade anything or offer payment for a review in any way, unless reviewer clearly states they were compensated.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews