Your Scrapbooking Business Website

As we've mentioned before, you MUST have a website to adequately promote your business. Get your own domain name – don't use one of the free services that require you include their name in your web address.

It will be much easier for people to find you online if you have a unique dot com or dot net address. Let's say your business name is Scraps R Us. You want potential customers to be able to type in www.scrapsrus.com rather than www.scrapsrus.geocities.com.

It's easy to find places to register your domain name and get your own website. The first place to check is with your Internet service provider. Many companies offer this service to their customers for a small monthly fee that includes registering your name, giving you your web space, and providing e-mail addresses that go with your domain name.

A note here about e-mail address: DO NOT use a free e-mail provider like yahoo or hotmail. Most web-savvy people know that these are free services and it makes you look unprofessional.

These free service mailboxes are relatively small and can fill up quite quickly. This could cause customers to have their e-mails to you bounced back to them with a note that the mailbox is full. Again, it makes you look unprofessional.

You can also find plenty of places online to register a domain name and get your web space. I did a Google search for "register domain names" and found plenty of places that provide services for a small amount of money per month. Many of these sites also offer web site builder that give you tools to design your web site and get it up and running.

If you're good with software programs, two of the most commonly used programs used in designing websites are Front Page from Microsoft and Dream Weaver. Both of these programs are relatively easy to use and they allow you to get really creative with graphics and fonts.

When you start advertising your web site, make sure it is up and completely running. If it isn't ready yet and customers receive an "Under Construction" message, the chances of them re-visiting your site later are lower. Why take the chance?  Don't advertise your web site until you are fully ready to accommodate visitors.