Either for fun, or if starting a website for your own home-based business, here’s a few helpful tips to start your own business website and hopefully avoid some problems.

When a person first wants to start their own website. There are few costs they need to take into consideration, (these are not all in the order they might appear in your individual quest).

Domain Registration
Hosting

Graphic’s Editor

Page Editor (unless you program from code, which can get a little long after a while)

Pictures (Unless you plan on taking all of your own)

Merchant Account

Today I just want to briefly mention Graphics editor. I once purchased a full photoshop suite from an O.E.M. reseller. About 8 months later, my hard-drive crashed and I when I contacted them to get another key to unlock the software, they were no where to be found. I came to find out later that the company I purchased from got caught in a big scam and is now editing his graphics in prison.

Honestly, if you have the money and want to invest it in some good software, I would suggest you get Photoshop (at least) the other programs that come in the suite are nice as well.

If you have don’t have the money or otherwise don’t want to spend hundreds of dollars on software you may not use, I would suggest you get The GIMP. This program takes a little bit to download and install but is really a helpful little tool.

It’s a little less than super-user-friendly, but i’d imagine that you could install it less than 15 minutes… Visit Gimp.org and check it out… For people who have windows and want to skip right to installing it… Here’s the quick links.

http://gimp-win.sourceforge.net/stable.html once you get here, Install the appropriate add on, (I prefer to run XP but select the add on appropriate for you), then download and install the “GIMP FOR WINDOWS” button.

Install it, then enjoy! You’re that much closer to making the website of your dreams!