Finding a Platform for Your Digital Message

Small Business Website: Platforms, Hosting, Themes

Platforms for Small Business Websites

Now that you have a site map for your website, you already know:

  • what components or topics will be on your Menu (navigation buttons)
  • the key message for pages of that Menu (brand and voice of your business)
  • a purpose (or objectives) for your site and what it needs to do (show off work, blog, sell, etc.)

And if you're really on top of things, you've created a written content strategy, ready to go, with a great content mix perfect for your audience.

Now you need a platform, typically called a CMS (content management system) to build and customize your web presence.

Your CMS is where you will design, implement and administer your online assets.

To stay competitive in the digital marketing environment, your site must be updated consistently. This also helps search engines notice you.

Integrate your site with all your business marketing initiatives and use it to create a community with prospects and customers. It should be interactive and evolving.

But first, you need to figure out the "mechanics" of having your business website.This is the infrastructure or framework, you use to build and develop—the first blocks of your digital empire!

Time to pick your platform, hosting, and theme.

Platforms.

You want a platform that offers:

  1. Stability, including security and backup features
  2. Performance and system support
  3. Price points suitable to your budget
  4. Flexibility (to customize, change and grow)
  5. Responsive design (to properly view from mobile and other devices)
  6. SEO capabilities

Check out this buyer's guide for a review and comparison of the most popular CMS platforms. Keep in mind, the most important thing for a business site is that it be proprietary so that everything is yours and you are in control.

WordPress, Joomla, and Drupal are well-known business choices though Drupal is very niche oriented.

And there are others but I suspect that the fairly new Rainmaker Platform will become more and more talked about, as well as a few others who are gaining momentum.

WordPress.org is the proprietary (closed source) site most used, and self-hosted which makes it yours, though it is sometimes confused with WordPress.com which is an open source blogging service run by a company called Automattic. Learn more here.

The size, type and budget of your business may impact your choice but for now the frontrunner, regardless of budget, is WordPress.org.

This is the staggering statistics: (SmallBizTrends.com explains more here.)

  • 60.4 percent of all the current websites online built using site builders were built using WordPress.
  • 23.8 percent of all the current websites online were built using WordPress.

HOSTING AND THEMES

Your platform needs a home, called your web host or hosting site. The most popular and reputable ones that come to mind are:

I think one or more of them will register a domain name for free when you select one of their packages, but InterNic is probably one of the oldest places to register yourself, and sometimes save money, or allows you to buy a longer term agreement.

Once you own a domain name, you can move it to any hosting site.

Now to bling it! That's where a theme comes in.

There are free themes and premium themes (paid) but the important thing to consider is using a reputable company like StudioPress, with themes powered by the Genesis framework, for example, that offer tested themes and all kinds of help if you need it.

Some themes won't be compatible and can break your site.

The theme works within the platform to customize the look and feel of your website. Look around for one that matches both your needs and style, especially if you don't know HTML or coding.

Don't worry, you will pick up the important things about these initial elements as you go and as you work with them.

Eventually, they function only in the background of your business website adventure, so selecting reliable vendors at this stage helps reduce the chance you'll experience problems.