How to Create a Website Without any Web Design Experience

February 6, 2023

Let’s take your online presence to the next level with a simple, professional website - no coding skills needed.

Building a website can appear to be intimidating, but it really shouldn't be. Thanks to easy-to-use website builders, even those without web design experience can create a fully functional website that’s up and running in no time. Instead of individuals or small businesses relying on a professional web designer with a high upfront cost and possibly additional fees for any future edits or changes, many choose to create their websites all by themselves. Not only does this saves them money but it also gives them complete control over the design and content of their website.

With many available options of user-friendly website builders out there, it is important to pick the best one for your specific needs. Several of the options out there are free, but they often come with limited features and annoyance like ads and/or a lack of options to connect to your own custom domain. For personal sites or blogs, this may not be a big deal. On the other hand, for a small business building a website or a professional making a digital resume, these hindrances would be a deal breaker.

How much does it cost to build a site with a website builder?

For those who decide to go for a paid one rather than a free website builder, there are a variety of price ranges. Some will cost between $10-$50 a month, while others can range from a hundred to several hundred dollars a month. It’s important to take note of what is and isn’t included in your subscription.

Other than the website builder, purchasing a domain and hosting are two other costs you will incur when starting on a website. Booking Zone includes hosting costs in its monthly subscription, but not the domain. Some platforms, especially in the lower price range may not include either. You can purchase a domain with Booking Zone's platform through our connection with Google Domains, or bring a custom domain you already own. If the website builder you choose does not include hosting in its subscription, you can expect to pay an additional $5-$30 a month, usually with a discount available when purchased yearly.

Designing a website from scratch made easy

Once you have decided on which website builder to use and your hosting situation, it is now time to get creative and make your website stand out from the rest. With your platform chosen, you now have to design the website. The design will define the overall look and feel of your website, which is the face of you or your business online. Two main things to focus on are making sure the design is visually appealing and easy to navigate. This can be easily done by any non-technical person due to the availability of templates that already have design and navigation built-in to it. All you have to do is add your information and branding to customize it.

When people want to know what the easiest website builder to use is, it usually comes down to the templates. With templates, the hard design work is already done, and customizing it for you or your business can be done in minutes. Several website builders, including Booking Zone's, have a wide variety of templates to choose from so you don’t have to start from scratch. You will have access to professionally made web designs, all available for you to start your website with ease.

Not just another small business website

No one wants their website to be forgettable, they want to stand out from their competition. Personalizing the website with your logo and branding is what you do to differentiate yourself. Your logo is often the first thing visitors notice when they see a website, so it's a key part of your branding.

After adding the basic information to your template, you can now start picking unique colors to match your brand. From the background color of the site to the colors of the headers and body text. Typically, you will try and match or at least complicate the colors you already have in your logo or possibly at your business location. With fonts, you want to pick the best ones to complicate your site, making sure they are easy to read and not going to frustrate readers.

Quick Guide on how to Start a Website

I. Decide on platform and hosting

Pick a website builder and hosting solution. Booking Zone can provide both with the ability to purchase a custom Domain.

II. Template

Choose from a wide variety of premade templates to start. Booking Zone has large selection to choose from.

III. Branding

Add in your information into the template, along with your logo and any branding.

IV. SEO

Optimize your site for the best results on search engines. Utilize Booking Zones built-in SEO features to maximize your technical SEO.

V. Publish & Share

Publish your site and then share it with your customer base, from social media to an email list. Watch the visitors come in.

Website designed, What’s next?

You have your template, your branding, and your design finished. Next up is adding your content, images & video to bring the site to life. From an introduction or overview on the home page to more detailed information on an About Us page, you want the key details about you or your business to be found easily. Each additional page you decide to add should also give viewers a basic idea of what can be found on it if it is not already obvious by the title.

High-quality images and videos can then be added in to add more visual appeal and enhance the overall layout of the site by breaking up text and adding focus points. It is preferable to use personal pictures or videos that reflect you or your business when possible. When you don’t have enough of your own pictures to use on your site you can always go with stock photos.

Stock pictures and videos are pre-made, royalty-free images and videos that are available to use for various purposes. There are several stock photo providers, some free such as Pexels, and others, like Shutterstock, will require you to pay to use their images. Booking Zone includes in its website builder the ability to add free images from Pexels, or the option to purchase licenses for individual images from Shutterstock to use on a website. You can also upload paid or free stock photos from other providers that you may prefer, and then use those on your website.

How do you get visitors to your website?

Outside of advertising and in-person spreading the word, you are going to want to find additional ways to get visitors to your website regularly. If prior to having a website a business was using only a Facebook page, they could announce their new site there for an initial boost of awareness. Another way to drive traffic to your website is to optimize your website for search engine ranking. Search Engine Optimization or SEO is the process of improving a website so it appears higher on results when searched on Google or other search engines.

There are multiple aspects of SEO, but the main parts can be categorized into on-site SEO, off-site SEO, and technical SEO. On-site SEO is the content of your page, so if certain keywords that someone might search appear on your site, then it has a better chance of appearing higher on search results.

Off-site SEO involves anything that is not directly done on your site, like increasing the number of links that link to your site coming from other sites. Search engines take note of how many other websites link to one as a point of reference to how useful a site might be.

Technical SEO involves more of the underlying code of a website and the overall structure and secureness of the site. Some examples include meta and schema tags in the head of HTML code, which give search engines an idea of what the site is about, titles and headings on the page, and the overall speed of the page. Increasing the loading speed of your site, particularly on mobile devices is an important part of the technical side of things as search engines don’t want to send users to low performing sites.

Booking Zone’s platform takes care of a lot of the technical SEO for you. With our editor, you can update meta and schema tags without needing to learn any coding yourself. All sites are optimized for mobile automatically, we use fast loading servers and we utilize a global content delivery network to ensure that media is loaded quickly no matter where the users are located. All sites also come with an SSL certificate which secures the site and stops Google Chrome, or other browsers, from telling users that the site is unsecure upon visiting.

Advance consideration for your newly built site

With your website fully built and ready to be found on the internet, there are a few additional steps you can take to help your site out. One thing to consider is gathering analytics on the visits to the site. With analytics, you can see where on the internet visitors are coming from, where they are located, and how much they are interacting with each part of your site. This can be helpful when deciding to add, remove or change content on the site, and to track what worked in terms of marketing and other promotions.

Google Analytics is a popular tracking service many people use, and Booking Zone’s system includes built-in analytics that automatically gives you key analytics on your site and visitors. Along with Booking Zone’s built-in analytics, you can easily add in Google Analytics without even needing to add new code due to our built-in integration.

Also with a newly built website, you can also create or expand an E-mail list for staying connected with your customers. Having a visible option for people to join your mailing list on the home page, whether in the body, a sticky header or a popup, will encourage users to sign up. They may sign up just for updates and the latest information, or you can entice them to sign up with discounts or special offers. There are several dedicated email services for managing such a list available or you can ask about Booking Zone’s marketing CRM platform to use. Regardless of your choice you can promote your email list on our platform.

Wrapping up: Choosing the right platform for your needs

Creating a website is critical for a small business or individual who wants to have an online presence. Social Media also is an important part of your digital footprint, but with those platforms, it is just the content you have to create. A personalized website gives you the ability to put more of your brand into it, giving a better reflection of you or your small business.

Making a website yourself will save you money that can be spent elsewhere. Once you have your budget for your website builder, hosting, and domain, you can spend the money saved by not using a professional web design service on other avenues such as advertising the new website you have created.

Building a website doesn't have to be difficult or intimidating if you choose the right platform. There are many different options available, but Booking Zone is user-friendly and makes creating websites accessible even for those without experience or coding knowledge.

We also have an online booking platform that is great for family entertainment centers, bowling alleys and any kind of venue that would want to make reservations. Also available is our digital waiver system that is perfect for combining with reservations for roller skating rinks, paintball parks or axe throwing venues. With the right platform in place, creating your own website is easier than ever!

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