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Adventures in Web development

If you run a small business with limited staff, the job of upgrading your Web site from "brochureware" to one where customers can actually buy things is daunting. If you're like us, you don't have the time or patience to learn HTML or deal with large HTML editor applications such as Microsoft's FrontPage or Cold Fusion. Fortunately we've found some tools that can give HTML novices a leg up, as well as drive site traffic and revenue.

We tested tools from Interland, Scorpio Software and Elibriz Software. Head online for lists of dozens more, with guidance on picking out what you need (see www.nwfusion.com, DocFinder: 9133).

Web-based site builders

Any Web hosting firm worth its salt should offer Web site building tools. If yours doesn't, consider taking your business elsewhere. One host with excellent site-building tools is Interland (wwwinterland.com). Recently, the company launched its Platinum Business Services. For $95 per month, Interland provides a custom-designed Web site, as well as one-on-one consulting that helps you market products and services, enable online transactions, and talk to customers and prospects.

At the heart of the service is Interland's Site Builder, a Web-based Web-site creation tool that helps you build a site using a variety of templates, tools for site promotion such as e-mail newsletter creation, keyword and yellow page advertising, and e-mail account management.

The Platinum service includes a 10-page Web site, e-commerce features such as shopping carts and secure payment processing, a search-engine submission tool and marketing tools to help generate revenue.You also get a domain name for two years and an e-mail account with up to 50 mailboxes.

Using an Interland-provided demonstration account, we set out to build our site. To get started,Site Builder offers templates for businesses ranging from accounting to hair salons, so there's probably one to fit your needs.

Because the tool is Web- and iconbased, you just click to add pictures, text or other content. The templates include sample text that you edit.We got the hang of them quickly and completed a fantasy football "team page" in about three hours. The site offers clip art and designs that aren't the best quality, but you'll probably want to skip them and add your own photos and art anyway You also can click a button to see the HTML code and edit it.

When you've completed the design, a one-button click publishes your Web site. Now you're ready to promote it. Interland offers some great tools to help small businesses handle search engine submission, gift certificate creation, e-commerce and other business-related needs.

Getting noticed

A great Web site isn't worth much if no one can find it. So the next big step is to get search engines to increase your site's "hit rating" so when people perform searches your site comes up. During our adventure we tested two software products aimed at helping you reach more eyeballs.

Scorpio Software's Golden Keywords 3.0 finds the best keywords for your Web site, based on an Internet search of popular keywords used at other sites, plus a user-based ranking on the phrases it finds.A feature takes the top keywords and exports them into a text file that you cut and paste into your own pages.

The application installed quickly and easily But the "getting started" help file was Spartan, which meant we had to fumble around pushing buttons to figure out the steps and what it all meant.The application was somewhat helpful - coming up with a few keyword phrases we hadn't considered for our site. The software has a 10-day evaluation period; after that it costs about $35. Go to wwwscosoft.com for more details.

Rather than generating keywords and phrases, another approach for generating hits is to use a Web site analyzer. These products scan your Web site for the most relevant and popular keywords and phrases. We tested Elibriz Software's Site Content Analyzer 2.0.The tool was a breeze to use; we simply typed in the URL we wanted analyzed, pushed a button and the software did the rest.

But in our test, the software came up with words that were irrelevant to a keyword search, such as "http" and "color_green." For some reason it picked up the file names of the images. So after running a scan,you'll need to tell the software to ignore certain phrases. The software costs about $80, and a 30-day trial download is available. Go to www.sitecontentanalyzer.com for more details.

Site Content Analyzer was an interesting way to find which words were most popular. But we preferred Golden Keywords' approach of generating new keywords. That said,Web site analyzers are useful for seeing what keywords your competitors are using (so you can use them too),so you might want to use both.

Net.Worker

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