Let’s see what we have in our mail bag…
Ok, I need advice because I’m pulling my hair out here. I’ll just spill all the beans here.
I’ve purchased SiteBuildit and I’m in a day 2 hell that’s lasting weeks – just in the brainstormit phase of building a master keyword list and viewing numbers on demand and profitability. Additionally, even if I just want a plain black background for my site, I’m an artist and want it to look great in the details, navigation buttons, images, etc., and most SBI sites
aren’t that “pretty”.My concern is that SBI advertises that they get your presold warm market first by helping you achieve a “top 3%” status on the search engines… BUT I’m not a techie, (I know a lot less than you about websites!!) I’m an artist, and just day 2 feels like it’s killing me.
Knowing these things above, do you think xsitepro would be better in my situation, and if so, how? Would I end up purchasing a lot of add ons? Don’t know much about Adsense, but have already signed up for a few affiliate programs I’d like to promote.
Don’t wanna know HTML, etc. Remember, I’m an artist – just wanna sell prints and do my artwork so I can add more art to my site. Can you help?! – Angela
Hey Angela,
Sorry to hear of your frustration. I’ve only used SBI on one project that is now long dead. The last time I used it was about 2 years ago. Frankly, I’ve never looked back.
The manual in SBI in my opinion is really not a manual at all. Rather, it is an introduction to Internet Marketing. That said, I think the info in the manual is great especially for newbies but on the other hand it is not so great if all you want to do is just build a site. Yes, I understand that the goal is to teach people to build it right the first time. But that’s just not the way some people learn. Me included. Give me the trials, tribulations and hard knocks. I think we learn more
that way but I digress.
You are also correct in that there are limitations to creative expression in SBI. Personally, I find many SBI sites old fashioned. A site does not have to be pretty to make money and I whole heartedly agree with that. But at the very least in keeping up with the times or in businesses like yours where you should be able to express some of your creativity is important.
After all, how can you convince people of your art if your site cannot reflect that. You knew that already.
Now let’s get into XSitePro. They have just relaunched the software and I have not upgraded yet. It does look very promising and has tons of improvements which I’m happy to see. But not being able to play with it yet I’m not sure if this is the right tool for you.
I think compared to SBI, you certainly have more creative freedom. Yet, on any packaged site builder tool, you will be somewhat limited. It is the extent of your limitation that is different. If you want total creative freedom, nothing works better than getting your hands dirty either with DreamWeaver or ExpressionWeb. While you do not need to know HTML to use them, these tools work much, much better if you do. Honestly, I highly suggest you to pick up some basic HTML because if you own a
website, you’ll need it. Maybe not right this minute, but as you go along.
Here are two other options I’d like to suggest. InternetBasedFamily Site Builder. This is truly easy to use and they have lots of beautiful templates. You don’t need to know a single piece of HTML and there’s room for creativity. Just keep in mind my last note – that no matter what site builder you use, there will be *some* limitation. It is difficult to give a list of what the limitations are because it depends on what you’re trying to achieve but this is pretty robust, plenty of options, recommended for those who are just starting out.
The next option is to get a web host and have WordPress installed in it. This gives you 100% freedom in just about anything. The only thing is, for beginners you may not be able to tinker with the design on your own. Adding content however like blogging and articles are a snap. If you can write email, you can publish with WordPress.
If you go the WordPress route, Here’s what I suggest you do. Get someone to install WordPress for you. If you prefer to do it yourself, you can get detailed help from Blogging Starter Pack.
Then, thumb through the free themes directory to see if there’s anything you like, get whoever installed the blog for you to put up the theme and make changes to the design.
For something unique, you can also design it on your own. Draw it out if you like, make an image of your design. Hire a WordPress theme developer to make that design of yours into a theme.
Hope this gives you something to work with.
