DOMAIN REGISTRATION FEE

The domain name is the most important step of a website. It is the address or URL at which your site resides on the Internet. Your site would be homeless without it so to speak. The name is usually the name of your business. If your business name is Jim's cookies then your URL should be jimscookies.com. So when logged onto the hosting companies website you would do search for jimscookies.com. This will tell you whether that name is indeed available. If not, you will have to choose a different name that is available. You can try jimscookies.net or .bus. Registering a domain name is quick and easy and, unless you pick what are known as Generic Term Names like beer.com or wine.com, domain names are very inexpensive. Generic Term Names are just that. They are generics for brand names. For example, Beer is a generic for beer brands such as Molson, Coors, etc. These names can be high in demand so there's usually a higher fee for registering, renewing and for hosting service as well.

Most likely your business name won't include a Generic Term so you won't need to worry about these high fees. There are also what are known as premium domain extensions. .com is a domain extension. It is a TLD (Top Level Domain). These are inexpensive but a premium extension such as .bus, .fashion, .tip, .design, .online, .store, etc. can be very expensive. Some of these cost about $500,000.00 to acquire and yearly renewal is about $60.00 or more. Registering a domain name using the simple .com extension is one of the least expensive steps of obtaining a website. The cost is usually paid yearly not monthly and is around $16.00 depending on which Hosting Company you choose. The Hosting company will do both register the name and host it if you choose.

As already mentioned, registering a domain is a yearly fee and must be renewed every year. Registry can be done through a Hosting company such as Entirely Digital, Name.com, Hostinger, or NameCheap just to name a few. You can do a search of your own for a complete list. Once on their site you'll be able to search for the domain name you wish to use and will have the option of registering it as well as purchase hosting for it. If the web design company you wish to use charges hundreds of dollars per month or year for domain names simply tell them you will acquire it on your own. A legitimate, respectful developer will always tell you up front that you can do that.

The bottom line is do your own homework before making a decission. Check into companies that will do both host and registry and won't rip you off like Entirelydigital.com, NameCheap.com, Hostinger.com, or Name.com. These compamies offer both shared hosting and registry for under $100 per year combined. Getting your own domain name and hosting is quick and easy. The sites listed here will walk you through the process in minutes.

DOMAIN HOSTING FEES

Some developers charge a monthly or yearly fee for domain registry and hosting. I have personally spoken with web design companies that charge as much as $300 per month. One company is charging $750.00 per year. Another charges $1000.00 per year. When called out on it they will quickly change their tune. They will say the price is not only for hosting but for maintenance, technical support, etc. They will quickly smoke you as much as they can. Here's the truth...

If you read our page about hosting then you already know how low the prices can be for this service. There are 5 main types of hosting; Shared, VPS, Dedicated, Cloud, and Managed Word Press. These are colocation servers that are rented out to those who need them. If you don't have your own servers you will need this service. Shared hosting is just that. Your site shares storage with other sites on the same server. This is the most cost worthy choice if you're just starting out and will not have a large site. The price can be as low as $3.00 per month. The reason for the low price is because you're not only sharing the server you're also sharing the price with other users. The downside is that if there's a site with high traffic sharing the same server it can slow your site down a bit. This is usually unnoticeable and is not a problem for small sites that don't use a lot of storage or bandwidth. SEO Optimization can be effected by a slow loading site but, as already mentioned, this should not effect small sites. Also, when it comes to SEO, we highly suggest purchasing SSL when acquiring your domain name. This will help boost your SEO ranking. If you're not sure what SEO is don't worry. We will be getting into that shortly.

Dedicated servers are more expensive because they offer physical isolation and more storage and bandwidth. These servers reduce vulnerability risks because you are the only user. These are geared for very large sites with over 100 pages like e-commerce sites. Dedicated Servers have faster load times but, again, is a waist of money for smaller sites especially if you're just starting out. The reason dedicated server prices are high is because you are generally not sharing bandwidth with other users and, therefore, are not sharing the price as with shared hosting. Dedicated prices can go from about $60 to about $120 per month or more. Our site uses Shared Hosting from a company called Entirely Digital. Price? $5.49 per month for Shared Hosting plus a .16 cents International Fee since they are located in Canada. So, why are some developers, who claim to offer shared hosting, charging much higher prices for this service even for small sites? Read on to find out.

The next time you talk with a "developer" who claims to offer hosting ask them if you will have access to the hosting server. They may tell you that you cannot. They will tell you that the reason is for security purposes. They will say they own the servers and they are on a shared hosting platform and other sites are using their servers as well. Sounds reasonable, right? Here's the truth. You can actually purchase as many names as you want from hosting companies. The developer will tell you they will host your name then they will go to the hosting company they are actually using and pay the company for your domain name registry which is about $16.00 per year. Then they will purchase shared hosting service from them which can be as low as $3.00 per month. So, they purchased a domain name for someone for about $52 per year. They will then charge unsuspecting clients as much as $150.00 per month or more for that hosting. The real reason they don't want you to know the name of the hosting company is because if you would log onto their site you would quickly realize just how much you're being ripped off. Shared hosting is like renting an apartment. Renters share infrastructure like plumbing, electricity but have private living spaces. Shared servers are partitioned so users cannot access other user's data and whether or not it is shared or dedicated everyone has their own name and password to access their partition. You also share the cost hence the low fee making shared hosting cost effective for those just starting out with a small site. A real bona fide hosting company such as Entirely Digital will not only charge a very small price but will also make sure you have access to the account. As a matter of fact, you will setup the account with log in info. that only you will have access to. You will be able to upload or download your files, along with a hole list of extras that come with the service. This is what the shysters don't want you to see!

If a developer tells you that they will host your name and you will have your own account with log-in access but charge outrageous fees for this service, here's how that works. Most bona fide hosting companies have reselling options. Web developers can resell the company's hosting service and make it appear that they (the developer) are the owners. The developer sells the hosting service as his own brand giving the illusion that he owns the servers. The developer has a master account enabling him to brand his own name using the supplied interface making the true hosting company invisible to clients. This allows the developer to charge any price he wants because the interface will only show his pricing not the prices of the parent company. Are you seeing the trend here?
Take the time to search for hosting companies and be careful of these outrageous fees. A true bona fide company who deals solely with hosting is usually your best bet. Companies like the ones mentioned above under Domain Hosting Fees are well known for their service and true pricing. The bottom line is domain name registration is renewed yearly and shouldn't cost more than about $20 per year for a .com name. Hosting on a shared server should be under $10 per month and can be as low as $3.00.

SEO OPTIMIZATION FEES

This is the most important aspect of any website so we're going to spend some time on this subject. It is incorporated into a site for one main reason.. to get noticed on the web and turn clicks into sales. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is a feature every website needs. 93% of today's websites are found through Internet searches. It is the very reason every business needs a website in today's world of competition. The competition is fierce and everyone is vying for the top of the search engine. You want your site to be found because if it's not you're losing business. You not only want your site to be found but you also want click throughs that end with a sale. But do you really need to pay hundreds of dollars per month to keep your site at or near the top of search engines? For that matter, is it found at or near the top even when paying those high fees? There's a lot of explanation here so let's get into it. Let's start by exploring just how search engines work.

Major search engines such as Yahoo, Bing and others have what are known as Index Crawlers. Google uses what is known as a Googlebot. These crawlers discover and index websites automatically by navigating the Internet usually through links. They scan HTML, images, keywords and more and make it searchable by storing the info. in the search engine's index. This in no way guarantees your site will be found or even listed on the search engine. That's where SEO optimization comes into play. Part of SEO is done by adding meta tag descriptions on the page that gives search engines information needed to index your business on the search page as well as using ALT tags for images and links. These are just basic SEO elements that should be incorporated into the page at the time of creation otherwise the site is useless. It's just an Online document with images and wording. These simple search engine elements are needed but will not guarantee your site will be found at the top of searches. In fact, there is only one sure way to get to the top of any search engine quickly like Google and that is to pay for ads such as Google ads. These are pay per click ads that give you the power to set the amount you wish to spend and, depending on the amount spent, will list you near or at the top of searches. You bid on keywords and pay only when a user clicks on your ad. For more information log onto ads.google.com.

There are other ways, however, that can get your site ranked high on search engines and possibly at the top of the page. But keep in mind that SEO optimization takes time. It does not happen overnight. It does not happen in a week but can take several weeks even months. Patience is a must. These other strategies go beyond the basic phrases and ALT tags and will help rank your site near or at the top of the search. Let's get into these...

The 3 C's - Content, Code, and Credibility include creating high quality, relevant and mobile friendly content and ensuring proper internal linking all play a roll in search engine ranking.
Trustworthiness - Create trustworthiness by adding content that answers real user questions and update it regularly. A Q&A page is a great way to accomplish this.
Load Speed - Load speed can directly effect rankings. A site that is slow to load will rank low. Your site should only be as big as needed. A site that has eye catching visuals like large banners that move, animations all over the place on every page, and videos are all very nice but these tend to slow down load time unless a preload tag is used but even that is no guarantee. A cluttered site is a slow site and effects rankings. The slower the load time the lower a site is ranked on search pages.
Canonical Tags - Canonical tags are essential to every website. The canonical tag tells search engines which page is the master page. This is usually the home page. A site without a canonical tag will rank lower than a site with one.
OG tags - OG (Open Graph) tags are meta tags (meta tags are meta data that provides information about a web page that is placed in the head section and is not displayed to the user). They tell a web page how to appear when shared on social media such as Facebook, X, and LinkedIn. Social media is a great source for obtaining backlinks, another essential part of a website that generates high rankings. We'll get into backlinks shortly.
CMS (Content Management System) - Most of today's hosting companies feature CMS (Content Management System). This allows the user to make changes directly on the hosting site without downloading the files. Some have edit features that will open the HTML source of the page that allows for changes on the source code itself. We'll get more into that shortly. With that in mind, let's get into some of the SEO features and how easy it is to make your own changes...

Log onto any website on the Internet. Once there right click on the page. On the window that pops up you should see a link for "view page source." click on that. What you now see is the HTML source of the page. If you don't see that or nothing happens when you right click then the page is locked. Try another site. Our pages are locked so right click is disabled on our site. Near the top of the page you will see the head tags. They look like this: <head></head>. In between those tags are the meta tags. You should see something that looks like this:

<meta name="description" content="jim's cookies are the best in the west. Our secret recipe has won several baking awards">

You just got your first look at some SEO. If Jim's cookies is shown in a search the content of that Meta tag may be shown as a snippet. 28-30% of the time Google may create a custom snippet from the description if it deems necessary. So, the content should be descriptive and under 160 characters to increase being used. Another meta tag will look something like this:

<meta name="keywords" content="cookies, best cookies, best cookies in Los Angeles, best tasting cookies, value priced cookies">

As of 2009 most of the top search engines no longer use keywords due to abuse. Some of the older search engines still use them so it wouldn't hurt to include these. Searchers use keywords to search and if they use a keyword that's listed on your site your page will display. However, because major search engines no longer use them, you should keep the count extremely low like maybe no more than 30 keywords otherwise search engines like Google consider it Keyword Stuffing and is seen as a low quality practice and may penalize you when it comes to ranks. Here's another tag:

<meta name="robots" content="index, follow">

This tag tells search engines to include the page in search results and follow the links on the page. Noindex and nofollow tells the search engine not to include the page and not to follow the links. The robots meta tag is a faster way to get search engines such as Google to index your site. It also is a way of telling the search engine which pages to follow and which ones you don't want listed on the search engine. The nofollow element is also used for links that you don't want followed. Am I confusing you yet? We can get more into robot tags another day. Another very important tag is the canonical tag. That looks like this:

<link rel="canonical" href="http://jimscookies.com">

This tag tells the search engine which is the master or preferred page. This is usually the home page of the site. It improves SEO rankings by directing ranking signals to a single page which is usually the home page. This next tag is one of the most important tags of any website. It is the Title tag and it looks like this:

<title>Best cookies in CA - Jim's cookies</title>

This tag is the clickable headline that appears in searches as a blue link and is the primary source used. The phrase used is highly significant for search engines determining page ranking. The title may be changed by Google so it's more relevant to a users search query. The way to avoid titles from being cut off with ellipsis (...) is to keep them between 50-60 characters or less. Besides appearing in searches, the title also appears on the browser tab. This is the tab at the very top left of the page just above the URL window. It also appears as the default title when sharing a link on social media.

We'll talk about one more tag that is also considered important when it comes to SEO. It is the ALT tag. This tag is usually found in the body section of the web page at the point where an image will show. Websites are full of images and, believe it or not, they also are described for SEO purposes. ALT is short for alternative text. This attribute improves SEO rankings by helping search engines understand image contents. This HTML tags looks like this:

<img src="cookies.jpg" alt="A great chocolate cookie">

The alt tag simply describes the image. As you can see, you can get cute when using these types of descriptions. Use well rounded descriptions. Don't say things like a picture of Jim's cookies. This may seem like a small detail but it does play a roll when it comes to SEO optimization. So don't take it lightly. Again these are just some of what makes a website SEO optimized. As mentioned earlier, Site content, clean HTML, proper internal linking, mobile friendly displays, and answering user questions i.e. Q&A page all play a huge roll in SEO optimization as well. Besides SEO ranking, ALT tags play another roll. If the image or fail to load on the page for whatever reason, the ALT text will be in it's place otherwise it would be considered a broken image or and effect the search engine ranking.

All the tag elements sown above are essential to any website. They all play a roll in SEO rankings and can be easily maintained by you through the hosting company's editing software. Elements such as keywords should be changed every 3-6 months. However, updates may be needed more often if poor performance dictates it. Obviously, if you make changes to images or you'll most likely want to change the ALT as well and it certainly wouldn't hurt to change the description every so often to keep with the times.

Believe it or not, a Call to Action also plays a roll in SEO optimization. A Call to Action (CTA) is simply a button, link or phrase that triggers an immediate response from the user. "Buy Now", "Learn More", or "Sign Up" are CTA phrases. These not only help with SEO but also guide the user through the sales. They are used to create urgency like "Today", "Now", or "Limited Time." CTA's should be kept short and simple and not overused.

There are two other elements that play a role in search rankings and they are SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) and Google Sitemaps. SSL secures connections by encrypting data that is sent between a user's browser and a web server and prevents data from being altered or tampered with during transfer. SSL protects against fake sites by verifying that a web server is legitimate. Http stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol. Https stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure. The Https contains the SSL certificate that makes it secure. Log onto any website then take a look at the URL window at the top left of the screen. If you see something like this: https://www.spidergraphicdesigns.com, That means the site has SSL and is a locked, secured site. A site that does not have SSL will look like this: http://www.spidergraphicdesigns.com. Notice that the difference is the letter S in the Hypertext Transfer Protocol. Search engines favor SSL and will rank sites using this higher than ones who do not. SSL can be purchased at the time you purchase your domain name and will cost about $30 more per year.

Google sitemaps are another element of SEO optimization and shouldn't be overlooked. They are simply a text file that displays the important pages of the website. This file is usually an XML file. They help search engines like Google efficiently crawl, discover, and index content. A sitemap also plays a part in finding pages that may have been missed. This can sometimes occur with larger sites. Creating a sitemap is easy. Site maps should be in XML format. If you need help with site maps we will be happy to help.

There is one more strategy that plays a high role in search engine rankings and that is backlinks. This is something a lot of developers forget about. Backlinks are simply links on other sites that link back to yours. They alert search engines such as Google that your content is trustworthy. They establish domain authority thereby increasing traffic to your site. Although it might sound petty, high quality, relevant backlinks do play a role in ranking pages higher on search engines such as Google. Backlinks also help search engines find your pages faster and directs visitors from other sites directly to yours. Backlinks is the one strategy that will take the longest. But if you have the patience and are willing to follow through it will be worth the effort. Again, backlinks take time to accomplish and are not a necessary element of a website but incorporating them will help SEO performance perhaps more than any other method but, as with any element, will not guarantee your site will be located at the top of searches.

Backlinks are not to be taken lightly. Meaning you want relevant links from large well known companies. For example, if you own a dog grooming company you don't want backlinks from another unknown dog grooming company. You want a large, well known company like Petco to link to your site. Keep in mind that accomplishing this takes time and effort. Getting links from a well known established companies will not only rank your site higher in searches but will also result in more customers who log onto the company's site linking back to yours through the backlink.

So, how does one get backlinks? This is a tedious task but, once learned, will come easy. Helpful sites like SemRush is a great way to get started. Keep in mind that their services are not free. Semrush charges a monthly fee of $199.95 for this service. However, you do get 10 free requests before you have to start paying so use them wisely. Here's how to find backlinks using Semrush. For this purpose we'll use pet grooming. Log onto semrush.com. In the left window click on SEO then in the window that opens click on Backlinks. Now click the Backlinks tab at the top. In the type in box that opens type a competitors website. Since we're working with pet grooming we want to look for well known companies so type in such as PetCo.com. You will see clickable links on the left for websites that have backlinks to PetCo. Go into those sites and get the email address then send out an email to them politely asking them to backlink to your site. In return, tell them you will do the same for them. Chances are since they've already backlinked to other sites they will have no problem backlinking to yours as well.

As already mentioned, acquiring backlinks is time consuming. You can do the work yourself without expensive sites like Semrush if you're willing to take the time and visit well established business sites that are relevant to yours and contact the businesses that are linked to that site. Remember to use sites that are well known businsses. You can never have too many backlinks to your site. The more the better. But you don't want to continue paying sites like Semrush especially if you're business is new and not making the funds to warrant such a step. Use the 10 free requests and go from there.

No one can guarantee your site will be found at the top of any search engine no matter how much you pay them unless there is no other business like yours and in today's world it's almost impossible. So, do those high monthly fees charged by so called SEO experts really help? As already mentioned, SEO Optimization takes time. It does not happen overnight. Whether you pay someone $99 per month or someone else $700 per month for SEO Optimization, it will not rank your site any faster than if you simply took the necessary steps yourself. It's much easier than you think and the only cost to rank at the top is to pay for ads such as Google ads or using third party sites to acquire backlinks. You control the cost of the ads. Keep in mind that the more you pay per click the more your site will display so it can get a bit pricey. We've mentioned the other ways to improve your ranking and doing it yourself won't cost you a single penny.

Did you know that word of mouth recommendations outperforms any other type of advertising? People are more likely to follow up after hearing recommendations from friends and family. Online reviews is a great way to accomplish word of mouth so don't forget about this important feature.

There is one more element that is going to add to the way websites are found on search engines and that is AIO. AI (Artificial Intelligence) will change the way people navigate the internet and can impact the sites ranking on search engines. Tactics used in AI will display search results on platforms such as Google, Gemini, and Perplexity and will make the site visible in AI chat responses. AIO is incorporated into the website language, like HTML. We do incorporate AIO into our sites because it will be a big factor in today's technology.

MAINTENANCE FEES

Like SEO, minor site maintenance is something else you can do yourself. Most hosting companies have built-in CMS (Content Management System). CMS allows you to make any changes needed to your site. You can change images, paragraphs, add to paragraphs, etc. A word of caution though, most sites today use CSS and it is very demanding. If you change the wrong thing on a page it can make the entire page look different. In fact, it can make the page seem to not appear at all. So, if replacing an image make certain that the new image is the same size as the previous. Most hosting company's CMS brings up the site the way it looks live so making some changes shouldn't be a problem. The developer that did your site should have given you the files. If not, get them from them. Their your files, you paid for them. That way if you should change something that changed the page or accidentally deleted something you can always upload the original file.

As we mentioned earlier, most of today's hosting companies have an editor that allows you to change HTML codes as needed. The meta tags we described in the SEO Optimization Prices section can be easily changed using this feature. While they shouldn't have to be changed very often, they should be changed in keeping with site changes. For example, if you change an image you may want to also change the ALT element to better describe the new image. In the same way, you may want to change the title to keep up with the product or products. When doing this make sure not remove the double quotes. Doing so will render the element useless in searches. Again, and this can't be stressed enough, make absolutely certain to get all the website files from the developer. You paid for them. They are yours. If a mistake is somehow made when making changes to a page you can upload the original to the server and try again. Changes on the HTML source can also be made using a simple note pad. Open the page in a note pad and you will see the HTML source. Find the tags or elements you need to change or update. Once you do this a few times you will start to see just how easy it is.

The bottom line is this, If your not savvy or don't know anything about designing websites you will need a developer to do it for you. Pay for the design but not for the extra ridiculous fees. You now know how to acquire a domain and hosting without the middle man. We show you how to maintain the site as well as SEO optimization. Once you learn, you'll realize just how easy it really is.

As always, we are here to help. We don't just create your site and forget about you. We'll help you avoid the large fees by educating you how to Get hosting, register a domain name, do your own SEO optimization, and do your own maintenance. Get started today.
Call or text us at: 484-538-8958, email us at: sales@spidergraphicdesigns.com or use the handy form.