Finding the proper tools to make an internet site may take time when starting a web business. However, I have outlined excellent helpful tools that may help as you begin your online business.
Table of Contents
Google Domains
Google Domains is a service I am using for my site. After watching some YouTube videos. I realized that Google has this service. So, I did my research and decided to utilize their service. As you can see in the image above. I am signed in to my account.
My experience so far has been great. I received excellent customer service from Google representatives when I had some questions.
The other two reasons I chose Google are they do not have a low introductory payment and then have a high price increase. I like to know what I will be paying from the start. Also, they offer the ability to do email forwarding to Gmail at no additional cost.
You can check a YouTube video that shows the steps to set it up. Click my favorite YouTube Videos and go to this section of my article. Setting up Google Domain Gmail Forwarding.
Namecheap
Namecheap is another domain registrar and hosting service as well and looking for a domain name. If you are looking to check whether your favorite domain is available, type the name and search away.
Find a domain starting at $0.88
powered by Namecheap
Get Your Domain, and Grow your Brand!
Hosting
The hosting company is very important as it will host your site, basically the foundation for your business.
There are three hosting companies that WordPress.org recommends.
Bluehost is a hosting company servicing over 2 Million websites, and they are offering an excellent platform for WordPress users. They are listed in WordPress.org as one of the recommended hosting providers.
Dreamhost is another hosting provider listed in WordPress.org as one of their hosting providers recommended. I am using Dreamhost for this site, and so far, I have been satisfied with the service.
There are different plans to choose from:
Site Ground is the third option in WordPress.org in their hosting section. It also states that they have an excellent platform for WordPress users. One-Click Install
Three plans to choose from:
Namecheap has hosting services as well.
- StartUp
- GrowBig
- GoGeek
Themes
Many excellent free themes with tons of features and an excellent choice to start when creating your site.
You can check the WordPress.org site to view the themes. Many companies offer a free theme, and if the customer needs more customization, an upgrade is available, sometimes for a yearly fee or a one-time fee.
Doing research online and finding out how long and reliable a company is will help you decide your next move.
GeneratePress The paid version has a site library. You can pick a design from the library to build your brand-new site.
The GeneratePress company offers a free version, and you can test it out and see if it might suit your website design.
Unfortunately, the site library only comes with the paid version. Like with anything, there is a learning curve to understand how to use this theme. I have spent time watching some videos to learn more quickly.
Their customer service has been excellent and answered my questions as I have the paid version.
Here are some of the features and customization that are simple to do if using this theme.
Check this video going over the Site-Library Overview.
- Menu Customization
- Headers
- Footers
- Up-Bottom
- Color Customization
- Fonts
- Blocks
Free Images
If you need to utilize pictures, you must use free royalty-free images Here are some sites. I am using it for the most part. Make sure that attribution is not required. If attribution is required, follow the guidelines to ensure images used on your site are okay to use. The best thing to do is before posting images on your web pages, to make sure to follow all copyright rules to avoid issues.
Compression and Optimization for Images for your site
Shortpixel is one of the best plugins to use that helps compress and optimize images. It is essential to reduce the size of pictures for the websites to help improve speed—a great tool to reduce the size of the pictures/images for any site is Shortpixel. Furthermore, their pricing is affordable, but it can get expensive if using a lot of images on your site, but the credits never expire. Review my article on image optimation here.
ShortPixel has a WordPress Plugin where you can manage the compression and optimization of your site images. Like with anything take time to read and watch videos on YouTube to learn how to use certain tools. You can watch a great YouTube video that reviews the plugin. Click Here to check it out.
Tinypng is a site where you can drop your PNG and JPG files to do compression; per their site, more than one billion PNG and JPEG images have been optimized. You can compress up to 20 images, and each image max 5MB. And what is great about this service is that using their website to compress images is free.
Design Tools
Having access to design tools will help make your ideas come to life in different ways. So, free resources for your next project are a must.
- Canva
- Crello
- Piktochart
So, what can be some of the designs that you can do?
Here is a short list of the many things you can do with these free design websites.
- Create a logo
- Create a chart
- Create a Gif
- Create a PDF
- Mind mapping
- Newsletters
- Instagrams post
- Facebook post
- YouTube Intros, etc.
Canva Color Wheel
This is a great tool to find out which colors will look good together in designs. If you are preparing a design and want to check out the color combination, this tool definitely will do the trick.
Shorting Long URLs
TinyURL is a free and paid service that will shorten long URLs, making them more pretty. I like this service as you can create a free account, and it offers unlimited Shortened URLs and Unlimited Clicks. This is an excellent resource for sharing links and not getting banned from social media or online platforms when sharing your affiliate links or website links. Example: I shortened my website link to be a TinyURL link to share on my Twitter account.
Bitly is another shortening links service that has a free option. Exploring these free services is great as you start your online business. It is crucial to shorten long affiliate links as they do not look pretty at all. So, explore these services and see which is best for your needs.
Rebrandly is another fantastic option that features a free account option with fast redirects and 5000 clicks tracked per month. Visit their site and see if this could be a great option as you start your business. Using free services is essential not to break the bank if you are not ready to spend or have a big budget.
Pretty Links is another option, and they have three paid plans on their site. However, they have discounted prices, so it is best to check their website for their current fees as they may change.
- Super Affiliate
- Marketer
- Beginner
The Pretty Links WordPress Plugin is available and free. I am a user of the plugin and use it for some of the long links on my site. You can learn more about the plugin in WordPress.Org. It has 300,000+ active installations. The plugin is easy to use to shorten the links within your site.
Email Marketing Tools
MailerLite offers a free account, and I currently use their free option. It is a straightforward platform to use. You have to apply to get approved for an account, and they will email you to approve or decline. Make sure to use an email for your domain to verify that you are the owner of your site—for example, [email protected]. Then, check your email to see if you have been approved.
Website Policies
WebsitePolicies is the site that I am using for all the forms for my Legal menu. Every website needs terms of service and many policies necessary to inform visitors of your terms and conditions, along with disclosures that are necessary to have on websites.
I am using a Paid Service. Why? all websites are different and offer different services. I decided to have a paid service since I cannot write my policies for my site, and many free services had generic policies that were not appropriate for my site. So, I opted to have a paid service.
The paid service can be on a yearly basis or you can be paid a one-time fee without updates. Or if you only need a very basic service, they also have a free option, but the free option is very generic.
Site Speed Checker
It is always important to check the speed of your site. There are services free to check the speed of your site. Here are three options that I sometimes use. These are my favorite websites to check my website speed. Below is a picture of the Performance Report for my site using GTMetrix
You may be interested in learning how to optimize images. You can read my post on how to optimize images here.
Online Tools
Online Tools
Looking for the best online tools to help you with Online Business? Look no further than our online tools directory. Here, you’ll find all the best web-based resources, organized by category, to help you when starting your business.
Conclusion
In conclusion, online business resources are powerful tools to help entrepreneurs and small business owners grow their side hustle. Unfortunately, finding low-cost or free online resources can take time. I hope the online tools page will help you find the right services to help you succeed as you begin your online journey.