Part 3 - The Real-Time Diary of an Aspiring Entrepreneur

Part 3 – The Joy…? of Building a Website.

Okay, so the few of you who read Part 1 and Part 2 may recall I said I’d write weekly updates. Well that’s not gonna happen. Entrepreneurs are just too darn busy!

But here we are at Part 3 and I’ll start by confirming that I am enjoying my entrepreneurial journey more than ever.

In truth, this diary is not real-time yet, because I’m still catching up on my first year, which was…

…A year of steep learning curves.

I asked myself: How good are these website-building platforms? – the likes of Wix and GoDaddy. I only tried one, and liked it; so Wix it was. I’m not able to offer you my thoughts on the others but what is clear…they are user-friendly, even for the non-techie such as me. In fact, my first dalliance with Wix was just killing time, but they sucked me in!

Here’s some of what happens when a novice embarks on building a website: -

·        Open your free account.

·        Choose your industry.

·        Choose templates and styles for that industry.

·        Start moving text and graphics boxes around.

·        Replace the text and pictures with your own story.

·        Buy one of those instantly ready company logos.

·        Start becoming excited about the possibilities because, hey, this website ain’t half bad and you’ve not even published it into the public domain yet!

And when you get really adventurous…

·        Subscribe to your website provider – to remove their adverts – and sign up for the domain name you need, for example: @pimmco.co.uk ; then buy email accounts for your business using said domain – for example: [email protected]; add your blog page; and finally, start copying most other average websites’ general layout because you haven’t yet figured out that you shouldn’t do that if you want to be even remotely original (as indeed I haven’t, yet!)

·        Add new functionality so that it appears a tad more professional than it would had you left it to your eight-year-old son to build.

·        Learn where to get free pictures from…pixabay is a good start.

·        Tie yourself up in knots trying to figure out what online payment functionality you need – especially so that you can take payments from international clients who don’t want to pay steep bank charges to their own bank when ‘wiring’ money over to you.

And start feeling pretty pleased with yourself, until you realise…

·        You need to learn about search engine optimisation.

·        You need to help people navigate your website to avoid frustration.

·        You need a ‘shop’ page to sell your wares.

·        You need to integrate all this into your social media strategy.

And ultimately…

·        The realisation that this website will need unending tweaking for the rest of your natural life, or thereabouts.

This, of course, is not an exhaustive list of challenges you will face, but it gives you a sense of the challenge.

But don’t let me put you off. You will have rewarding “Eureka!” moments, and you don’t have to eat the whole salami in one sitting.

So just like I suggested in Part 2 of this series, embark on your journey to entrepreneurialism, with the safety of knowing that you don’t have to quit your day job…yet!

Next: Part 4, where I’ll probably add another huge list of considerations to bamboozle even the most committed of you potential aspiring entrepreneurial types.

Later peeps!

p.s. I can’t help thinking my international readers are going to be furiously looking through their dictionaries to decode my funnies. No doubt, vaguely amusing becomes decidedly confusing when lost in translation.