Blog

Often, at a meeting, I am asked by small business owners to review their website and give them my thoughts. These are a few common issues with websites, especially DIY websites. These are good tips on what to look for when doing a DIY website.

• Images missing alternative (alt) text
• Insufficient color contrast
• Improper heading structure
• Images are too large
• Missing SSL certificate

Images missing alternative (alt) text

Alt text is text used to describe an image on a website. It is used mostly by people with vision disabilities who use screen-readers to read the content of a website. When screen-readers get to an image, it will read the text out loud. Most people I talk to have no idea what alt text is. Most websites that I see that were created by business owners don’t include alt-text.

Missing alt-text can have the following negative effects:

• Your images may not be found by search engines. Images with alt-text can help search engines better understand your website and possibly improve your overall search engine optimization (SEO).
• You could be missing out on sales from an underestimated population.
• You could be making life harder for someone with a disability.

Want to know more about alt-text? We wrote an article on it: What is alt-text and why should you use it.

Insufficient color contrast

Your content will be much harder to read if you do not have sufficient color contrast. Color blindness affects about one in twelve men and about one in 200 women. These people may have a very difficult time with your website if you do not have enough contrast between components such as text and background. Beyond color-blindness, having the wrong colors can cause eye fatigue and cause people to stop reading your content.

Our favorite tool for testing color contrast is the WebAIM color contrast checker.

Improper heading structure

In Hyper-Text Markup Language (HTML) – the computer language used on all websites –  headings are indicated with “h” tags (h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, and h6). When your web browser displays these h tags, the headings are usually displayed in different sizes automatically based on heading level. H1s are displayed larger than h2s, h2s are larger than h3s, and so on. If you are using a Content Management System (CMS) such as WordPress, then the theme’s stylesheet  probably makes the headings different sizes based on the heading level as well. For this reason, people often use different heading levels to control the size of the headings.

The proper way to control heading size is to use Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). If you are using a CMS, you are usually given some size adjustment options via a slider or a dropdown menu.

Headings help search engines to understand page and topic structures. There should only be one h1 per page – usually the page title. The h1 should be followed by an h2. You can have multiple h2 headings on a page and these should be subtopics of the h1. H3s should only come after h2s, h4s after h3s, and so on. 

Images are too large

Slow websites can affect a website visitor’s experience. If the website is too slow, people will leave your page and may not view the content you want them to see. One of the most common reasons for a slow website is having excessively large images on the page. While large, high-definition images may be stunning, they are rarely ever necessary for an effective website. 

We suggest using optimized images of the right size for where it is being used. If you were inserting an image with a maximum width of 1080px on the website, your image width should probably be between 1080px to 1200px. There are many tools to resize images such as Adobe Photoshop or Imageresizer.

Missing Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate

Installing an SSL certificate on your web server (your hosting provider) is a way to ensure communication between the web server and a web browser (Chrome, Edge, Firefox, etc.) is encrypted. These digital certificates are issued by a Certificate Authority (CA). It is a semi-complicated procedure that gives your website a secure designation. 

When you have a secure connection via an SSL certificate, you will usually see a padlock in the URL address bar. If you don’t have an SSL certificate, people visiting your website may see a warning from the browser stating that your website is not secure. If people visit your website and quickly leave because it is marked as insecure (commonly referred to as the bounce rate), search engines may decide not to show your website in the search results.

This is an example of what it looks like when you don’t have an SSL certificate:

This is an example of what it looks like when an SSL certificate is installed:

These days, there is really no reason why your website should not have an SSL certificate. Most web hosts provide a free SSL certificate for every website. If they don’t, that is a good indication that you should change your web hosting provider. Need help choosing good hosting? Read our article on WordPress hosting companies.

Conclusion

In our work we often review websites and find many of the same common issues. Optimizing your website can lead to better usability and better results in the search engines. 

Are we missing any common issues that we should include? Let us know in the comments below.

In our line of work, we often help non-profit organizations to develop and expand their online exposure. We love to help organizations that have a mission to make the world a better place.

These are a few resources that we have learned about that offer free services for nonprofits. Some restrictions may apply to these resources.

Note: some of the links on this page may be affiliate links. If you click on a link and make a purchase, we may receive a referral fee. This fee does not affect your price and it helps us to provide helpful content such as this.

Google for Nonprofits

If you are a registered 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, Google can provide you with a free Workspace account, Google Ads, YouTube services, and Google Earth services. Google Workspace is a set of services and tools built by Google that include gmail (using your domain name) [link to choosing a domain name], Google Drive, Google Meet, Google, Calendar and other useful services. 

DreamHost website hosting

DreamHost is a website hosting company that we really like. They offer free shared hosting for 501(c)(3) nonprofit organizations. If you want to upgrade to a managed WordPress hosting plan, they offer 35% off for the life of the plan. 

Kinsta website hosting

One of, if not the best managed WordPress hosting companies, Kinsta also offers a 15% discount for nonprofit.

AmazonSmile

The biggest online retailer has a great program for nonprofits. When a nonprofit organization registers on AmazonSmile, they are provided with a link that they can share with their audience. When anyone uses that link and makes a qualifying purchase, a small percentage of that purchase price goes to the nonprofit. 

Canva for nonprofits

Canva makes it easy for nonprofits to create graphic media that can be used for flyers, banners, websites, and social media. They have great templates that you can start with or create your own. Having an easy way to create graphics can help you spread the word about your nonprofit faster. Canva gives nonprofits access to the “Pro” features of its platform for up to 10 users. 

Nonprofits that help other nonprofits

Some nonprofits specialize in finding volunteers and matching them with nonprofits in need. This is how we first started to build our portfolio. We hope to find more soon but this is a start.

Jericho Road Pasadena

Not specifically a digital resource but they help other Pasadena based nonprofits to grow. We’ve done a few website projects with them as volunteers. They truly make a difference for Pasadena nonprofits.

Conclusion

Nonprofit organizations help to make the world a better place and there are many companies that want to help. We hope these resources are useful for you.

Leave a comment below if you know of any resources we should be including in our list.

If you are building a website using WordPress, one of the most important decisions you make is choosing the right website hosting provider. The hosting you choose can affect your website speed, uptime, and security. Working with a good hosting provider can save you a lot of time and frustration in the setup process. Use that time to improve your website instead of spending time researching and communicating with support.

The following is a list of our favorite website hosting companies that we commonly use and recommend to others. We are not going to provide you with numbers regarding page speed, or uptime, or bandwidth, etc. While all of those are important, we believe that these hosting providers are adequate.

These are the main considerations when choosing a hosting provider:

• Performance/Up-time
• Price
• Customer Service

In addition we also consider the following:

• Do they have a good reputation?
• Do they support the community?
• Is it easy to use their services?
• Are there any other reasons I should use them?

Note: the links provided in this post are likely affiliate links. If you decide to make a purchase, we may receive an affiliate fee. The amount we receive does not affect the price you pay but it does help us to provide you with content like this.

What is Website Hosting?

I like to think of website hosting as “someone else’s computer” that is connected to the internet. The web hosting provider’s “server” is a more powerful (probably) computer with back-up hard drives, back-up generators, large cooling fans, and many other concepts that I do not fully understand. Unless you want to be a system administrator, you don’t have to. There are a lot of people out there who can do that a lot better than me.

You rent your space on the server, place your files on it, point your domain name to the server, and the hosting provider transmits it to the world. There are many different types of hosting available for whatever website or application you want to build and for your skill level. This article focuses on hosting for WordPress websites. 

Learn more about WordPress.

Types of Web Hosting for WordPress Websites

The two main types of website hosting for WordPress websites are shared hosting and managed WordPress hosting.

Shared Hosting

As the name suggests, in a shared hosting plan, you are sharing a server with several (maybe hundreds) of other users and websites. The main advantage to sharing a server with other users is the price. For less than the price of a latte at your favorite coffee shop each month (at least during the introductory period) you can purchase space on a server and broadcast your website across the globe.

There are many negatives to shared hosting including:

• Slower websites – with so many websites on a server, you may often have congestion which slows down your website. 
• Less secure – if one of the websites on the server gets hacked, you may be putting your website at risk of a back door entry. 
• Lower email deliverability (if you use their email hosting). You are likely using the same IP address as other email accounts on the same server. If one of them is sending out spam emails, your emails may soon be blocked by many users as well.

Managed WordPress Hosting

With Managed WordPress Hosting, each website has its own resources and is not sharing space with other users. WordPress is preinstalled on each website. The hosting company will handle things that shared hosting (usually) does not – such as enhanced security, back ups, and performance optimization. 

The dashboards are usually much simpler to use which, in my experience, saves me a lot of time. We believe that all established organizations using WordPress should be using managed WordPress Hosting.

The hosting Companies we use

These are hosting companies that we have experience with that we recommend to other users.

Our Current Favorite Hosting Company: Flywheel

Type: Managed WordPress Hosting

Our favorite hosting company and the one we have been using for most of our new clients since 2020. 

One of the best values in Managed WordPress Hosting. Similar plans are twice as much with other companies. We fell in love with the ease of use of their dashboard. Their customer support so far has been amazing. When we have had issues, the problems were resolved quickly. The websites we have hosted with Flywheel have received good scores using Google Lightspeed.

Flywheel has a separate product called Local WP that is used to create a “local” environment on your computer so that you can run a local version of a WordPress website on your computer (not accessible to anyone on the internet). Local is the easiest (my opinion) tool of its kind. If you use Local WP and Flywheel, you can “push” and “pull” the website from your computer to the production website in a matter of minutes with the click of a button. This has been a big time saver for us.

Flywheel recently merged with WP Engine so they are even more of a reputable company. Flywheel and WP Engine have been huge supporters of the WordPress community and have sponsored many events.

---

Best Overall Hosting Company: Kinsta

Type: Managed WordPress Hosting

Kinsta is well known for providing excellent performing hosting services. They excel in speed tests and they have excellent customer service. 

A Google Search says that Kinsta’s headquarters are based in West Hollywood, California. A big plus for us to be able to work with local companies. According to their website, their workforce is remote first and they hire support people in all time zones. 

Kinsta has an amazing blog that showcases their mastery of the industry. I am signed up for their newsletter and am constantly reading their articles. Their video tutorials include some well known industry specialists that explain things in easy to understand ways.

---

Best Shared Hosting: SiteGround

The current Emphasis.LA website is hosted on SiteGround. We feel that they are an excellent hosting company. The unlimited websites provided on our plan, allows us to experiment with other side projects.

They are one of the three hosting companies recommended by WordPress. We have used them and have had good success with them. They have one of the better performing shared hosting plans and their optimizer plugin works well to make the websites perform. Their custom dashboard is easier to use than most of the other shared hosting we have used. 

One thing to be aware of is that they offer an exceptional introductory rate but if you don’t pay attention to the renewal rate, you could be in for a shock. Still a value at the renewal rate – especially if you have several websites.

Other Hosting We Like

BlueHost

We like them for their affordability and for their support of the WordPress community. Also, one of the hosting companies recommended by WordPress. We’ve heard a lot of complaints on message boards but I believe a lot of that is unrealistic expectations for often less than $6 per month. I have found their website speeds to be decent for small sites and their support to be more than adequate most of the time. 

If you are an established organization or if you want the best customer experience, you should probably use a managed WordPress hosting company. If you are a new business trying to create an online presence now with very little budget, Bluehost is an excellent option.

---

Dreamhost

Another host officially recommended by WordPress. I’ve mostly used their shared hosting service but they also offer Managed WordPress hosting. They offer great pricing and good service.

Since we work with a lot of nonprofits, we truly appreciate the difference they make by providing free shared website hosting for 501(c)(3) registered nonprofit organizations. While larger nonprofits can easily afford hosting plans, many boots-on-the-ground nonprofits can really use all the help they can get.

Dreamhost values your privacy and they have fought for it. They have shown that they are a company that can be trusted. https://www.dreamhost.com/blog/we-fight-for-the-users/

They are based in Brea, California. We love working with companies that are based in Southern California.

---

Greengeeks

Environmental conscience website hosting. They put back 3 times the power they use into the grid through renewable energy. They support the WordPress community such as the WordCamp Santa Clarita 2019 event where I was a speaker. 

They operate out of Agoura HIlls, another fine neighborhood in Southern California that we love.

Conclusion

We have a strong preference for managed WordPress Hosting but understand the need for using shared hosting. Our list is not extensive and we’ll keep adding as we go along. For now I hope you like these recommendations.

We left off one of the biggest shared hosting companies from our list (you’ve seen their commercials). We feel that all hosting providers these days should at the very least provide free SSL certificates and we have been unhappy with their nickel-and-diming.

Have you ever wanted to create or expand your online exposure but don’t know much about the digital world and don’t have a lot of money to spend? 

I attend a lot of networking events and other Meetups. I often encounter people that are just starting out in their journey and do not have an online presence yet. Oftentimes it is a stay at home mom starting a work from home business or someone that is working full time at a day job while starting a new side venture. When a person is just starting out and they don’t have a big enough budget to hire someone like me, they still need to create their presence online to attract customers and instill confidence.

The following are what I would recommend to a new business owner just starting out on setting up their online presence. Not all of it applies to everyone. I will make my recommendations and give you other options when available.

Note: Several links in this post are affiliate links. If you make a purchase using our links, we may receive an affiliate fee. Our fee does not affect the price you receive and it helps us to continue providing quality content.

Starting with a website

We believe that your web presence starts with a website but some people may start with social media because they feel it is easier. While we believe that having a social media presence is vital to most businesses, we believe that social media should be directing traffic to your website where you have more control of what visitors see and they won’t get distracted by other posts. 

Choose and buy a domain name

A domain name is a web address that will be used to direct people to your website on promotional materials such as business cards, flyers, commercials, and in general communications. You can also set up emails using your domain name. An ideal domain name is short, memorable, and suitable for your business. I recommend using Google Domains to buy your domain name. Some web hosting companies and proprietary content management systems offer a free domain name registration when you sign up with them. It is more than ok to take advantage of deals when they come up.

Read Choose and buy a domain name for more information.

What kind of website do you want to build?

If you feel comfortable using HTML, CSS, JavaScript and/or other programming languages, then you may want to build a custom coded website. For most people, this is not an option. Even if you could, it may be too much work for you. In that case you need a content management system that is already built and trusted by millions. There are two types of CMS: proprietary and open source. 

Proprietary Content Management Systems

Proprietary systems are those owned by a company that sells the CMS software and hosting as a pre-built package. The more popular systems are Wix, Squarespace, and Shopify. With these systems, you have limited or no access to the source code so the websites are not as customizable. The advantage to these systems is that they can be easier to use without having much technical expertise. The lack of customizations means that the websites could end up looking very cookie cutter. The owners of the platform provide the technical assistance when necessary. With these proprietary systems, hosting is included and they handle all software updates internally. 

Shopify is an excellent choice if you want to build an ecommerce website. For other websites Wix and Squarespace are both good options.

Open Source Content Management Systems

An open source content management system is software that is installed on a web server. All of the code for the software is available to view and is 100% customizable. The most popular open source CMS is WordPress which powers roughly 40% of the top 10 million websites around the world. 

The disadvantage is that there is no centralized support for open source software. When you have an issue, you have to either rely on documentation, pay a developer, or search through Google and YouTube for answers. The good news is that for almost any issue that you may have, someone else has already had the same problem and written about it. 

Open source systems also require you to keep the software updated. Most of the time, that is just a click of a button that takes about 10 to 15 minutes a month. Occasionally though, you may encounter a compatibility issue that causes your website to break. 

If you do the work yourself, using an open source CMS can be the most affordable option. If you hire someone to create a website for you, there’s a good chance that they will be using WordPress to build it for you.

Find out more about WordPress.

WordPress is our preferred platform for building websites. If you decide to use WordPress, your next step is to set up website hosting services.

Sign up for Web Hosting

Hosting refers to a computer server connected to the internet that allows files on the server to be displayed across the globe. I like to think of it as someone else’s computer that I am renting to connect to the internet. 

Once you choose your hosting provider, you will need to connect your domain name to the hosting plan. You will have to search online for specific instructions since each registrar has different instructions. 

There are two common types of hosting for WordPress websites: shared hosting and managed WordPress Hosting. 

Shared hosting

With Shared hosting, you are sharing a computer server with several (maybe hundreds) of other users. The main advantage of shared hosting is price. For less than the price of a drink or two at a coffee shop (per month), you can have unlimited websites and unlimited email hosting accounts. There are many negatives to shared hosting including:

• Slower websites – with so many websites on a server, you may often have congestion which slows down your website. 
• Less secure – if one of the websites on the server gets hacked, you may be putting your website at risk of a back door entry. 
• Lower email deliverability – you are likely using the same ip address as other email accounts on the same server. If one of them is sending out spam emails, your emails may soon be blocked by many users as well.

Our favorite shared hosting is SiteGround. Their pricing is a little higher than most other shared hosting but the increased security and speed tools may make them worth it. 

We also like GreenGeeks and DreamHost as more affordable options. 

Managed WordPress Hosting

While shared hosting is ok for someone just starting out, or an organization with a limited budget, we believe all established businesses using WordPress should be using Managed WordPress hosting. Managed WP Hosting will give you a faster, more secure website. The dashboards are usually much easier to use as well. A disadvantage is that they don’t provide domain name or email hosting services. You would have to use a third party service such as Google Workspace or Microsoft Office for your emails. The tools that come with these services are well worth it.

We recommend Kinsta as the overall best hosting provider. 

We also recommend Flywheel as the best value for money. Since 2021, Flywheel is what we have been using for most of our clients.

Build It

If you are new to websites this will be a slow process but fortunately there are a ton (maybe too much) videos online that can guide you through the process. Here are some of the steps you will have to take to build a WordPress website.

Choose a Theme

A theme is a set of styles and functionality that are put together to give a website a consistent look and feel. You can search for themes by keywords for the type of industry you are in (roofing, photography, etc.) or by style (art deco, modern, etc.). There are many other factors but this gives you a starting point.

Install some plugins

Plugins are sets of code that add functionality to your website. As the name suggests, you plug in the code and then the functionality is added. Do you want to sell something? Add an ecommerce plugin. Want to add a way for people to contact you? Add a contact form plugin. There are an enormous number of plugins available that can help you accomplish just about anything you can imagine. 

Write some stuff

To maximize your website’s potential, you will need to write a lot of content that answers your potential customers’ questions. Become a trusted source of information for people looking for your product. Your goal should be for people to think of your page as the go-to reference. 

Buy some ads 

Writing content is a long term strategy. While you wait for your content to start generating traffic, you can proactively lead people to your site by paying for ads. Google Ads and Facebook Ads are the most common types of ads. They are probably the most effective ads at this time but there are other markets including Bing ads or Yelp ads that can also be effective.

Set up Social Media accounts

As a business owner you must meet customers where they are. Social media is a great way for people to find and refer to you. We recommend at least setting up accounts with the major platforms so you can increase your chances of getting your business name as the link (handle). With social media platforms you don’t have as much control due to changing algorithms and trends. A new social media platform can appear at any time and reduce the effectiveness of your presence on a platform. 

Facebook

As the most popular social media platform, you should definitely have a presence on Facebook. Although it is not as inexpensive as it used to be, Facebook ads are still an effective way to show your business to potential customers. 

Instagram

We recommend at least a minor presence on Instagram. Some businesses will be more successful than others. If your brand is young, fun, or passionate, you may be able to attract a large following. 

LinkedIn

Some people really love LinkedIn. Takes a more serious, business approach than other social platforms but you can still have fun with it.

Twitter

Certain businesses can really succeed on Twitter. We recommend testing it out and at least reserving your preferred handle (business name).

TikTok

A fast rising platform. Ideal platform if you are looking to target younger generations. 

Other Business Directories

Take advantage of free business directories where you can. They can help increase your exposure and solidify your business. 

Google My Business

A must for any business. Control the way you appear on Google Search results

Yelp 

If you are doing a search for a place to eat, or a roofer, or car wash, oftentimes the first result is Yelp. We recommend organizations that want to do business with their local community to create a Yelp profile. 

Nextdoor

An up and coming business directory that focuses on local neighborhoods. 

Conclusion

Creating an online presence is within reach for just about anyone. We hope that we can help guide you in making the best of it. Let us know if you have any questions or if we missed anything. 

If you want someone to build your  website for you, help with your digital marketing, or if you want to hire us for an hour or so to help you build it, please contact us.

If you want to set up a website for a new business and you already have a business name, your first step is to buy a suitable domain name. This is the web address (URL) that you will direct people to on your business cards, directory listings, email signatures, and in person.

Price for a domain name

The price of a domain name depends on many factors including:

• the perceived desirability of the name
• the Top-Level Domain (TLD)
• availability
• the domain registrar
• and other registrar algorithms.

If the domain name is available, you can expect to pay between $12-$25 per year. Prices can go up to a few thousand dollars if someone else already owns it.

Choosing a domain name

Domain names should be easy to remember, easy to spell, as short as possible, and reflective of you or your business. Once you know what your ideal domain name is, keep it close to you. You may want to have a list of alternative names ready in case your ideal name is not available.

Hot tip: don’t search for your domain name until you are ready to buy. It’s said that searching for a domain name and not buying it can alert other domain name buyers of your interest. They could end up taking the domain name from you or you may end up affecting the price of your desired domain name.

Choose the Right Top-Level Domain (TLD)

As a rule of thumb, if you are a for-profit business, you want a dot com (.com) TLD. Likewise, if you are a non-profit organization, you want a dot org (.org) TLD. With so many organizations out there, sometimes the name you want is already taken. If you don’t want to change the name of your business, then you can choose from a wide variety of other TLDs available. Some popular alternatives are dot net (.net) or dot biz (.biz) but there are many more to choose from.

Industry Specific Top-Level Domains

One option you have is to use an industry specific TLD. For example, if you are a wine shop, you may want to consider using dot wine (.wine); A car dealer might want to choose a dot autos (.autos) domain. Many churches have started adopting dot church (.church).

Country Specific Top-Level Domains

Many countries have their own TLDs such as dot fr (.fr) for France, dot ca (.ca) for Canada, or my personal favorite, dot us (.us) for the United States of America. These TLDs are usually restricted to residents of that country. A company that has major business operations in a different country may be able to use that country’s TLD.

Other Top-Level Domains

There are many other TLDs such as city TLDs (.nyc, .la, .atl) or fun TLDs (.party). Domain name registrars are very good at making suggestions. Make sure you consider how the TLD may affect your professional image. From experience, we know that some people still get confused with alternative TLDs but it is becoming less of a problem as time passes.

Choose a registrar

A registrar is a company certified by ICANN to sell domain names. Our current favorite registrar is Google Domains. You can buy a domain name and they include free privacy protection. Some of the other registrars charge an extra fee (usually around $10/year) for domain privacy protection. Another advantage to Google Domains is the ease of integrating a Google Workspace account. Workspace is a bundle of services that includes email hosting, file storage, and other useful business services.

A disadvantage of Google Domains is that they do not offer a wide variety of TLDs. In that case you can try other registrars such as GoDaddy, NameCheap, or Network Solutions.

Web hosting companies

We must also mention that some hosting companies will give you a free 1-year domain name registration if you buy hosting from them. This is usually only offered by shared hosting companies such as SiteGround, Bluehost, Dreamhost, or GreenGeeks and by proprietary website platforms such as Shopify, Wix, or Squarespace. Most managed WordPress hosting companies do not offer domain or email hosting services.

Should I keep my domain name separate from my hosting?

In most situations I would recommend keeping your domain name separate from your hosting. Keeping your domain name separate gives you more control over your online presence and makes it easier to switch hosts if you ever need to. If you want to save a few dollars, go ahead and take advantage of the domain name included in your hosting plan.

Stay in Control of your Domain Names

I’ve seen it happen a few times… a web developer sets up the domain name and hosting for the customer and the developer retains control over the domain and the hosting. Then the relationship between the client and the developer sours for one reason or another. I’ve even seen one situation where the developer passed away. The client loses everything. They may have put in a few years of work into the content of the website and it is all gone. While losing hosting is bad, there are sometimes ways to recover content and rebuild. A lost domain name can be tragic. Good domain names can be hard to find. Even if you find a new domain name you like, search engines will view you as a new business. It may take more time to rank on search engines.

If you have your domain name and hosting separate, you can give the developer access to only the service they need access to. This is especially important if you haven’t built a relationship with your developer yet.

In closing the three major steps to purchasing your very own website address are:

1. Choose your ideal name
2. Choose the top level domain
3. Choose your registrar

And seal the deal! Every registrars sign up process is different but they are all usually intuitive.

When you have chosen your web hosting provider, you can then do a Google search for “Connect domain from [your chosen registrar] to [your chosen hosting provider]”. You should get results with detailed instructions on connecting your domain to your hosting. If we can be of any help, please contact us.

If you have ever researched how to build a website, you have likely seen WordPress as one of the top solutions. While there are other ways to make a website and it is not the right solution for everyone, we at Emphasis.LA prefer to use WordPress for most of our website projects.

In an effort to make sure our customers are well informed on what goes into creating an effective website, we want to answer a few frequently asked questions regarding the framework we use.

What is WordPress?

WordPress is open-source content management system (CMS) software built on the PHP coding language. It was created in 2003 and now powers roughly 40% of the top 10,000,000 websites worldwide and growing.

Open-Source means that the code behind the software has a communal license and once downloaded, can be used, and modified any way you wish. In the case of WordPress, Automattic owns the brand “WordPress”, and they own the main repository where the master code files reside, but they do not control what you do with that code once it is downloaded. Automattic is the ultimate decision maker when it comes to the direction WordPress is heading in, but they cannot, for example, say that they do not agree with you politically and tell you to stop using its code.

To make a website with WordPress, you must upload the files to a web hosting company. Fortunately, most popular website hosting companies have a one-click install button for WordPress which means you can have a working skeleton of a website up in a matter of minutes.

Here’s an article we wrote on website hosting with links to our favorite hosting companies.

Advantages of WordPress

Customization

The main advantage to using WordPress versus other platforms is that it is highly customizable. There are thousands of plugins available that can help you accomplish almost anything you want. In the cases where there are no pre-built solutions, a developer can custom-create one and integrate it easily.

People Know How to Use It

Since WordPress is the number one platform for so many websites around the world, it can make it easier for a small business to hire someone internally that can maintain the website and content.

Control Your Content

With WordPress (WordPress.org not WordPress.com), you have more control of your content. With CMS solutions that are proprietary (not open source), you must agree to terms of service that often restrict the type of content you can place on your website. They may even include terms that gives them ownership of your website content. What if, for example, you were making political statements on your website? If they disagreed with you, they can say that you violated their terms and take down your content at any time.

With WordPress (.org) you own your content so, except for the law, no one can tell you what you can or cannot put on your website. You do have to comply with the terms of your hosting company since they can take down your website from their servers. But if you are backing up your website properly, then you can look for another host that is more favorable to you and place your already built website on their servers quickly. If you wanted to remove your website from Shopify for example, you cannot just download your content and place it on Wix. You would have to recreate your site from scratch.

Disadvantages of WordPress

Ease of use

While we believe WordPress can work for almost any venture, it is not the right solution for everyone. Some people do not find it very intuitive. They may prefer other proprietary solutions such as Shopify, Wix, or SquareSpace that do not require a lot of technical skills. WordPress in our opinion, is not that difficult, but for some it just takes a little getting used to. With a little help from Google, anyone can become a moderate WordPress pro.

Website Maintenance

Website maintenance is an advantage that other Proprietary CMSs have over WordPress and other open-source CMS solutions. Plugins, themes, and WordPress core need to be updated regularly. Although updates are usually a painless push of a button, occasionally an update can break a website. If even a small amount of downtime can disrupt your business or profits, then you may need to create a technical process to safely update a website. This may mean you need to hire someone to maintain your website.  With a Proprietary CMS, updates are handled by the CMS internally.

What is a theme?

A theme is a set of files with code that determines the overall style of the website and it may also control some of the functionality. The theme can be changed at any time by the website administrator. When you install WordPress, it comes with a choice of default themes already installed. As of the writing of this post the default theme is TwentyTwentyOne. WordPress has a large repository of themes to choose from that have met certain criteria to be listed on the repository. There are also other websites or repositories online where you can purchase themes.  All WordPress themes are built independently of WordPress Core, usually by third party individuals or companies.

You can choose a theme based on many factors. The most common reasons a theme is chosen is by the way it looks and by the industry it caters to. For example, if you wanted to build a website for a restaurant, you can look in a search engine such as Google for “WordPress theme for restaurants” and you will get several choices of themes that focus on restaurants.

What are plugins?

After choosing a theme and adjusting the theme settings you will most likely need to add some functionality to the website. Plugins are a set of code in a file or folder that are added (or plugged in) to the website that can help you achieve a specific functionality. Common plugins add forms to the website, help you to optimize for search engines, increase security, and many other possibilities. While a plugin like JetPack adds a lot of functionality to your website, most plugins only perform one specific functionality. The more code you add, the more likely you will cause performance or compatibility issues. You should create your website with as few plugins as possible that will achieve the website’s objective.

What are page-builders?

Page builders are a type of plugin that add a visual editing process to the website with the ability to drag and drop items into place. Page builders are easy to use and come with a lot of built-in functionality. They can save you a lot of time in building a website without having to know how to code. The main disadvantage to page builders is that they can affect your website’s performance. If you have good hosting and otherwise optimize your website, you may be able to negate the disadvantage.

Want to know more about page builders? Read our article What are WordPress page builders and should I use them.

At Emphasis.LA, we usually build websites without a page builder but there are times when we prefer the simplicity and speed of using a page builder.

WordPress.com vs WordPress.org

The product provided through WordPress.org is open-source software that is installed on a web hosting companies’ server. You can even download a copy of the software and run it on your personal computer along with other software to create a website only visible on your computer. This is commonly done by us and other web developers while building a WordPress website for testing purposes. If you ever want to change hosting companies, you can easily download your website and take it anywhere.

WordPress.com is essentially a hosting company that uses the WordPress.org software to sell a website CMS service that directly competes with Shopify, Wix, Squarespace etc. Like those other options, the websites are not as customizable, but they require less maintenance since WordPress.com handles the maintenance. WordPress.com is also owned by Automattic, the company behind WordPress.org.

How do you get support for WordPress problems?

Being open source means that there is no central source of support when you inevitably run into a problem with the website. Anyone who has worked with WordPress for a while has most likely become adept at using Google to find answers. Almost every issue I have faced with WordPress has already been dealt with by other developers and WordPress enthusiasts. Your questions on any WordPress issue may have already been asked on Reddit, WordPress Stack Exchange, WordPress Forums, and other Forums. Very often you will find someone has written a blog post about your question. Several websites such as WP Beginner focus on writing about the most common issues. YouTube is filled with tutorials. Udemy has several budget friendly courses. Facebook has several groups you can join to ask questions.

Are there alternatives to WordPress?

If you are looking to build a website, there are numerous options besides WordPress. Most solutions will fall into these 3 categories:

• Custom coded websites
• Proprietary CMS
• Open-Source CMS

Custom coded websites

You can get someone to build you something from scratch that meets all your requirements. Custom coded websites have the added benefit of being lightweight and fast. A person or agency that is good may demand a high price tag and you may be tied to them for the life of the website. Making updates to the website may be too complicated for most people so updates may have to be done by the developer. Best suited for larger businesses who want to really stand out and can afford to have a team constantly optimizing.

Content Management Systems

A content management system (CMS) is software installed on a server that simplifies the process of creating a website and aims to solve the issue of updating content on a website. A CMS user is given a dashboard where they can choose a theme for the website, add a logo, add pages and posts, change colors, and make many other changes without having to write a single line of code. Most will allow to add your own code if you really want to.

Proprietary Content Management Systems

A proprietary CMS is a privately owned CMS. You have either no access or limited access to the code behind the software and so you are limited to the number of customizations you can make. The code for the CMS is maintained by the owners so you do not have to worry about constant updates.

Some popular proprietary CMS are Shopify, Wix, Squarespace, and Weebly. These are good solutions for people with low budgets who want to build something fast.

Open-Source Content Management Systems (OS CMS)

The two most popular open-source alternatives to WordPress are Drupal and Joomla. For the most part, most of the people using these alternatives are web developers who have a personal preference for them. Without having used these other CMSs, it is hard to say what a specific advantage would be that would make a person use them instead of WordPress. Drupal was the CMS of choice for the WhiteHouse.gov website from 2009 to 2016.

OS CMS do not provide technical support. Users must rely on documentation and support forums to find solutions to problems. Since more people use WordPress, there are naturally more people creating content about WordPress. This gives WordPress a major advantage over other open-source content management systems.

Is WordPress Secure?

Yes, WordPress is secure software. It is safe enough that since 2017 WordPress has been used to build the website for the White House – two different websites – one for each of the administrations (Trump and Biden). For hackers, there would probably be no better prize than the White House website. That is a huge vote of confidence for WordPress.

So why is WordPress the most hacked CMS platform if it is secure? Simply speaking, it is because it is the most widely used. But that does not tell you much. These are the most common ways WordPress websites get hacked:

• Weak or insecure passwords
• Lack of updates – plugins, themes, WordPress, and PHP all need to be updated periodically.
• Robots – hackers are constantly running scripts on websites looking for vulnerabilities or guessing passwords.

To avoid hacks, we recommend a strategy of constant monitoring and hardening of the website. Use secure passwords, keep everything updated, use a good host, and use security software to control the robots. If you add two factor authorization, you can prevent hackers from logging in to your website even if your password has been compromised.

Summary: We Love WordPress

WordPress is the tool that we, at Emphasis.LA, use to create effective websites for small businesses and nonprofits. It allows us to offer cost-effective, customizable websites that can allow small businesses to compete with mid to large size firms without looking cookie-cutter.

As of November 14, 2020, we have now been operating as Emphasis.LA for 3 years and counting. We want to thank all of our partners in business for making it possible.

Emphasis.LA is celebrating two years of doing business in Los Angeles and Southern California.

Jason Orellana, the founder of Emphasis.LA, began his digital career with many challenges. Shortly after graduating from ITT Technical Institute, the school went out of business. Jason felt like his investment of time and money in his future were in vain. Little did he know that this was the beginning of an entrepreneurial journey that would land him a gig as a business owner.

Jason started Emphasis.LA in November 2017 following a stint as a freelance website developer to a couple of different customers. Through trial and error, Emphasis.LA has evolved into a digital marketing and website development company. Our goal is to help small businesses and non-profits create an online presence and expand their exposure from LA to the world!

“There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure.”

Colin Powell

We love and relate to this quote from Colin Powell. We learned that with hard work, preparation, and investing in ourselves, we can better position our company for success. Learning from mistakes while figuring out new ways to overcome obstacles has led to Jason’s success as the founder of Emphasis.LA.

From our own experience, we know that building and running a business is hard work. You have to love what you do. We love meeting business owners and doing what we can to help them reach their goals. We have a small team that works good together and shares a common vision. Along the way we have also worked with a select group of local, dedicated freelancers on a few projects.

Thank you for coming on this journey with us and for celebrating two years and growing with Emphasis.LA. We went from working on two small accounts to serving thriving businesses across Southern California. We look forward to helping you grow and Expanding Your Exposure!