Free Webmaster Resources

Here you will find tutorials, marketing resources, SEO tricks and a lot more. We recommend you bookmark this page as we will be updating it on an ongoing basis.

Topics

>How to Set Up a Website - Basics
>Tutorials - We Help You Create Your Website
>Personalized Support
>Marketing: Start a Conversation With Your Website Visitors
>Search Engine Optimization (SEO) - Boost Your Traffic
>Free Tools and Plug-ins
>Free Web Analytics
>Web Law
>Professional Stock Photos
>Monetize Your Website

How to Set Up a Website - Basics

What you should know about website creation (even before you start building)

• How to set up my own website: 5 things every beginner should know.
• Website Creation for Absolute Beginners: our free ebook, full of useful tips
• Tips on Using a Website Builder to Create Your Professional Website: on Freelancefolder.com.
• Website Builder Reviews: here you'll find the right tool for your website project.
• Setting up a membership website: the best and most easy-to-use providers

Tutorials - We Help You Create Your Website

Find tips und instructions on using your website builder.

• Tutorial main site
  
   

Personalized Support

If you need help deciding which solution to use to build your website, you are more than welcome to talk to us. For other questions, we recommend you try these sites:

• Webmaster Talk: this UK-based forum answers your questions and you can have your site evalutated by other users.
• Warrior Forum: focuses on internet marketing and offers a great variety of discussion topics.
   

Marketing: Start a Conversation With Your Website Visitors

If you don't promote your site you won't attract many visitors. Luckily there are some easy ways to fix this.

• How blogging could benefit your business: learn about the advantages of blogging.
• Integrate Twitter and Facebook into your website: this article shows you different options.
• Mailchimp: one of the best email marketing tools around: offers great free ebooks.
• Live chat support: a great way to interact with your website visitors. Our sister site ChatToolTester.com helps you find the right provider.
• Facebook advertising: Rick Mulready's free toolkit provides a number of useful resources that get you started.
• Practical guides: Informly provides valuable information on various topics such as Google Analytics, Adwords, Podcasting and Twitter.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) - Boost Your Traffic

SEO starts with your choice of website builder, and includes both On-Page Optimization (everything that happens on your site) and Off-Page Optimization (backlinks from other sites to yours).

• SEOMoz: free beginners guide: nicely illustrated crash course on SEO
• Google SEO guideline (PDF): why not check what the world's most important search engine has to say?
• Google Webmasters: register your new site here for detailed insights.
• SEOMoz Blog: a fantastic resource for advanced SEO. Check the backlinking profile of any website with their Open Site Explorer.
• Link Building Strategies: PointBlankSEO features a fantastic resource with ideas to find backlinking opportunities.
• Analyse your website for SEO: rates several key factors. Website Grader is another great free service.

Free Tools and Plug-ins

The internet is a fantastic repository of free tools you can use to make your life easier. Here are some tools we use ourselves:

• Copyscape: detects copies of your valuable content and helps you find content thieves.
• Use Disqus for a more sophisticated blog commenting feature - includes email notifications, moderation and more.
• Google Alerts: get email alerts when your or your competitors' brand is mentioned on the web.
• Dropbox - share large files with your coworkers. We use it quite extensively ourselves. Get 2 GB for free.
• Fireshot - Firefox add-on to create screenshots of the full length of web pages.
• HTTrack Website Copier: brilliant tool to create backups of your website.
• Kanbantool: excellent tool to manage projects the Japanese 'Kanban' way. Can also be used to organize your to do list.
• Free web form builders: it's fast and easy to create forms with these free form builders.
• Online Meetings / Screensharing: Yugma offers free web conferencing. For short screencasts we can recommend Jing or Screenr.
• TestSize.com: see how your website looks in different screen resolutions.
• Xenu's Link Sleuth: finds broken links on your website. Very important, use it regularly!

Free Web Analytics

Three free professional web statistic tools:

• Google Analytics is THE standard in web analytics. We highly recommend it. Learn how to add it to your website in our tutorial.
• For advanced users: Woopra gives you a real-time picture of your website traffic. It's a great way to understand how they navigate your site. Warning: highly addictive!
• For real pros: Clicktale enables you to create short videos and heatmaps of your visitor's actions. You can even track exit points in web forms.

Web Law

Know your rights before launching your website!

• Legal requirements: comprehensive list of legal information for the U.S., UK and Ireland.
• Website Law Blog: find information on numerous topics, for a UK audience.

Professional Stock Photos

 
Great images at no or little cost that can make all the difference to your site
 

• Fotolia: offers high quality images starting at $0.75 USD.
• Photl.com: free high resolutions stock photos.
• Creative Commons Search: search Flickr, Google and Yahoo at once for Creative Commons photos.
• Da Button Factory: Nice little creator for buttons that include text, e.g. for call to actions like "Register now!".
• Smashing Magazine: excellent icons and other freebies that can usually be used for even commercial purposes.
• Shiny Icon Maker: create free Web 2.0 icons for your site.
• Just as important as professional images: a professional font type. Dafont.com offers loads of great free fonts.

 Monetize Your Website

There are numerous ways to make money online, for example start an online shop and sell things, or be an affiliate for another company. Here are some great resources to get you started:

• Smartpassiveincome.com: Pat Flynn's highly recommended blog. No pop-up banners, no sales pages. Simply great content.
• Entrepreneurs-Journey.com: Offers great podcast interviews and the free 'Blogprofits Blueprint'. Too many pop-ups and sales pages on this blog, unfortunately.

Icons: © Sunroots - Fotolia.com