How to Build a Website in 2024 (Step-by-Step Guide)

Everybody should have their own website, especially when it comes to selling your knowledge on the internet.

In this article, I'm going over everything you need to know to set up your own website. I'll show you what makes an effective website too, so you don't end up with an overpriced business card.

Here's everything we'll cover:

• Why you should create a website
• How to pick the right platform and domain name
• How to drive traffic to your website
• How to turn that traffic into money

Let's dive in!

1. Why Having a Website Is Important

So why is having a website important?

Well, the website allows you to have a home on the internet.

It's a place where people can go to get to know you, see what you're all about and more importantly, how you can help them.

And when you build out your website right, your website should work for you. It should become almost like an employee that works on your behalf 24/7.

Because when it's set up correctly, which I'm going to show you how to do throughout this article, your website should lead to business, most importantly to capturing leads, converting them into subscribers and ultimately buyers.

If someone's considering working with you, they're probably going to be doing a bit of research by typing your name or your business name into the internet.

And when they do, a really nice website should pop up, and that's where your domain name comes into play.

2. How to Get a Website Domain

There's a lot of different places that you can purchase and find domain names inside of. They all work relatively the same.

These the three that I like to use are Google domains, Domain.com or GoDaddy.com.

When you're picking a domain name, you want to make sure it meets these criteria:

• It's short
• Memorable
• Easy to say
• Easy to type
• Uses keywords that your perfect audience cares about

For example, my business name, Profit Your Knowledge is easy to say, it's easy to type out, and it's memorable.

I've had people who book calls with me or purchase a program and I get to know them and find out that my name is what really drew them in.

They found it. They said, "that's what I want!", then they got interested in my brand from there.

But oh, if only picking a domain name was as simple as just typing in the idea that you had and that it's available and it's not too expensive.

You see, picking domain names is very simple, but it can be a tedious process because two things are probably going to happen to you.

1. The name is going to be taken

What's frustrating about this is that you type in the perfect domain name or business name. You say, "This is the best thing ever!" and then you see that it's taken ...

You type it in into Google or some search engine, there's no page ... nothing shows up.

This happens because people do what's called "domain flipping", where they purchase domain names for cheap and then they resell them for more expensive.

They even go as far as having bots that buy these domains on autopilot.

So, they're just kind of hoarding domains, which makes it frustrating for us who are just trying to pick a cool domain name.

2. It's a Premium Domain

The other thing that can happen is that you type in a really good domain name. It's short, it's memorable, it's easy to say, easy to type, uses the right keywords, but it's a premium domain name.

What this means is that your domain name that you came up with is just really good ... In fact, it was a little too good.

What these domain companies do is jack up the price and call it a "premium domain name", where it can be $2,000-$30,000+ for a domain!

People even pay millions of dollars to get a really short domain name.

For example, the mattress company Tuft and Needle bought the domain name tn.com, and that domain name was not cheap.

Another big question that comes up is whether or not you should use your personal name or use a business name.

It's totally up to you. It kind of depends on how easy your name is to say and how easy it is to type.

Obviously, your name won't have specific keywords that you can type in, but for me, for example, James Allen, there's already a huge engagement ring company called jamesallen.com.

It was really hard for me to first stand out because my first domain name was JamesAllenCoaching.com. But then there was another person named Jimmy Allen coaching, and it was just too confusing.

And I've picked many different domains over the years. But now I finally stuck with Profit Your Knowledge because my personal name is just very generic.

So, it kind of depends on you. I would recommend picking a domain name that's not your personal name if you're building a sort of business.

If you could pick a domain name that has keywords that your audience cares about, that's 2 to 3 words long, ends in a ".com", and ideally that's priced between $10 and $30 for the year. That's going to be a great domain name for you.

3. Choosing Your Website Builder

So, once you get your domain name, then we need a website builder.

Now there's many different paid and free options for you to choose a website builder online. Two of the most popular paid ones are going to be GoDaddy or Squarespace.

As for free website builders, you can use WordPress, Weebly, or Wix.

Now, when people look at my website, I often get asked, "James, what's your website builder? Your website looks very clean, professional and simple. I really like it."

I only use one major tool in my business and that is Kajabi.

Kajabi is an all-in-one platform designed to help you sell your knowledge on the internet.

Everything from your website, products, membership sites, marketing, communities, podcast, blog, sales. Everything is done on Kajabi.

And the beautiful thing about Kajabi is that everything works together seamlessly on one server.

It's a bit more expensive per month, starting at $119 per month, but it's totally worth it because when you consider all the different tools that you use to do everything that Kajabi does, it's really a steal and you end up saving money.

If you want to try it out, you can get a free 30-day trial of Kajabi using my affiliate link. 

Here's what you get with my link:

• 30-day FREE trial of Kajabi (normally you only get a 14-day trial through their website)
• Online course that shows you how to set up your business and a marketing system inside of Kajabi so that you can shortcut your learning curve
• And on top of that, you also get a 1 to 1 coaching call with me

To get access to all of that, just go to profityourknowledge.com/kajabi.

4. How to Structure Your Website Homepage

So, you got your domain name. You picked a website builder. Now let's talk about structuring your website home page.

Studies show that over 80% of people spend less than 30 seconds on a website.

That means that you have less than 30 seconds to capture their attention and more importantly, capture an email address.

All great digital entrepreneurs know that an email address is the most valuable thing that you can collect on the internet, which is why everything should be built around capturing an email address, including and especially your home page.

So, a great example is Justin Welch:

Another example would be my website:

The reason you build your website around catching an email address is because people are not going to bookmark your website, most likely, and I don't want to rely on that.

I want to capture the right kind of people's information right when they land on the page.

Because once you have their contact information, you can send them more offers, build a deeper relationship with them, and ultimately lead to business.

And that's how you create an effective home page.

5. How to Write a Killer About Me Page

Next, let's talk about how to write a Killer About Me page.

I'm going to start off by telling you that nobody cares about your business. You don't care about my business.

You're reading this article because you want to learn how to build your website and you're thinking, "This is a guy who knows a bit about websites. I'm going to learn something from him to help me."

It's ok ... I'm not offended ...

So, when you're crafting your About Me page, make it more about your audience than it is about you.

It does have to have a bit of information about you, your backstory, to make sure that they can see that you're credible and you know what you're doing, but for the most part, it should be about your audience and how you can help them.

Now, a great example is a mentor of mine, Ramit Sethi.

When you go on to his About Me page, you scroll down and he's not talking about him.

He's talking about typical money advice that holds you back.

Another example is on my About Me page. 

Look at my opening statement ...

Then after that, I go into a little bit about me, but then it's right back to them and how I understand them and can help you achieve your goal

And then at the end of my About Me page, I always end with a call to action to again pick up my free guide.

Here's a link my About Me page. Read through it, check it out, and hopefully you can get some inspiration when writing your own About Me page.

Just remember that your business exists to serve your audience, not boost your ego.

6. How to Drive Traffic to Your Website

 The best way to drive traffic to your website and make your website more known is to create content.

The two biggest search engines in the world are Google and YouTube. And Google actually owns YouTube now, which is great because if you make YouTube videos and people type something into Google, YouTube videos will be promoted even if you're not writing blog posts.

But ideally, when you make a YouTube video each week, turn that into a blog post by transcribing the audio, putting it into ChatGPT, or just handwriting your own blog post, that's going to really boost the amount of SEO that you have related to your website.

It is a long game and it's something that you never stop doing. Even if you become very successful in your business, you always have to keep creating content because that's what keeps your business alive and relevant online.

But content marketing is really just about answering your target audience's questions.

I have many different articles where I talk about content strategy, but the best way to just get started is to use the "People Also Ask" section inside of Google.

No matter what you type into Google, you're going to get the "People Also Ask" section.

If you click the three little dots, you'll get a little pop up that says, these are questions people commonly search in Google. And when you click on these questions, more questions start to auto populate.

This is a goldmine for content creators because again, content marketing is just about answering your target audience's questions.

So, you can take these questions, put them in an order that you like, and then that turns into a blog article or a YouTube video so you can start getting more traffic to your website.

But what do you do with that traffic? How do you turn your website traffic into money?

7. How to Turn Your Website Traffic into Money

The way you do it is by creating a lead magnet like I've been talking about, like I showed you with the home page some way that is interesting to this person and makes them want to give you their email address in exchange for this thing.

Lead magnets come in many different forms:

• PDF Guides/Checklists
• Quizzes
• Video/Audio Training
• Complimentary call with you

Whatever it is that you want, as long as it is valuable to your audience since it's something that they don't just want, but they really need.

And when you build out your lead magnet, you want to put it everywhere.

Build your home page around it, put it at the bottom of your About Me page, put it on your blog as a sidebar where they can pick up the guide and at the bottom of each blog post.

Put it on your social media, talk about it in your content, if you get invited to guest interview on a podcast, or speak on a stage in front of your target audience, offer your lead magnet to them and you will start to get opt ins.

And once they opt in, you're going to want to create a short series of emails that add more value, overdeliver, and ultimately transition into a call to action.

Inside this article, I walk you through each piece of this funnel so you can start building yours out today.

Conclusion

Having a website is a great way for being relevant and looking professional online, but the way that you build it is key, and that's why it should all be built around adding value, speaking to what your audience really cares about and what they want, and ultimately getting an email address.

Take what you learned here, get out there and make something happen and I'll see you in the next one.