I am presently using Yahoo Sitebuilder for my websites but was told and found on many other sites that it might not be the best tool to use and makes it difficult for search engines. I like the ease of use of the Sitebuilder (it's also free to download) but if it creates problems for people to find my sites than it is a big problem. Could anybody suggest any other tools that I could use which would have the same ease of use, access etc. I need Yahoo to be able to support my websites as that's what I'm using for web hosting. I need something that won't require too much learning since I'm very busy with clients and home life. Another option would be to look at what is causing the problems with Sitebuilder and try to correct it but I guess it would require html knowledge and I'm not sure that it's worth investing the time to learn it. Or would it???

Thank you.

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Genevieve Lachance
VA Simple Services

Genevieve - If you're plenty busy and don't need to take on something new, the best and easiest way to go might be to find a website designer to work with. Find someone who will build a site you can maintain with relative ease.

Free design software is fine for a certain level of approach, but when you want to step things up a little, some investment is usually involved. Outsourcing the task is probably the quickest way, and you end up thinking it's well worth the cost.

On the other hand, if you can take the time to learn html (not much more than a course or two through the internet or your local community college) it will come in handy in a million instances as you continue your VA practice.

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Mary H. Ruth/Virtual Writing & Communications
http://www.writingVA.com

Hi Mary,

Thank you for your reply. I am looking into taking a few courses and htlm courses are offered at my local college but I also noticed a few websites where they offer free tutorials. Would that be good enough for me to be able to use it to work on my own? I don't necessarily want to get a free web building tool. Actually, I don’t mind paying if it’s worth it. I do agree with you that I should know at least the basic of html. But if there are site building tools that make it easier and faster, why reinvent the wheel and try to use html. I hope that doesn’t sound bad and you understand what I'm trying to say.

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Genevieve Lachance
VA Simple Services

Genevieve,

I completely agree with Mary, sometimes we need to look outside of ourselves for tasks that are important and we don't have the knowledge. If you are willing to learn and want to get your site up now then go for it. You can always change later, however you need to look at time and costs for that route.

I would suggest that every VA take at least a very basic HTML course or learn HTML. It will come in handy with many applications that are used on a daily basis and not just on your website.

Keep us up on what you decide. Best to you.

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Lee Drozak
My Office Assistant

I have used SiteBuilder.

Unless there is somethign I missed, once built with SiteBuilder always built with SiteBuilder. I left Yahoo in December. When I tranferred my files to my new host my pages showed a warning that they were only built for Yahoo pages. I had to manually delete the reference from the code.

Once I altered the files with a free program (nVue) SiteBuilder would no longer read the files correctly.

After three years of the same layout, I will be redesigning my site this year.

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Robin A. Holstein
Robin's Desktop Virtual Administrative Services
My Blog

Genevieve,

I'm a wordpress evangelist, in other words I love using wordpress for all of my needs. I now only work in wordpress and offer services for transitioning from static websites to wordpress. I love the flexibility, the platform (software) is free to download and you can self host it.

Some of the themes available provide lots of flexibility, it's clean pretty straight forward and the Search Engines love it! My personal belief is that static web pages are becoming a dying breed in the online world and there is a large movement towards a blogging platform for all aspects of online world.

It's easy to use, quick and simple and editing of any blog, page etc is a breeze....

That's my thoughts...move from Yahoo and come over to the Wordpress Side

<that's my attempt at being funny and playing off of Star Wars, don't think it worked tho' LOL!>

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Renee Shupe, Become a Techie Virtual Assistant
eMail Marketing & Aweber Training Starts May 15! - Save 50% using VAFAweber

Love snappages. You don't need to know html at all and you're able to launch some of the google webtool widgets. There's a free trial and I believe it was only around $60 for a year.

I'm on board with Renee about WordPress. That is certainly a great option and once you work with it, you can offer (if you want) as a service to your clients.

If you don't want a WP site and still want to work with a sitebuilder, I only want to say that I used a sitebuilder with Office Live. When the time came to come off the free site and make a better, WP site, I was not able to transfer any of my pages. My host was not able to do that and I had to recreate new pages. A complete overhaul which took forever.

So I only send caution in using a sitebuilder. You may have problems as time progresses and you want to improve or expand your site.

I also think that going with Mary's suggestion to outsource the site to someone else is the easiest way to go. And investment like that will be well worth it.

Janine

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Most definitely if you aren't ready to manage the transition or the site yourself find someone to outsource it too. I personally enjoying working, tinkering and updating my site but when I desire I customized theme it would be something I'd outsource because it's not my skill set.

As a virtual assistant it isn't always necessary for all of us to be able to do everything, but I think - more importantly - know great resources to access and connect with...

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Renee Shupe, Become a Techie Virtual Assistant
eMail Marketing & Aweber Training Starts May 15! - Save 50% using VAFAweber

Thanks guys! I was looking into Wordpress but I wasn't certain how easy/hard it was to use. Also, there is so much info on Wordpress that I was getting confused. I need something that other people can also access to modify on their own. That's why I liked Yahoo Site builder. Anyone can go in (with id & PW) and easily modify files without knowledge of HTML or programming. As an example, my father wants me to built him a site and wants to access it himself when he wants to add pictures and stuff. I will try to look at Wordpress this week and see if I can make it work for my needs. I don’t want to invest all this time and energy into Sitebuilder if down the road I will want to move to something else.

Anyone have advice on Wordpress and where to start?

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Genevieve Lachance
VA Simple Services