It’s been a big month for ideas in Sydney with the Sydney Writers Festival, TEDx, Vivid Sydney, AMP Amplify and XMedia Lab along with many other events intended to stimulate thought and action.
One of the things that’s great with the Internet is we’re able to get our ideas out to the world very easily without spending much money. If you have a great idea, for a business, community group or just an interest there’s nothing stopping you letting the planet know about you and your dreams.
During the Sydney Writers Festival we saw debates between food bloggers and the print critics, particularly notable was Food blogger Rebecca Varidel and her Inside Cuisine website.
Earlier in May, Louise Hewson launched her 52 Suburbs book and exhibition which was born out of her website chronicling her discoveries around the suburbs of Sydney.
The biggest challenge is setting up a website so you can be found on the net, today’s tools make it very easy to set up a site. Here’s a few you can use.
If you already have a Facebook account, it’s very easy to set up a page covering your topic or idea.
While it’s simple to create a Facebook Page, be aware there are risks as the company has some quirky policies and not everybody has a Facebook account or is comfortable with it.
Blogger
This is the best basic starting tool which also has the attraction of being free.
Blogger’s simple layout which you can change by dragging and dropping the various parts of the website works well and you can add features such as subscription services, advertising, e-commerce and other features by turning on various “gadgets”.
52 Suburbs and Grab Your Fork are two good examples of Blogger based sites. In Louise’s case she registered the 52 Suburbs domain name – the bit behind the “www” or “@” in an email – which costs around $20 a year.
WordPress
The big daddy of Internet publishing is the WordPress tool. This free software drives most websites and is becoming the software of choice. Rebecca at Inside Cuisine and this website are using WordPress along with thousandds of businesses.
One WordPress’ great attractions is it features thousands of ready to use “widgets” and templates that makes it extremely easy to add features and customise your website.
WordPress offers a free service that gives you the basics of the platform. To get the most from WordPress you need to host the site with a web hosting provider and this can get more expensive and complex.
Other tools
There are hundreds of other platforms you can use to get your ideas out to the world. Worpress, Blogger and Facebook are just three of the most popular and easy to use. It’s worth exploring with what you find works well for your idea or business.
Growing your site
As your site grows, you’ll need to manage content, track visitors and promote it through the various social media and traditional methods. We have some free resources from NSW Microbusiness Month that can help you manage and grow your online presence.
More information
In July we’ll launching eBu$iness: 7 Steps to Get Your Small Business Online… and Making Money Now! Which will cover all the steps of getting your business online, promoting it and tracking your success. Pre-release orders are available now.
We also have some free workshops for business wanting to get online sponsored by the NSW Government, contact us for more details.
If you subscribe to our newsletter we also make available various free offers along with keeping readers up to date with smart new ideas.
There’s nothing to stop you getting your ideas online. If you want to do something interesting, or even change the world, the tools are now here for you to do it.
Listened (and called in as you know) to ABC 702 Sydney radio this morning. Great spot Paul – inspirational. I know a lot of people want to get started but don’t know how.
My advice is always – just do it (that’s not a brand endorsement). Inside Cuisine is my third blog and I’ve learnt as I’ve gone along.
My other advice is unless its just for a conversation with friends and relatives, get a domain name, because then the blog can always move platforms at a later date if needed.