Shocker: I Designed a Cool Website

I'd created a writer website with CoffeeCup Visual Site Designer but had to do a system reinstall, losing the program. Plus, to add any little thing on it like videos or flash, you have to buy extra attachments, which is ridiculous. They have so many free builders online, there's no point in buying anything. So, I went on the hunt.

Most of the templates on various sites looked so generic and stock. I tried a few builders (Yahoo and some others I can't remember) but they weren't really what I was looking for.

Then, I landed on Wix.com, advertised as FREE. It's huge array of templates, backgrounds, flash options, animations, customizable features, etc. won me over. So, I tried it out for my Kings & Queens page and loved the whole process. I think I made an awesome site with it.

The site builder was wicked easy to use, and ironically, I didn't even use a template. I got inspired by two of their examples, combined ideas, and designed my own.

Wix is not a perfect hosting company at all. It barely hosts. You don't get an email account or access to your code, nor a stat counter (Google Analytics) unless you pay $8.25 per month (the locked-in price for a one-year commitment), but you can have a free site if you don't care about stats (or their tiny ad bars) (though, their two ads will be affixed to your site) or upgrade to one of their plans. Most hosting sites are in the $4-a-month range.

They do have a $4-and-change plan but their little ads stay on your page. The $8.25 plan no ads, Google Analytics, a free domain and the extra advertising candies that every other host gives out.

For now, I'm online free; stats are not really important to me at this point. But I really don't mind paying $8.25 a month later on if it gets me an awesome site and I don't have to pay for a designer. Plus, I honestly don't need another email account to check, so linking my contact form to my current address totally works for me.

Here's my URL: http://www.kingsandqueensnovel.com if you want to check it out, but please note, it's a work in progress and I haven't plugged in my trailer, picked my set copy and all that jazz. I'm just so excited to show it. Check it out and let me know what you think.

If you pop in, please sign my guestbook, so I know you stopped by and let me know if it's easy to navigate and if everything appears cool on your end (fonts especially). My body text type should look kind of like Courier and all the page headers should look like black punch tape. Thanks a bunch.

~ Signing off and sending out cyber hugs.