Category: Guides & Tutorials

Start by defining the purpose of your website and who your audience is -- this will guide every decision you make. Next, choose a domain name and register it, then select a hosting provider and a website builder that matches your skill level. For complete beginners, we recommend starting with a managed platform like Squarespace or WordPress.com, which bundles hosting and a builder together. Follow a step-by-step tutorial to build your first pages, and do not aim for perfection right away -- you can always improve your site over time as you learn more.

WordPress powers over 40% of all websites globally and is the most versatile CMS available, with thousands of themes and plugins for nearly any feature you need. It is the best choice if you want full control and long-term scalability. Shopify is ideal if your primary goal is e-commerce, while Ghost is excellent for writers and publishers who want a clean, fast blogging platform. For Canadian businesses, WordPress is particularly well-supported with many local developers, agencies, and hosting providers offering optimized WordPress plans with Canadian data centres.

A simple website with five to ten pages can be built in a weekend using a website builder like Squarespace or Wix, or within a week using WordPress if you are learning as you go. A more complex business website with custom features, e-commerce, or integrations typically takes two to six weeks for a professional developer to build. Custom-designed websites with unique branding, animations, and advanced functionality can take two to four months. The timeline also depends on how quickly you can provide the content -- gathering text, images, and product information is often the biggest bottleneck.

Set up automated daily backups that save both your website files and your database to a remote location separate from your hosting server, such as Google Drive, Amazon S3, or Dropbox. Many Canadian hosting providers include automatic backups in their plans, but you should not rely solely on your host -- always maintain your own independent backup. For WordPress sites, plugins like UpdraftPlus or BlogVault make this easy to configure. Keep at least 30 days of backup history so you can restore to a point before any issues occurred, and test your backups periodically by performing a trial restoration.

First, submit your sitemap to Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools so search engines can find and index your pages. Install analytics tools like Google Analytics or Plausible to track visitor behaviour. Set up essential security measures including an SSL certificate, strong admin passwords, and automated backups. Create key legal pages such as a privacy policy and terms of service, which are especially important for Canadian businesses under PIPEDA. Finally, test your site on multiple devices and browsers, check all links and forms, and set up monitoring to alert you if your site goes down.