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The strain of the budget especially since recession has forced many persons into employing a site template in building their website. For others it is a matter of skill, or the lack of it, or even time restrictions that drive one to rely on templates.

Numerous website templates can be had at no cost online, but often with conditions.

So, there are a few basic things to do when going through the list to find one to suit your needs. That is after you have decided on an appropriate name which summarizes well your offerings, and further whether you need a simple blogger theme or website of templates to give you a uniformed appeal.

DESIGN IS CRITICAL:

The first step is to choose a comfortable variety of designs which represents even the slightest impression of your character, and make note of the source of that site template. Make sure the template sample can strongly reflect your product or service, when information is applied, and be so attractive that even the quickest visitor stops and take note.

Therefore look for the mood of the site, e.g. pay attention to the colors, tones, fonts and the possibility of changing these should the need arise. Also ask yourself if the site reflects well the intended image such as business, personal, portfolio.

OTHER YARDSTICKS:

Afterward you are going to narrow the choices, as you apply other yard sticks.
These yardsticks can include:

- Accessibility to the template's designer or creator. Make sure there is access to at least one workable contact

- Manipulation power

- Ability to add features as needed such as calendars, music, albums, downloadable options, comments area, contact form

- Ease of template, and access to the root site and/or holding folders. How easy is the site to navigate through

- Flexibility in changing around elements of the templates such as widgets, blogs, adding categories, banner heads, background photos.

- The conditions upon which you are allowed to use the templates. This may include whether there is an eventual cost affixed or where the template might be free, or a simple donation is required. You might also want to consider how much publicity you end up giving the creator of the site, in terms of marketing. Sometimes the creator's name is embedded and cannot be changed as the designer, regardless of how many changes you make to its appearance. Further you are not allowed to add credits to the fixed template such as on behalf of the host or technicians who may also be in a deal with you for their services.

- The matter of advertisements is one to take seriously. Aside from soliciting advertisements, and hence needing set slots to place them, there are sites which allow you to network with them and earn added income through placing advertisements on their behalf. On one hand, you may need to check whether slots can be provided, or the degree of difficulty of adding advertisement images of different sizes in required areas such as to the side of an article, or as a banner. On the other hand, networking advertising companies sometimes allow you to create your own size, narrowing down the content to relate to your potential visitors, and in the end provide you with a code to place on the pages or templates of your sites. These codes once activated on the site of origin appear according to the preferences you selected such as size, content. Google AdSense is a popular choice. However, for this feature, you must check to see if you have control over changing the html coding, or whether the hosting company offering the templates are the ones who will ultimately benefit from advertisements placed. They do this by embedding their own id into your created, which ultimately overrides your codes and identification pin (id) generated with the originating networking advertising companies.

This denies you the opportunity to place or earn income from any placed advertisements, in exchange for their 'free' templates, and in some cases 'free' hosting. Care must be taken as aside from not earning, you ultimately are the one to introduce new visitors to their site, and in some instances the hosting company is advertised at your expense, without you even appearing in search engines.

Strive therefore for a site, with flexibility, that is, if you want to earn additional income which can go towards defraying maintenance cost of the site.

These considered you now must move on to the challenge of hosting. Choose your host wisely. Do some research into the background of companies that offer free hosting, especially when it comes to hosting of the free websites you build using their templates. Check them above all for reliability, especially when it comes to addressing technical problems, and consistency in maintaining your presence on the web. Wix.com has been reliable in my experience, and even provides a good interactive expert team for constant reference within good timing.

Always remember though that there are levels to what companies offer, whether its website themes, templates or hosting. You may gain better access and more manipulation power as you upgrade from one level to the next, sometimes at a cost financial or otherwise, so check this out too.