Now that you’ve acquired a domain name and a hosting account, it’s time to connect the dots. This no-frills slideshow is a short guide for pointing a domain name registered at GoDaddy.com to your site with an imaginary hosting company called “hostcompany.com”.

Typically, your web host will provide you with two nameserver values in an email along with other important account information. You’ll definitely want to print everything out and keep it in a safe place. (Tip: Store an extra copy on a USB flash drive.)

After changing the nameserver info in your GoDaddy account, allow up to 24 hours (typically much less) for the changes to cycle through the Internet and make your site visible.

In the meantime, key in “free WordPress themes” to your favorite search engine and explore the myriad offerings available to you as a self-hosted teacher. One good place to start is the WordPress.org site, but there are hundreds of others.

Preview any that catch your fancy, and download the ones you really like. We’ll be uploading them to your website in the next part of this series.

According to the experts at TopTenReviews, this table presents the best of the best web hosting companies. Which one should you choose to host your site?

The answer: None of the above. Unfortunately, this outfit and tons of other review sites put profit ahead of objectivity when making their recommendations. The underlying motivation shows clearly in this video clip.

Finding a truly “good” web hosting company is probably the biggest challenge you’ll face when setting up your site. Word of mouth is a good place to start. But in the end you have to test-drive the service yourself before you really know if the fit is right.

For me, a “good” web host has to offer, at the minimum, the following:

• Money back guarantee
• Better Business Bureau rating of at least B+
• A telephone number that is answered within a reasonable amount of time
• 24/7 tech support from knowledgeable staff via chat, phone, or email
• Modern, reliable hardware with limited down time
• Generally positive comments from independent customer forums
• Full feature set, including cPanel and the Fantastico script installer

I have researched quite a number of web hosts but found precious few that satisfy these criteria. Among those that pass are Arvixe, Inmotion, and Host Gator. Any one of these would probably be a good choice.

But even if your experience is unsatisfactory, you can easily back up your entire site and transfer it to another provider. Intact. That’s one of the biggest advantages to going with a host that features the proprietary cPanal versus other control panels. It makes managing your site a breeze.

Once you have registered a domain name and chosen a web host, the next step is to connect them and start building your site. Look for details in Part III of this series.

More and more teachers are jumping on the bandwagon and creating some sort of web presence. Many teachers that I know have set up a blog as their  base of online operations. Free services such as Blogger, WordPress, and EduBlogs make it so easy!

These free services are a great place to start. But if you’re like me, at some point you realize their limitations. Caps on storage space or bandwidth. No FTP capability. Unsightly advertising. Inability to use themes other than those provided. Limited customization. You can, of course, upgrade to a premium account to get some of these features. After all, outside of advertising, that’s how these services make their money.

But let’s say you want to expand your web presence with a wiki, bulletin board, forum, or Moodle. Unless your school is doing the hosting or footing the bill, you could end up with a hefty charge at the end of each month.

A more economical solution, and one that is ultimately more flexible and satisfying, is to host your own site. For one low, flat monthly fee, you can set up any number of blogs, wikis, Moodles, etc., and customize them as you like. This is also a very good option for teachers whose schools have unusually tough firewalls or less than cooperative system administrators.

Other self-hosting advantages include:

• No bothersome advertising
• Free email accounts with your own domain name
• Complete control of all your files and information
• Direct upload and download of these files to and from your server
• One-touch installation of WordPress, Moodle, and other scripts
• Complete site backup and restore capability

Where to start?

I would suggest first getting a domain name. Be wary of the “free domain for life” that some web hosts offer. Why? Because if the hosting company goes out of business, or is bought by another firm, your domain name could disappear or be held hostage to extract more money from you (I speak from experience).

Play it safe and get your own name from a third-party domain name registrar and manage it yourself. I use GoDaddy and have no complaints, but there are a number of others to choose from. Expect to pay $8-15/year to secure your domain name.

Tip: No matter where you register your domain, make SURE to keep a safe copy of your username and password. This info is vital for connecting your domain name with your website.

What’s next?

Now that you have a domain name, it’s time to go shopping for the right web host. Details coming up.