Gnarly

I have, what I think is, a pretty good idea for a website.

It would be a simple website featuring my own content (text with pictures), and maybe leave comments on if that feature is easy to implement.

My goal for this website is to get clicks/viewers, whatever they're called, and make money off of ad space.

Do companies like Word Press take a share of your profit? Would I be better off coding my own page, buying a domain, and having a site host it? If so, how do I sell ad space and keep track of the number of viewers? How do I get Google to notice me eventually?

Thanks,

Wyatt

Agshlee

Well having a host would guarantee a high up time, and it's generally easier than hosting your website yourself. As far as the ads are concerned, you can just sign up for Google AdSense, and use the URL they provide on your website. You'll get paid for every person that clicks on it, as far as I know. Not a lot, but still.

AdSense: https://www.google.com/adsense/login/en_US/?hl=en_US

Gnarly

I was thinking about one of the sites that gives you a custom name with no bs and hosts it for you with a package for your usage/size. e.g. www.gnarlyfromoverclocknet.com

kyotejones

Do companies like Word Press take a share of your profit?
No

Would I be better off coding my own page, buying a domain, and having a site host it?
Depends what you consider "better off" to mean, and how much time you want to put into this. No doubt it would be better to do it all yourself, but it takes a lot of work to maintain a website with no CMS to help you. But if you think about it the only sites that ever became anything on the net are those who built it themselves. I rarely ever hear of sites who use CMS apps who are successful (google, facebook, myspace, youtube, twitter, digg, kind of success).

If so, how do I sell ad space and keep track of the number of viewers?
You can sell space yourself on the website and hope someone buys banner space; you can use google ad-sense or other ad-sense like companies; or you can go through affiliate links. Tracking viewers can be done a number of ways. My preference is Google Analytics.

How do I get Google to notice me eventually?
Not going to go into SEO but that is what you need to read into.

Gnarly

Reps all around! Thanks for the info, but I have one more question.

Is it possible to pull information from other sites with my site's code. E.g. if I wanted to pull the price of a stock off Google every hour or the number of active users at a given time using Overclock.net. If it's possible, how difficult is it?

Gnarly

Nevermind, Google'd it, derp.

Edit give your opinion for the best method if ya'd like.

A-E-I-Owned-You

Wordpress is open source(free). You get their CMS and install it on your host. There are also other blog CMS type deals. Id google "blog cms" or similar to find some options.

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