Free online website builder

When you register a domain name at 1&1, you get more than just a domain. The package also includes free private registration and basic tools for establishing e-mail addresses and a Web presence at that domain. Each domain comes with a free online website builder.

As they say on their site, "1&1 Starter Website Builder is a convenient, easy-to-use tool that lets you create a 5-page website in minutes for your online business card, coming soon page, parking page, or the mini site of your choice. No HTML experience is needed and your site can be online in minutes!"

So I decided to test it, and this mini site is the result of my experimenting. And my verdict is: 1&1 Starter Website Builder lets you quite easily build a simple one-to-five page HTML-based website at your domain. The main advantage of this tool is its price - you only pay $7.99 per year for your domain and get a full-featured website without banners, popups, and other annoying adds.

The builder is very easy to use, I had no problems at all creating and editing pages, adding pictures and custom HTML to them, even though I didn't bother to read the help instructions. The main menu...


Building a website is a simple process...

 Design - choose your template from a library of 140 website templates and customize it with colors, fonts, pictures, navigation buttons.

 Pages - add, rename, change the order of, or delete pages in your website.

 Content - add content to your website: text, pictures, links, and more.

Preview - see how the finished website will look before putting it online.

Publish - put the latest version of your website online. It can be viewed under your domain.

By using an easy WYSIWYG MS Word-like editor you can add text, change the font type and size, put words in bold or italics or underline them, align paragraphs, make bulleted or numered lists, indent lines, change the text color, add pictures, links, tables...

I've found an interesting feature of this free online website builder - the [Ctrl]+[V] shortcut key enables you to insert content from the clipboard into your page. The content is processed in different ways, depending on its type. You can select the type of content you wish to insert...

  • Unformatted text
  • Keep formatting
  • Insert HTML source code
The last option allows you to add any HTML code to your page.

One of the best things about this website builder is that the content of your website is stored separately from the layout. At any time, in a few clicks of the mouse, you can easily change the appearance of your site - the template, colors, images, etc., without having to retype any information.

Other online website builders

Intuit Websites
It allows you to build a small business website very quickly, easily and inexpensively (it's free for the first 30 days and $4.99/month thereafter). There are over 2000 professional templates that are fully functional sites with multiple pages, navigation, images, and even text you might use in your business site. If you are in a hurry, you can simply add your business name and contact information, and publish your website. You can easily update anything later: edit text directly on your pages, add your own pictures, etc.

Site Build It
It's the most comprehensive and well established product among other online website builders. Best of all, it's one of the most effective traffic building tools. It's most suitable for those who are serious about making money on the Internet and want to focus on building their business instead of managing their website. See Sitesell SBI for more information.