What You Need To Know To Become A Webmaster

By:Darren McLaughlin

The webmaster profession is a wonderful one. Many webmasters work flexible hours and are "their own bosses". Being a webmaster was an unheard of position even a short decade ago, but now more and more people are flocking to the profession. What are some of the basics you need to know in order to become a webmaster? I'll do my best to outline them for you. Webmastering in the modern era requires a rich combination of both technical knowledge and marketing experience. If you have one without the other, you may be doomed to either having a website that is just great, but nobody knows about it, to one that is hugely successful, but falls apart because of technical missteps. You'll need to at least understand the basic architecture of your website in order to maxmimize its' potential, or you'll end up paying big money to others who know how to do it.

Web technologies are emerging at a rapid rate, but with dilligent effort, you can keep up with the basics. You'll need to have a thorough understanding of the following technologies:
1) HTML/HTML
2) RSS Feeds
3) CSS web design skills
4) Content Development
5) Search Engine Optimization
6) Search Engine Marketing
7) Branding
8) Business Model - how does this site monetize traffic?

Failure in any of these areas will ultimately spell doom for your website. Your best bet is to use a template-driven design where all of your business logic, design logic, and usability features have been sorted before hand, and each page is created dynamically. Use of templatization and your own custom content management system will ensure that however many people work in your organization, all of them will be able to create html documents without overwriting each other's work, or missing an important element. If you build your search engine optimization into the template, it will help you greatly later on when people start finding your website based on typing in related terms in search engines.

The best way to become a webmaster is to dive in. I don't mean go full time in the beginning, but I do recommend developing websites right now. Find out if you like the field, and if you have a knack for it. The learning curve can be steep, but that's half the fun. The web develops rapidly, so you'll end up spending your greatest amount of time on keeping up with changes. Make sure to check out the Webmaster Forums, as they can be of great benefit to you as you learn the ropes. There's no greater teacher than experience. Many professional webmasters are happy to answer your questions, and lend a hand by answering some of the most common webmaster questions, so make sure to drop in and say hello today.

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