Jeremy Caplan’s nine ways to build your personal website

CUNY Professor Jeremy Caplan teaches the Reynolds Center workshop, "How to Launch You.com -- Build Your Personal Website," during the SABEW Conference in Dallas.

DALLAS — Looking for how to get your personal website launched? CUNY Professor Jeremy Caplan offered these nine ways during a hands-on Reynolds Center workshop called, “How to Launch You.com — Build a Personal Website,” during the SABEW Conference:

• Make a landing page — Flavors.me and About.me allow you to build instant pages for free using your existing social media content. Pros: free, fast, easy. Cons: limited content, design.
• Post a basic blog — Blogger.com lets you create a site quickly. Pros: free, easy to maintain. Cons: Not designed for portfolios.
• Use a microblog — Posterous and Tumblr are easy to use and maintain. Pros: easy, multimedia friendly. Cons: designed for blogs, not portfolios
• Learn a free Web tool – Weebly, Wix and Yola let you build a free site using simple menus. Pros: easy, cheap and fast. Cons: few options, amateur look.
• Go with WordPress — WordPress offers free or premium templates for blogs. Pros: flexible, affordable.
  

  Boston Globe reporter Jenn Abelson created this personal website using WordPress during the Reynolds Center workshop.

  Cons: requires initial set-up.

• Use free software — Apple’s iWeb lets you create a site the old-fashioned software way. Pros: free, easy, templated. Cons: few options, Apple only.
• Buy pro software — Dreamweaver is part of Adobe CS5 Suite or can be purchased as a standalone piece of software for $399. Pros: Full control over design. Cons: Complex, has to be used on one machine where software is installed.
• Use a pro-hosting service — A professional hosting service costs $12 to $36 a month. Pros: easy, nice design. Cons: cost, limited template flexibility.
• Pay a contractor — Sites such as Sortfolio.com or 99designs.com will produce a site for you for $3,000 to $20,000. Pros: high quality. Cons: cost, slower.