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If you are like may others on the internet, then you would like to have a web site of your own. The problem is, you don't know how to design a web site, and you can't afford to pay a web site designer to design a new site for you. So how do you get around this problem? Actually it is very easy - and as always there are options! There are many talented web designers on the internet, and they will allow you to purchase a web site design from them for a very reasonable price. The designs available to you are as varied as the people that made them. There is literally something for everyone - a design for all tastes and all purposes - just waiting for you to come along and use it.

These pre written web sites are called web site templates, and some of them are extremely well done. Web site templates are usually created one of three ways - they are : Html, Adobe Photoshop and Macromedia Flash. If you know how to edit html, a template can be a quick and easy way to turn your ideas into a new web site. I can already hear some of you saying "That's no good to me, I can't write html!". That's ok! There is the photoshop style of web site template that you can try. Do you have a digital camera? Have you ever put a title on your photos? Have you edited your pictures or made a collage out of them? (multiple pictures joined into one..) If you have, then you can probably make your own web site using Adobe Photoshop - or a similar photo editing application. The photoshop templates do all the initial design work for you, you just have to fill in the text areas with whatever you want to say. It really isn't that hard to do. The software will do most of the work, you just need the 'content' to fill in the provided spaces. Have a go at home using your own digital photos, and when you have made a couple of pages download a photoshop template and make a complete web site. Of course you will need someone to host your new site, but as most ISP's include a small 'home page' area with every account, you can probably put your new site there to begin with. The next type of web site template uses Macromedia Flash to create it. Web site templates designed using Flash are usually animated and can have some quite advanced visual effects. The downside to using Flash templates is they are not really intended for novice web designers - the Flash software is quite complicated - but the results can be well worth the effort.

As a side note, search engines have a very poor understanding of Flash web sites, and if you want to create a commercial or business web site, then you would be better off using html or photoshop for your design.

The final option for designing a web site by template is to find a template that you like the look of, and have someone else turn it into your web site. By purchasing a web site template you will greatly reduce the cost of the design of you new web site - and as a bonus, you will know from the start what it will look like when it is finished :-)

When you use a template to design a new web site please be aware that you are not the only person on the web that is using that template. There could be other web sites using the same design - but with the enormous number of web sites on the internet it is unlikely that you will ever find one of those sites. If you want to guarantee that your web site is completely unique, then you need to design it yourself, of you will have to get it designed just for you. Good luck with your new web site!