Creating a website to advertise myself...any hints?

[Lowryn]

Oh well, I just read the subject line again and it sounds odd, but can't think how to re-word it!
I don't want to advertise myself in the "oldest profession in the world" sort of way!
I am a fledgling photographer and want to help bring in some money by doing portraits, weddings, business events etc etc.
I would like a website but I don't know where to start.
Are they really expensive? Do I have to contact someone, or can I do it online?

SP I've been thinking of using online templates thingies at register.com rather than going to the hassle of doing it myself. When you say that the online thingies aren't search engine friendly why is that? I'd like to come up in a search engine So now wondering whether I should do it myself (although ti will take me for ever and a day and I'm not sure it woud look that good at the end).

You could try Chant4
Really nice and friendly people to deal with!

Oh and relativly cheap!

It's easy to create your own website. I would suggest not skimping by looking for freebies on the web, but you don't have to pay out much. You can have your own domain name for as low as £2.50 per year, and ad-free webspace for £1.50 per month.

After that, you'd need a program for creating, editing and uploading your site. A program such as Microsoft Frontpage, although shunned by experts, is a very easy way to create professional looking webpages with no more knowledge than it takes to use a wordprocessor. There are plenty of other programs that promise the same things, btw.

I don't know if I should say this here, but you can get dreamweaver off kazaa if you look hard enough and have broadband to download it. I wouldn't tell anybody to do that, obs, as it is a breach of copyright.
it's a pretty good programn, I hand programn usually but I like dreamweaver as it colour codes everything so it helps where might have forgotten close brackets etc. and the preview is a quicker way to check progress. it does have loads of other creativity functions, but since I do hand code I don't know much about them!

Once you have sorted the site out make sure that you submit your site to google so that you get to the top of relevant searches. All the other search engines will catch up. I have also got lots of free listings on things like my city council website so that if people type anything regarding what I do into google they end up at my site somehow.

It can be the best site in the world - but if nobody goes there...

Oh and get a spam filter, or make sure your ISP one is set to stun. You get loads of dodgy emails once your link is on your website.