Add LINE
TimTech
Book a consultation
Book a consultation
  1. Home
  2. /News
  3. /A first website on Cloudways: five steps toward an SEO-friendly site

A first website on Cloudways: five steps toward an SEO-friendly site

圖片預留
2024.08.25Updated 2026.10.07
  • Business websites
  • TimTech news

Summary

For a beginner who wants a site, and a business on it, without code and without a large budget. The basic idea of a website, then a plain, low-cost way to build one that can do SEO.

Do you want to start an online business by building a website of your own?

This article is written for complete beginners to website building. Even if you don't know how to code and don't want to spend a lot of money, you can still build your online business step by step.

In this article you'll learn the most basic concepts of building a website, and I'll show you the simplest, most affordable and most practical way to build a website that's ready for SEO.

Website basics

What are the benefits of having a website?

A website is essential for both individuals and companies. As an individual with a website, you can:

  • Build a portfolio
  • Learn professional skills
  • Create passive income

As a small business or a large company, you can:

  • Increase sales
  • Build your brand image
  • Gain more customers and partners

In short, in today's internet age, having a website is a great way to open up more opportunities and become more competitive.

The three building blocks of a website

A website is made up of three elements: a domain, hosting, and a content management system (CMS). You don't need to understand them deeply; a basic grasp of these concepts is enough to build a website.

Share

On this page

  • Website basics
  • What are the benefits of having a website?
  • The three building blocks of a website
  • 1. Domain
  • 2. Hosting
  • 3. Content management system
  • What should you use to build a website for SEO?
  • How much does it cost to build your own website?
  • Domain
  • Hosting
  • Five steps to building a website
  • Buy a GoDaddy domain
  • Buy Cloudways hosting
  • Basic Cloudways server settings
  • Connect the domain and the server
  • Set up an SSL certificate
  • Start writing high-ranking articles
  • Conclusion

TimTech

Ideas, made real.

We help B2B companies turn the website into a long-term asset: a clearer position, search that compounds, and inquiries that actually get handled.

Explore

  • Home
  • News
  • FAQ
  • Cases
  • Contact

Services

  • Website Development
  • Search growth
  • From inquiry to close

Industries

  • Print shops
  • Court-auction leads

Contact

  • Email：service@timtech.tw
  • Address：10F.-2, No. 118, Dazhong S. St., West Dist., Taichung City 403533 , Taiwan
  • LINE：Message us on LINE

© 2026 TimTech. All rights reserved. | Power By TimTech

  • Privacy
  • Terms
1. Domain

A domain is the address of your website (your home). Every domain is unique. Besides being easy to remember, it lets people easily access and use your website's resources.

2. Hosting

Hosting is, simply put, the land your website (home) sits on. It stores all of your website's resources, including text, images, video and more.

3. Content management system

A content management system is, simply put, your website's admin panel. It helps you edit and publish the text, images and video on your website, so you can design pages and write articles without knowing how to code.

What should you use to build a website for SEO?

Now that you understand the benefits of a website and what it's made of, I'll show you how to build one using GoDaddy to register your domain, Cloudways for hosting, and WordPress as your content management system.

You might ask: why not use a website builder such as Wix or PIXNET? Because with a website builder, you don't have 100% control of your website. Adding extra features costs more, and more importantly, your flexibility for SEO is limited. If you later want to move your site, you can easily end up locked in and unable to move.

That's why the method below gives you 100% control of your website. You can make the most of your business ideas, design the layout you want, and earn search traffic through SEO.

How much does it cost to build your own website?

Building your own website involves two costs: the domain fee and the hosting fee. A physical server is very expensive and needs professionals to set up, manage, run and maintain it, so unless you're a large company, you'll most likely rent hosting on a recurring basis.

Domain

Prices range from a little over NT$300 a year at the cheapest to several thousand NT dollars a year. It mainly depends on how popular your website's name is: the more popular, the more expensive.

Hosting

This part costs more, because the hosting provider is responsible for server maintenance and operating costs. Taking Cloudways as an example, the more capacity you get, the higher the price, at roughly NT$300-700 a month, and you can adjust capacity to fit your budget.

So overall, for less than NT$400 a month at the cheapest, you can have a fully featured website that's ready for SEO.

Five steps to building a website

I'll show you how to build a complete website from scratch. The main steps are:

  1. Buy a GoDaddy domain (the address)
  2. Buy Cloudways hosting (rent a plot of land)
  3. Basic Cloudways server settings
  4. Connect the domain and the server (link the address to the land)
  5. Set up an SSL certificate (make the website more secure)

Once you've mastered this process, you'll have the basic framework of a website. From there, whether you want a personal blog, a brand website or an ecommerce website, you can shape it freely in the direction you want.

Buy a GoDaddy domain

Why buy a domain from GoDaddy? Because it has these advantages:

  • Chinese-language customer support for Taiwan (great for beginners)
  • 90-day money-back guarantee
  • Easy and secure to use
  • Affordable prices

That makes it very beginner-friendly for buying a domain, which is why I recommend it as a starting choice. You can always switch to another provider later.

STEP 1 → Search for the domain you want

The first rule: keep it simple and easy to understand, and related to your website's content.

For example, if I wanted to start a blog about travel in Taipei, I could use “taipeitravelgo” as my domain name, then go to GoDaddy's search page to find the combination I want.

I usually choose .com or .tw as my domain ending (top-level domain), because they're the easiest to remember. If the name you want isn't available with the top-level domain you want, I suggest choosing a different domain name.

Also, try not to add any symbols in the middle of your domain name. If you can, just join the words together like I did!

STEP 2 → Click Add to Cart at the bottom right

Note: the price shown above comes with conditions, and the actual price is what you see at checkout. Price itself doesn't really matter; if you can get the domain you want for less, all the better. Generally, the more popular a name is, the more it costs.

STEP 3 → Click Go to Cart

Note that you don't need any of GoDaddy's other add-on services, so click “No, thanks” every time.

STEP 4 → Change the term to one year

Note that you don't buy a domain outright; you rent it by the year. Beginners should start with a one-year domain, though if the price is good enough, you can buy two years upfront.

STEP 5 → Enter your card number, then save and continue

STEP 6 → Click “Complete Purchase”

Double-check your bill to make sure “Payment,” “Billing Information,” “Term” and “Total” are all correct.

As the image below shows, the domain I chose was fairly cheap: only NT373ayear,whichworksouttojustNT373 a year, which works out to just NT373ayear,whichworksouttojustNT30 a month for a domain of your own. Very affordable.

STEP 7 → Check your products

After buying the domain, click your account at the top right of the page and open “My Products” to see the domain you just bought. If you want to contact customer support, your customer number and PIN will help you get help faster.

People also often ask: will the domain affect my website's future ranking on Google? In fact, Google's algorithm no longer uses the domain name as a ranking factor, so you generally don't need to worry about this.

Still, keep in mind that a domain is your website's unique address, and changing it after you've bought it is a hassle, so think it through before you buy.

Buy Cloudways hosting

Why buy Cloudways hosting rather than GoDaddy's or another brand's? Mainly because of GoDaddy's drawbacks:

  • Renewals are expensive
  • The servers are often unstable

By contrast, Cloudways hosting is much more stable, and you get better service for the same price. The only difference is that the interface is in English.

But if you use Google Translate and follow this article, it's really not hard at all. If you do run into problems, you can talk to support in simple English.

STEP 8 → Click “START A FREE TRIAL”

Cloudways offers a free 72-hour trial, so you have three days to decide whether to use Cloudways hosting.

STEP 9 → Enter your basic information

Enter your first and last name, email and password, then select “blogger” and “0-50$” in the fields below. If you have a promo code, enter it, then click “START FREE.”

STEP 10 → Verify your account by email

Cloudways will then send an email to the address you just registered. Open your inbox and click “Activate Account” to activate your account.

STEP 11 → Verify your account by phone

Besides email verification, you also need to complete phone verification. Enter your mobile number in the empty field and click “Launch.”

STEP 12 → Choose a server plan

Once verification is done, name your server and choose its capacity and location.

For the WordPress version, just keep the default. Naming is split into App/Server/Project, which correspond to your website/server/project. You can name them however you like; it just makes things easier to identify if you add other domains later.

For the next settings (provider, capacity and server location), you can follow my choices in the image below. If you're on a tight budget, choose 1GB of capacity, which is cheaper.

Once you've confirmed the price, click “launch now” (the three-day trial starts and you won't be charged).

Basic Cloudways server settings

STEP 13 → Go to Server Management:

Wait a few minutes, then click the server to open the settings screen.

STEP 14 → Change the basic settings in Settings & Packages

PHP TIMEZONE: (GMT+8:00) Taipei, then click Save Changes to save the settings.

STEP 15 → Change the Advanced options

  1. MYSQL: timezone +8 taipei
  2. ENCODING: UTF-8 Unicode
  3. SYSTEM LOCALES: Chinese(Taiwan)

Finally, don't forget to click SAVE CHANGES to save your changes.

STEP 16 → Change the PACKAGES options

  1. PHP: PHP 7.3 or 7.4 both work
  2. MySQL: MariaDB 10.3

Basically, just use the settings shown in the image below. These changes take a bit longer, so please be patient.

STEP 17 → Upgrade your Cloudways account

The server you just set up was created for free, but the trial only lasts three days. If you like Cloudways, remember to upgrade your account before the trial ends, so the account you just set up isn't deleted and you don't have to start over.

You can click Upgrade Account at the top, or go to the account section at the top left, choose credit card and enter your card number to finish upgrading.

A first website on Cloudways: five steps toward an SEO-friendly site｜Business websites、TimTech news 附圖

STEP 18 → Get 24/7 support

If you run into trouble during setup, you can open the window shown below from the right side of any Cloudways page. Besides searching for your question in the search bar at the bottom, you can also use:

  1. Knowledge base: search all FAQs and how-to guides
  2. Live chat: type your message and someone is always available to solve your problem.
  3. Create a ticket: for more complex issues, fill in a ticket describing the problem in detail, and an engineer will resolve it as quickly as possible.
  4. Community: join or start a discussion about any question you have.

Connect the domain and the server

As mentioned earlier, the domain is like your “address” and the server is like your home's “land.” Now you need a “signpost” that links the address to the land. That's called “DNS pointing.”

The steps below show you how to connect your domain to your server:

STEP 19 → Go to Apps management

Click www to open the App, which is where you manage your website.

STEP 20 → Enter the domain you bought on GoDaddy

Enter the domain you bought under Domain Management. If you've forgotten it, you can look it up in GoDaddy's “My Products.” Remember to click save when you're done.

STEP 21 → Copy your server IP

“Public IP” is your server's unique IP address. Copy this string of numbers; you'll need it in STEP 25.

STEP 22 → Go back to My Products

First go to GoDaddy and click “My Products” again.

STEP 23 → Open the DNS settings

Then click “DNS” for the domain you just bought.

STEP 24 → Edit the value of the A record

The A record originally points to Parked. Click the edit button on the far right to change it.

STEP 25 → Change where the A record points

Point it to your own server's address, which you copied in STEP 21. Leave the rest at the defaults shown in the image, with TTL set to Custom, 600 seconds.

After waiting 10 minutes, enter your domain and you'll see a homepage like the one below. This is WordPress's default page, which means you've successfully connected your domain to your server.

STEP 26 → Log in to WordPress

Go back to website management. ADMIN PANEL is where you log in to WordPress. Once the domain and server are connected, the URL becomes “your domain/wp-admin.”

Click the URL to go to the WordPress login screen, then enter your username and password to access the WordPress dashboard.

Once you're in the WordPress dashboard, the menu on the left offers many features, including editing posts and changing your website's theme.

Set up an SSL certificate

What is an SSL certificate? Simply put, it's a security technology that keeps transmitted data from being stolen. It builds trust with both Google and your readers, and it proves your website is secure.

So to make our website complete, installing an SSL certificate is an essential step in building a website. Below is the difference before installing SSL (“Not secure”) and after (a padlock).

A first website on Cloudways: five steps toward an SEO-friendly site｜Business websites、TimTech news 附圖

STEP 27 → Go back to the App management page and click “SSL Certificate”

STEP 28 → Enter your email and domain

Just enter an email address you use regularly, or the one you registered with Cloudways. For the domain name, enter the domain you bought in the first step, then click “install certificate.”

STEP 29 → Install and check

After you click Enable https, your website changes from “Not secure” to a padlock, and the address changes from “http” to “https.” Once installation succeeds, visit your website to check that it's done.

Start writing high-ranking articles

These five steps help you quickly build a website with room to grow. But having a website is only the first step toward your personal and business goals. Next, you need to learn how to “bring in traffic” so more people can find you.

The way to get traffic without paying for ads is called “search engine optimization,” or SEO. If you've already built a website by following my steps, check out the next article right away: SEO tutorial

Conclusion

Buying a domain and hosting involves many settings, which can feel complicated for a newcomer. But if you follow the steps in this article one by one, you shouldn't run into major problems, and you'll soon have a website of your own.

Previous

Internet marketing: seven strategies for a model that fits

Next

Eagle: what the asset manager is, and how to start using it

Related articles

  • TimTech platform update: from a company site to a platform you can keep extending
    TimTech news

    2026.06.01

    TimTech platform update: from a company site to a platform you can keep extending

    TimTech has shipped the next stage of the platform. Past a company website, it n…

  • Redesigning a company website: fifteen things to get right
    Business websites

    2026.08.16

    Redesigning a company website: fifteen things to get right

    When a company site needs a redesign, how to judge that first, and what to watch…

  • What belongs on a company website? Fourteen features, basic and advanced
    Business websites

    2026.08.16

    What belongs on a company website? Fourteen features, basic and advanced

    Common pieces of a company site: content management, product pages, SEO, more th…