Starting your own eBusiness is so FUN! We have big plans for exploring all areas of web design in this area and in the FreelanceMom forums. We'll go through the basics with you now.

Get your domain name!
This is so fun! But it's tricky to get a good name, so many are already owned. I recommend purchasing your name at www.godaddy.com or Dotster.com. There are zillions of places to buy your name -- but these two have good prices and have been around long enough that I trust they won't go out of business.

The references I mentioned will have tools where you can look up available names and purchase them. Be sure to print out all of your paperwork, including your username and password that you sign up with. You will be needing it when you move on to step 2!

I still think the best names are .com names, and .net names are the next best thing. But you may be surprised at how many .com names you look up are already taken. There are quite a few people out there who buy domain names as a form of business. They buy them and then sell them for pretty hefty prices. The ethics of this is debatable. If you have a few names in mind - and more then one are available, it's a good idea to grab them all. For the small price you pay to own them for a year it's worth it. And then you won't find out down the line that the name you were hoping to get 'for that other site' is lost to the cyber squatters!