Today's Internet entrepreneur need not worry anymore about the technical side of building a website for his online business.
Turnkey websites offer a solution for the business-person whose expertise lies in marketing, but not necessarily in web design and PHP or HTML.
A "turnkey website" is, essentially, a ready-made website, complete with the programming specific to the type of website/business that you want to run.
The term comes from the idea that you need simply to "turn the key" to get the business started.
Real-life equivalents to the turnkey website business include franchises and direct-marketing businesses, those which have all of the business elements in place to begin immediately.
Turnkey sites are much like website templates which allow a user to build his own site and content.
The major difference between turnkey sites and website templates is that the turnkey templates are more customized.
They have been tailored for a particular type of Internet business with programming and scripts built in which are specific to that type of business.
Internet entrepreneurs turn to these types of templates for four major reasons when it comes to getting their sites up and running: 1) No technical experience necessary.
As already noted, a vast majority of web marketers have little or no technical knowledge of the Web.
Combine this lack of expertise with a lean start-up budget, and you have an entrepreneur at somewhat of a disadvantage.
In fact, these are the people for whom turnkey websites were created.
The marketer needs only to choose the template that best meets the needs of his type of business.
2) Numerous options to choose from.
Sometimes the word "template" is viewed as a limitation when it comes to design and programming options.
Fortunately, this isn't necessarily the case.
The Internet is rife with turnkey website sellers, each with dozens or even hundreds of options when it comes to design and style.
3) Includes hosting.
A majority of turnkey site retailers include hosting as part of the package.
This means that the buyer doesn't have to deal with several different companies when starting up a site.
Everything from choosing a template to running the site can be done from the same account.
4) High return on investment.
Starting a website from scratch is extremely costly.
The business owner must pay for the domain, the design (which costs hundreds or more), scripts and the necessary software, and hosting.
The final cost may run into thousands of dollars for one website.
Compare this to purchasing a turnkey website.
Many are available for less than one hundred dollars.
Additional costs, which typically include a monthly hosting fee, are generally minimal.
Some retailers, in fact, offer membership programs which allow you to access features and templates multiple times.
Less money spent on start-up costs means that your site will pay for itself faster.
Turnkey website retailers can be found all over the Internet.
Be sure to compare several of them before you make a decision.
It also helps to know exactly what you need to run the kind of business you want.
You'll be able to narrow your selection more quickly to only those providers who offer the features that you need.