Over the past month, Operation Rebuild for Heroes at Home called on Americans to vote for the Rebuilding Together affiliate program that they believed was the most deserving. Visitors to the Sears Facebook page could read the stories behind each grant application and then vote for their favorite. Based on the final vote tally, Sears and Rebuilding Together awarded 25 grants totaling $250,000 to Rebuilding Together affiliates at platinum, gold, silver and bronze levels. The full list of recipients is available on the Sears Heroes at Home Facebook page, accessible from Facebook.com/Sears.

“Operation Rebuild for Heroes at Home is one of the many programs that make it possible for Sears to support and give back to the military members that selflessly protect our country each day,” said Monica Woo, vice president, CMO for Sears. “We are honored to be able to help so many local communities and help our military members like those at the Guardian House.”

Rebuilding Together Saratoga County chose the Guardian House of Ballston Spa as its project for Operation Rebuild for Heroes at Home. The Guardian House is a transitional housing facility that provides assistance and resources for homeless female veterans, many of whom suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, substance abuse, sexual abuse and other issues that stem from combat experiences. The $20,000 grant will allow Rebuilding Together Saratoga County to make critical renovations to a community room within the home, to transform it into a meditative space to be used by all of the veterans as they begin to heal from their injuries. The renovation will include: insulation, new flooring, ceiling and wall coverings and new windows.

“Operation Rebuild has been a fantastic way to engage our supporters and raise new awareness for the needs of our veterans,” said Gary A. Officer, president and CEO of Rebuilding Together. “The Heroes at Home program continues to advocate on the behalf of veterans through innovative and engaging campaigns such as Operation Rebuild.”

The Heroes at Home program is part of an ongoing relationship between Sears and Rebuilding Together which aims to improve the lives of American military families by making necessary repairs, improvements or modifications to their homes. Over the past four years, Sears has raised more than $15.3 million and provided over 5,000 volunteers for nearly 1,000 veteran rebuilding projects.

Step 1 – Choose an Internet Service Provider (ISP).

You need a place for your site to exist on the Internet. This is what your ISP will provide. You want to look for a host that has a good, price, a strong selection of tools and services, and one that has a user friendly interface or C-Panel. For entry level hosting for a simple site you should expect to pay anywhere from $5-$10 dollars a month. You will also have an additional annual charge for each domain you register. This should cost you no more that $10-$15 dollars per year. You must shop wisely. ISPs have very low profit margins so they look for ways to sneak profits into packages. Some will have low monthly hosting, but hit you with $100 per year for each domain name, so be sure to examine their entire pricing structure.
Most serious ISPs have rich feature packages included in their packages. You should have ample server space (100MB+), email accounts, mySQL databases, and FTP access. There are a number of features that can save you money on your site like free stock images and widgets like weather and new, but you will need to lay the options out and decide what matches your effort.
For the interface, this can be tricky. Most ISPs will have some way for you to simulate an account experience so you know what you are in for as a client. Give them a try. Most of the core functions are the same for all the ISPs but finding out how each one implements them can be time consuming and frustrating. Find one that fits your workflow.
I started with ISP selection because you need to find a domain name, or URL for your business.  All ISPs have domain search tools but beware. Network Solutions used to be the default choice for searching domain names but I found a disturbing fact about Network Solutions. I seems they bought large blocks of domains to resell. I would search for an available domain and then when I located one try to purchase it through my ISP. I was told that the domain was already registered through Network Solutions. So while the domain is technically available, it is only really available if I use Network Solutions over priced domain registration and hosting.

I use 1and1 and Blue Host but there are a number of good ISPs out there. Use these simple guidelines to find an ISP that fits your needs.

– Next week I’ll write about picking your domain name.