Homestead Technologies is a
web hosting
A web hosting service is a type of Internet hosting service that hosts websites for clients, i.e. it offers the facilities required for them to create and maintain a site and makes it accessible on the World Wide Web. Companies providing web ho ...
company based in Burlington, Massachusetts.
Homestead offers its members
WYSIWIG tools to build and publish their own websites. Since its founding in 1997
as a free service provider, Homestead has expanded the scope of its services to include online marketing,
paid search
Contextual advertising (also called contextual targeting) is a form of targeted digital advertising. Contextual advertising is also called "In-Text" advertising or "In-Context" technology. Contextual targeting involves the use of linguistic fact ...
ads,
SEO tools and
e-commerce
E-commerce (electronic commerce) refers to commercial activities including the electronic buying or selling products and services which are conducted on online platforms or over the Internet. E-commerce draws on technologies such as mobile co ...
services. Homestead.com, which launched in June 1998, enables Internet users to build a website, with focus on small businesses, e-commerce, and their related services, such as consulting, listings and online business directories.
History
Founded in October 1997 by Justin S. Kitch and Thai Bui, in
Menlo Park, California
Menlo Park ( ) is a city at the eastern edge of San Mateo County, California, San Mateo County in the San Francisco Bay Area of California, United States. It is bordered by San Francisco Bay on the north and east; East Palo Alto, California, Eas ...
, Homestead quickly became popular due to its accessibility and ease of use. Its proprietary drag-and-drop SiteBuilder platform enabled users with no prior knowledge of coding or web programming to create fully functioning websites for personal, educational or business use. Homestead is geared mostly towards small business owners, non-profit administrators, retailers, and hobbyists, unlike competitors such as
Angelfire
Angelfire is an Internet service that offers website services. It is owned by Lycos, which also owns Tripod.com. Angelfire operates separately from Tripod.com and includes features such as blog building and a photo gallery builder. Free webpag ...
and
Yahoo! GeoCities
GeoCities, later Yahoo! GeoCities, was a web hosting service that allowed users to create and publish websites for free and to browse user-created websites by their theme or interest, active from 1994 to 2009. GeoCities was started in November 1 ...
, who target more casual users. By October 1999 member registrations reached two million.
In October 2003, Homestead Technologies launched