WordPress is designed for blogging. If you want to create a content-heavy website, this CMS will be your best friend.
WordPress makes setting up a blog incredibly easy. After all, it was initially created as a blogging platform and hasn’t lost its roots.
Next, you’ll learn the ins and outs of starting a WordPress blog.
(Note: If you want to learn the ins and outs of WordPress and the benefits of choosing it as your blogging platform, please read our “What is WordPress?” If you’ve chosen WordPress and are ready to dig in and start building your blog, keep reading. )
Even if you’re a complete beginner and have never thought about building a website before, then this post is for you. We started completely from scratch and left no stone unturned (we even included some how-to videos.) By the end of this post, you’ll have a working WordPress site, ready to go live with your first post.
1.Set up your hosting website and domain name
The first thing you need before you start creating your WordPress blog is a domain name and web hosting, without these two things there is nowhere to install WordPress and have a site website that lives on the Internet.
To keep things simple, your domain name o (or your web address) is what people will type in the address bar. to access your website. While your web server is where you will store your website files. When someone types your domain name in the address bar, their web browser communicates with the server and displays your website files. In this case, those files will be your WordPress blog!
BONUS! If you buy a web hosting package for 1 year or more, HostGator will give you a FREE domain for the first year.
Okay, let’s select a domain name and hosting account. Need help choosing the best domain name for your blog? Check out this article.
First, head over to HostGator’s managed WordPress hosting page. You’ll see that there are a ton of different packages to choose from:
In general, it’s a better idea to go with the Standard or Business plan, as these plans give you the freedom to add more domains. to your hosting account and they also come packed with more advanced features.
Once you’ve decided on your plan, click the ‘Buy Now!’ button. On the next screen, you will be able to add a domain to your order.
The domain search feature is integrated into the registration page, so the tool will search any domain you enter and show you it will indicate which domain name extensions are available.
Once you’ve found the perfect domain, you can enter your payment information to complete your purchase and officially register it.
Once you have finished signing up, you will receive an email from HostGator containing your cPanel link. This control panel is what we’ll be using to install WordPress, so keep an eye out for this email before proceeding to the next step.
2. Install WordPress on your site
To install WordPress, click the control panel link you received in your welcome email, then enter your username and password.
Your control panel should look similar to the image below:
You can quickly install WordPress by clicking the icon ‘Softaculous Application Installer’. Softaculous will guide you through the steps to complete your setup or you can follow these instructions.
Once the installation is complete, you will be directed to a confirmation screen. Your login details will be on this screen and will also be sent to you via email. Be sure to keep them in a safe place, as we’ll need them to finish setting up your site.
3. Choose and customize your WordPress theme
You now have the foundation in place. Your domain and hosting are purchased, and WordPress is installed on your site. But you can’t start customizing your site yet, to do so you’ll need to install a WordPress theme.
Themes are the way WordPress handles site customization and adding new features to your site.
To install a new theme on your site, we are first going to log in to your WordPress dashboard. To do this, you’ll use a link that looks something like “mywebsite.com/wp-admin”. On this screen, you’ll enter your username and password and click “Login”.
This will take you to your WordPress dashboard, which will be your home base for customizing your site. It will look something like the image below:
By default, our site will use a basic WordPress theme, but you’ll probably want to change it to a theme that better suits your site. .
To do this, go to Appearance>Themes in the left navigation bar, then click ‘Add New’.’ On the next screen, you will be able to choose from thousands of different free themes available in the WordPress theme repository.
You can sort themes by popularity, date published, or even use the features filter, or search a specific name or keyword. Let’s filter by the most popular and see what kinds of themes are available.
After a bit of scrolling, we found the ‘Escape’ theme. This travel blog theme is perfect for an aspiring travel blogger. Once you’ve found a theme you like, you can click the ‘Preview’ button to get an idea of what the theme will look like, or browse for it and click ‘Install’.
A Once you click ‘Install’ WordPress will install the theme for you, all you have to do is click the ‘Activate’ button once the installer is complete.
Now this theme will be the new face of your WordPress blog. You can further customize your site by navigating to Appearance>Personalize. Here you will get a number of customization options, such as changing the color scheme of your site, adding a background image, changing your logo, and much more. The customization options you have will depend on the theme you have installed.
Feel free to spend time playing with the customization menu until you have a blog layout you’re happy with.
Create a site menu for your WordPress blog
To make site navigation easier, you’ll need to create a site navigation menu. Your theme may have already created a basic menu for your site. But, if not, this is how you get to your menu section and create a new menu.
Inside your WordPress dashboard, navigate to Appearance>Menus.
On this screen, you’ll be able to create new menu items, rearrange your menus, choose between existing pages, and assign your menus to different locations on your site.
Add New Pages to Your WordPress Blog
WordPress treats your pages similar to your posts. But, in our case, our pages will be things like our home page, about page, contact page, and more.
Almost all types of websites will need these standard pages. They may have been pre-created when WordPress was installed. But if not, you’ll want to create them yourself.
To do this, go to Pages>Add New.
Then, once you’re happy with your page, click ‘Publish’ and you’re done.
To manage all the pages on your website and see which ones you’ve published, you can navigate to Pages>All Pages, and this will give you a list of all the pages you’ve created so far:
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As you can see in the image above, there are duplicate pages that can be removed.
Customize Your WordPress Sidebar
One of the last things we want to customize is our sidebar. This is the space to the right of your text, and is common on many popular blogs. In this area, you’ll typically display your recent posts, insert an email signup box, include ad space, and more.
We’ll customize this area with what’s known as widgets. These are drag and drop sections of code that add new functionality to our sidebar.
Navigate to Appearance>Widgets and you’ll see a screen like the one below.
Then, in the ‘Main Sidebar’ section we can drag widgets from the left side, into the ‘Main Sidebar’ box. You can add things like image galleries, recent posts, a search bar, custom text, and much more.
This widget section is also how you’ll customize other widget aspects of your theme, such as the footer section, certain home page sections, and more.
When you install certain WordPress plugins they will sometimes also add a widget to this area.
4. Add New Blog Features With WordPress Plugins
With your navigation menu created and your front pages created, it’s time to add some must-have WordPress plugins.
Plugins are the way WordPress handles site customizations. This allows you to add new features like social share buttons, speed optimization features, image sliders, SEO optimization and much more.
To add new plugins to your blog, navigate to Plugins>Add New.
Here you can browse through popular plugins, search by keyword, or even install from the list of plugins Recommended .
With thousands of different WordPress plugins to choose from, the search can be a bit overwhelming, but this article is a great place to start:
- Best Plugins WordPress Every blog needs
Once you’ve found a plugin you want to install, hover over the plugin and click ‘Install Now’, then ‘Activate’.
5. Publish Your First WordPress Blog Post
You’ve finally done it; It’s time to publish your first blog post! As you’ll soon learn, this is very easy to do.
From your WordPress dashboard, click Posts>Add New. This will take us to a new screen where we can write our new blog.
Below the title, all you have to do is click to start writing.
If you would like to add additional media to your blog post, you can do so by hovering over the section below your sentence and selecting the ‘Add Image’ icon:
Now, you can upload an image from your computer, select an image you previously uploaded, or insert an image from a URL.
With content blocking, you can add image galleries, new headers, and more.
Once you’re happy with your post, all you have to do is click ‘Publish…’ in the top right corner of your editor:
Now your first blog will be live for the world to read!
If you ever want to see all the posts you’ve written, or delete certain posts, go to Posts > All Posts.
Simply click the title and you can open and edit your blog posts. From this screen you will also have the option to delete multiple posts at the same time.
You already have a super solid foundation. Your site is set up, has some basic functionality, and you’re working on your first post. Your blogging dreams are one step closer to coming true.
Now is the time to start writing and make your blog a success!
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