Introduction
Welcome to WordPress! Having chosen this as your website building platform, you’ve already made a wise decision. Known for its flexibility and ease of use, WordPress is a perfect choice that caters to websites of all shapes and sizes.
This article is your roadmap to creating a professional website, that not only looks good but functions excellently. We will explore everything you need to know to build website in WordPress and be up and running, from the initial setup and theme selection to creating pages and fine-tuning your site for optimal performance.
Whether you’re a business owner keen to take your online presence to the next level, or a blogger ready to share your thoughts with the world, this guide is designed to empower you to build a WordPress website that suits your needs and reflects your vision.
Ready to get started? Let’s begin this exciting journey to creating your very own WordPress site.
Getting Started with WordPress
To build a WordPress website begins with choosing a domain name. This is the unique web address where your site will be found online. While you can get a free domain name with some web hosting services, it’s often more professional to choose a custom domain (rather than a free domain name) that reflects your brand or the purpose of your own site.
Your web hosting provider is also essential. Think of your web host or hosting service as the foundation of your WordPress site. A good web hosting company or provider will ensure your website is accessible to visitors around the clock, provide security measures to keep your site safe, and assist with how to install WordPress .
Among web host providers, you can choose shared hosting for a cost-effective option, but if your website traffic grows, you might want to consider a web hosting plan that offers more resources. For a more robust solution, managed WordPress hosting is an option, ensuring optimised performance for own website.
Once you’ve secured your domain name and chosen a hosting provider, the next step in building your WordPress website is installing WordPress. Many web hosting companies offer one-click installation, which simplifies the process. Once you install WordPress, you can access your dashboard – your command centre for managing all aspects of your website.
Remember, choosing your own domain name, and web hosting are vital steps in creating your own website. Be sure to spend time considering your options and choose services that align best with your needs before you start to create a website.
For the purposes of this article, I will make the assumption you have a custom domain name and hosting setup already.
Installing WordPress and Setting Up Your Website
The actual process of how to build a WordPress website begins with installing the platform on your web hosting account. To install WordPress is typically a straightforward process, as most hosting providers offer a one-click installation feature.
Options to install WordPress:
- Manual Installation: This involves downloading the WordPress software from the official website and then uploading it to your web hosting server. After this, you create a database for WordPress on your web server and then run the installation script. This is however a more technical way to install WordPress.
- One-Click Installers: Many web hosting providers offer one-click installers for WordPress as part of their hosting plans. These include services like Softaculous, Fantastico, and others. With these services, the process of installing WordPress is streamlined and simplified, often taking just a few clicks from your hosting account dashboard.
Once you’ve have installed WordPress, you will be provided with your own website’s URL, which you can use to access your brand new WordPress site.
After you successfully install WordPress, it’s time to get familiar with the WordPress dashboard. This is the control centre of your WordPress website, where you can make all necessary adjustments, updates, and customisations. Here, you can set up your site title and website title, which are crucial aspects of your website’s identity and SEO. The title of your site usually is your business or website name, while the website title (or tagline) gives more context about what your website is about.
To set these up, simply navigate to “Settings“ > “General” from your dashboard. Enter your desired title and tagline in the appropriate fields. Remember to click “Save Changes” once you’re done.
Next, let’s talk about adjusting your homepage settings. By default, WordPress displays your latest blog posts on the homepage. However, you may want a custom, static page as your homepage instead. To do this, go to “Settings“ > “Reading” in your WordPress dashboard. Under “Your homepage displays”, select “A static page” and choose which of your pages you want to set as the homepage.
The dashboard is a powerful tool that you’ll get more comfortable with over time. It allows you to manage every aspect of your website, from publishing new blog posts to moderating comments, changing themes and installing plugins (which we will cover in the next section), and much more. It’s worth spending some time exploring all of its features as you build your WordPress website.
In the next section, we will delve deeper into WordPress themes and plugins, two significant components that will shape the functionality and appearance of your website.
Choosing a WordPress Theme
In the world of WordPress, themes are pivotal in determining the appearance and style of your website. Essentially, a WordPress theme is a collection of templates and stylesheets that define the layout, typography, colour schemes, and design elements of your site. Think of your theme as the aesthetic blueprint of your WordPress website.
However, the importance of themes extends beyond just the look and feel of your site. The right theme can enhance your website’s functionality, improve user experience, and contribute positively to your website’s SEO. Conversely, choosing a poorly coded or incompatible WordPress theme can hinder your website’s performance and even lead to security vulnerabilities.
So, how do you choose the perfect theme for your business website? Here are some factors to consider:
Simplicity
While it’s tempting to opt for a theme with flashy animations and complex layouts, simplicity often wins when it comes to web design. A clean, uncluttered theme not only looks professional but also ensures that your website visitors aren’t distracted from the essential elements of your site.
Responsiveness
With an increasing number of web users browsing on mobile devices, having a responsive theme is non-negotiable. A responsive theme adjusts its layout across different screen sizes and devices, ensuring a seamless browsing experience for all visitors.
Browser Compatibility
Different users will view your website on different browsers. Ensure the theme you choose to create a website is compatible with all major browsers to prevent any inconsistencies in your website’s appearance or functionality.
SEO Readiness
Most WordPress themes are SEO-ready out of the box, but it’s always a good idea to double-check. A new theme that follows the latest SEO best practices will give you a head start in your new website’s search engine rankings.
Compatibility with Plugins
Plugins are essential for adding extra functionality to your WordPress website. Ensure that your chosen theme supports all popular plugins, or you might find yourself limited in terms of what you can do with your site.
Support and Updates
Themes that come with regular updates and reliable support are usually a safe bet. This ensures that your theme stays compatible with the latest version of WordPress and remains secure against any new threats.
Remember, while there are many free themes available in the WordPress theme repository, premium themes are often more robust and come with additional features and dedicated support.
A fresh installation does ship with preinstalled theme options and for now this theme installation may actually be the best place to start while you learn more about what the platform is capable of.
Customising Your WordPress Website
Now that you have chosen and installed a theme for your WordPress website, the next exciting step is to start customising your site. WordPress offers an in-built tool called the Customizer, which allows you to make changes to your site and preview them in real time before pushing them live.
Accessing the Customizer is simple. From your dashboard, navigate to the ‘Appearance’ menu and select ‘Customize’. This will open up the Customizer, which presents a variety of options on the left and a live preview of your website on the right.
The first element to customise is your site identity, which includes your logo, site title, and favicon.
- Logo: Your logo is an essential part of your brand identity. To add or change your logo, navigate to the ‘Site Identity’ section in the Customizer and click on the ‘Select logo’ button. This will open your media library where you can choose an existing image or upload a new one. After selecting your logo, you can crop it to your desired size before clicking on ‘Publish’ to save changes.
- Site Title: Your title is the name of your WordPress website, which is displayed in the tab of a web browser and in search engine results. You can add or modify your title in the ‘Site Identity’ section. Remember to make your site title descriptive and engaging as it’s one of the first things your website visitors and search engines will see.
- Favicon: Also known as a site icon, a favicon is the small image that appears next to your title in a browser tab. Adding a favicon enhances your site’s professionalism and helps it stand out in a crowd of browser tabs. You can add your favicon in the ‘Site Identity’ section, just below the title and logo options.
Once you’ve established your site identity, the next aspect to customise is your website’s menus and widgets.
- Menus: Menus are the navigational structure of your WordPress website, guiding your visitors to the most important parts of your site. From the WordPress Customizer, navigate to the ‘Menus’ section to start creating and managing your menus. You can add items like pages, blog posts, custom links, and categories to your menu. Don’t forget to set the display location of your menu, such as the header or footer of your site.
- Widgets: Widgets are small blocks that add additional functionality to your WordPress site, such as displaying recent blog posts, a search bar, or social media buttons. To customize your widgets, go to the ‘Widgets’ section in the WordPress Customizer. Here, you can add, remove, and rearrange widgets in your theme’s widget areas, which typically include the sidebar and footer.
Remember to click ‘Publish’ in the WordPress Customizer to save all your changes.
In the next section, we’ll delve deeper into creating and editing web pages and blog posts, another key component in building a WordPress website.
Creating Pages and Posts
Building a WordPress website isn’t complete without adding your unique web pages. Fortunately, creating new pages is a straightforward process on WordPress. From your WordPress dashboard, navigate to ‘Pages‘ and click ‘Add New‘. You’ll be taken to the editor, where you can add text, images, and even embed videos.
The title of the blog page goes in the top box, while the body text goes in the larger box below. WordPress’s user-friendly editor makes it easy to format your text, add links, and insert media files. Most themes come with built-in page templates, which can give your site a professional look without requiring any coding knowledge.
It’s also possible to create a static front page (or “homepage”) for your website, instead of displaying your latest blog posts. To do this, you’ll need to adjust your homepage settings in the WordPress customizer. Simply navigate to ‘Settings > Reading‘ and select ‘A static page’ under ‘Your homepage displays’. You can then select your preferred page from the dropdown menu.
Crafting Blog Posts
If you want to build a website that includes a blog, WordPress makes it easy. Creating a new blog post is very similar to creating a new page. From the WordPress dashboard, simply navigate to ‘Posts’ and click ‘Add New’.
Again, the title of the blog post goes in the top box, and the body text goes in the larger box below. You can add categories and tags to your blog post from the right-hand side panel, and set a featured image that will be displayed along with your blog post in various places on your website.
One notable feature in WordPress is the ‘Preview’ button which allows you to view your blog post or page as it will appear on your site before it’s published. This enables you to check your content, correct any mistakes and ensure that all images and links are working correctly.
As you continue to build your WordPress website, adding new pages and posts will become second nature. Remember, consistency is key when it comes to creating content. Regularly updated sites not only provide fresh content for your website visitors but also signal to search engines that your site is active, which can help improve your website’s ranking.
In the next section, we’ll explore how to further enhance your WordPress site’s functionality and appearance with plugins.
Extending Functionality with WordPress Plugins
Plugins are one of the essential aspects of a WordPress website that provide the ability to add more complex features and functionalities without having to delve into code. From enhancing your site’s SEO to improving your site security, and creating forms, the right plugins can elevate your website’s performance and user experience.
Choose and Install WordPress Plugins
There are thousands of WordPress plugins available, both free and premium, catering to almost every need a website might have. But how do you choose which ones to install? Here’s a helpful tip: consider your site’s requirements and objectives. Do you want to improve SEO? You might need an SEO plugin like Yoast SEO. Are you looking to sell products on your ecommerce site? An eCommerce plugin like WooCommerce could be your best bet for an online store.
Once you’ve determined which plugin(s) you need, installing them on your WordPress site is a straightforward process.
From your WordPress dashboard, navigate to ‘Plugins > Add New‘. Here you can search for plugins by name. Once you’ve found the plugin you want to install, simply click ‘Install Now‘, and then ‘Activate‘ once the installation is complete.
Essential WordPress Plugins to Consider
While the plugins you need may depend on your specific website needs, there are a few that are generally useful for all types of WordPress websites:
- Security Plugin: A security plugin like Wordfence can protect your website from hackers and malware, giving you peace of mind.
- Backup Plugin: It’s crucial to regularly backup your website files in case anything goes wrong. Plugins like UpdraftPlus make this process easy and automatic.
- SEO Plugin: Plugins like Yoast SEO can help you optimise your website for search, increasing your visibility and potentially driving more traffic to your site.
- Contact Form Plugin: If you create a website and you want to make it easy for your website visitors to contact you, consider installing a contact form plugin like Contact Form 7.
With the right plugins installed and activated, your WordPress website will be equipped with the tools it needs to thrive and grow. Remember, while plugins can significantly enhance your site’s functionality, it’s important not to overload your site with too many, as this can impact your website’s speed and performance.
Optimising Your WordPress Website
Having a well-designed, user-friendly WordPress website is a good starting point, but to truly make your mark on the internet and get the most out of your online presence, you need to optimise your site. This includes making your site SEO-friendly, ensuring the speed of your site is optimal, and keeping your website secure.
Basic SEO for WordPress Websites
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is crucial for any website. It helps improve your site’s visibility on search, potentially driving more traffic to your site. While you can install plugins like Yoast SEO to help with this, there are a few basic steps you can take to optimize your WordPress site for SEO:
- Choose an SEO-friendly WordPress theme: When building your WordPress website, make sure to choose a theme that is coded well and is SEO-friendly. This can significantly impact your site’s performance and its ranking on search.
- Use Keywords Strategically: Identify the keywords relevant to your site and include them in your content, titles, meta descriptions, and URLs. This will help search engines understand what your site is about and rank it appropriately.
- Use SEO-friendly URLs: Make sure your URLs are simple, meaningful, and include your keywords. Avoid complex URLs with unnecessary characters.
Importance of Speed and Tips for Optimisation
Website speed is another critical aspect of a successful WordPress site. If your website takes too long to load, visitors might leave before they’ve even had a chance to see what you offer. Here are a few tips to optimise your site’s speed:
- Choose a Reliable Web Hosting Service: Your web hosting service can significantly impact your website speed. Choose a hosting provider known for its speed and reliability.
- Limit Plugin Use: While plugins can enhance your site’s functionality, having too many can slow your site down. Only install necessary plugins and regularly update them.
- Optimise Images: Large, unoptimised images can dramatically slow down your website. Use tools to compress and optimise your images before uploading them to your site.
Keeping Your WordPress Website Secure
Security should never be an afterthought when building a WordPress website. A secure site not only protects your data but also builds trust with your visitors. Here are a few ways you can keep your WordPress website secure:
- Keep WordPress Updated: WordPress frequently releases updates that often include security enhancements. Make sure to keep your WordPress installation, themes, and plugins updated.
- Choose Secure Login Credentials: Choose a strong, unique password for your WordPress site and change it regularly.
- Use a Security Plugin: Security plugins like Wordfence can help protect your site from malware and hacking attempts.
In the end, optimising your WordPress website is a continuous process. You should always keep an eye on your site’s performance, be aware of the latest SEO best practices, and remain vigilant about your site’s security.
Conclusion
You now have a good starting point of how to build a WordPress website. Your focus should no be on adding valuable content relevant to your business.
Building a website in WordPress offers flexibility, robust functionality, and a user-friendly interface that suits beginners and experienced developers alike.
From choosing the right web hosting and installation, to selecting the perfect theme, extending your site with plugins, and optimizing for performance and security, the process is a journey worth undertaking.
With the right approach and guidance, your WordPress site can become a powerful tool for sharing your vision, promoting your business, or serving your community.
Embrace the process, and remember, the beauty of the platform lies in its infinite possibilities. So, go ahead and build a WordPress website that reflects your unique style and meets your online objectives.