How To Build A WordPress Website In 9 Steps

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A quality website is essential, regardless of whether you're a tiny business starting out or an established enterprise trying to increase your internet visibility. Although there are numerous approaches to creating a website, WordPress is among the most widely used choices because of its adaptability and personalization features. We'll walk you through the process of creating a WordPress website in just nine easy steps in this article.

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1. Purchase a domain name and web hosting

Getting web hosting is the first step in creating a WordPress website. Even though WordPress is a free website builder, in order for your site to be accessible online, you must use a web hosting provider. Typically, web hosting is less than $10 per month. By starting with web hosting, you can save time and money because the top WordPress hosting providers come with a free domain name and one-click WordPress installation, which makes the process of building a website much simpler.

You will be asked to select a domain during the account registration process if you selected a web hosting package, like DreamHost, that offers a free domain name. If not, buy a domain name straight from one of the top registrars, like GoDaddy or Google Domains, and manually link it to your web hosting provider after that.

See more about choosing a domain name for your company for more information.

Now that you have a web hosting plan (like the one we recommend, DreamHost) purchased, you need to install WordPress, or connect WordPress to your web hosting provider. To accomplish this, access your user dashboard (also known as cPanel), select Websites from the vertical menu on the left, and then click Manage Websites. Locate the website you wish to create from there, select Manage, and finally select Install WordPress.

Take note that depending on the web hosting company, the processes may differ somewhat and this process could take several minutes.

2. Look for and set up a theme for WordPress

A theme is a website template in the WordPress universe. It manages the appearance, functionality, and features of your website right out of the box. It's worth taking the time to choose the template that best fits the website you want to create because there are dozens to choose from, and websites like ThemeForest allow you to browse and purchase premium ones. After deciding which theme best suits your needs, buy it and download the theme files.

Additionally, WordPress offers free themes. Nevertheless, they frequently need a lot more effort, so buying a high-quality, well-designed theme is usually a better option in the long term.

3. Set up the plugins

Installing and activating all necessary plugins is the next step after installing your theme. Plugins enhance WordPress' functionality. There are thousands of more plugins available that may do everything from improve site security to adding live chat to transforming your page editor into a drag-and-drop editor, in addition to the ones that come with your theme. Try to keep the amount of plugins you use to a minimum, though, as using too many can slow down your website or break other plugins.

4. (Optional) Import Demo Content

You should import the theme's demo content if you selected a paid theme. Your site will be significantly harder to develop without the demo content because it will only contain the themes, plugins, styling, and functionalities without any pre-built web pages.

Each theme has a different import procedure for demo material. After installing your theme, you'll frequently notice a tab with your name on it in the vertical menu on the left. Usually, the demo content is stored here. If it's not there, check the documentation for your theme (usually included with your theme files) to see how to import demo material (from the vendor that you bought it from).

5. Modify WordPress Preferences

You must set up your settings, such as identifying your home page and blog posts page, as well as modifying your site's name, tagline, and icon, before you can start customizing web pages and adding content.

6. Make Pages

It's time to go to work on your web pages, which are the main components of websites. A typical business website, for instance, has several pages, including the homepage, services, pricing, about, and contact. Any page in WordPress that isn't an article or blog post is referred to as a page.

7. Arrange Your Menu

Create and configure your menu now that your pages are configured. This is how users navigate your website, thus there may be more than one menu (for example, a menu at the top and one in the bottom) depending on your theme.

Once your menu is configured, locate the menu settings area by scrolling down the same page. Make sure that the primary box is checked under display location. This will make the menu the primary menu for your website, which will show up in your header.

8. Compose Your Initial Blog Entry (Optional)

Many companies choose to include blog entries in addition to web pages in order to increase the possibility that they will be discovered by search engines like Google. Go to posts from the vertical menu on the left and select "add new" to start writing a blog article. You can then make changes to the blog post just like you would to a web page. One distinction is that you can compose a blog post and schedule it for publication at a later time, which is not possible with a page.

Keep in mind that you may need to confirm that WordPress has recognized your blog page if you are not seeing your blog articles appear on your website. Navigate to appearance > modify > homepage settings to accomplish this. Choose the page you wish to use as your blog by going to the posts page from there.

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9. Promote Your Website

Not to mention, you need to prepare a marketing strategy for your website. The reason is that websites aren't always a case of just create it and they will come. Rather, companies that are visible online are those who have made investments in a range of internet marketing techniques to increase their website's exposure, which will help attract customers to your website.

Using a combination of these tactics is the ideal way to market a website, since it will maximize exposure and increase the likelihood of it being found online.

WordPress is the most widely used blogging platform on the internet, with over 43% of users. It is well-liked for a cause. With enormous flexibility and customization capabilities, it may be used to create complex portals, business websites, blogs, webpages, and applications. A programmer's paradise, WordPress.org is free and open-source software. In addition, WordPress has a sizable user and developer community that is always producing new themes, widgets, plugins, and other goodies to improve the user experience.

Yes, WordPress.org and WordPress.com differ in a number of ways. WordPress.org is self-hosted, but WordPress.com is fully hosted. This is the primary distinction.

Yes, although while developers frequently use WordPress to create quite intricate websites, non-developers can also utilize WordPress. Although it's not the most user-friendly CMS for beginners, anyone can pick it up with some time. Additionally, a tonne of free internet resources are accessible to assist you in learning how to create a WordPress website due to the CMS's widespread popularity.

You can create a WordPress website for free, but you will need to pay for hosting if you want to use your own domain name instead of a subdomain like businessname.wordpress.com. Granted, hosting is inexpensive—between $3 and $10 a month—so it's a little investment to pay to look reputable and professional.

The price to create a WordPress website can differ significantly based on several aspects, including your hosting requirements, the theme and plugin costs, and whether you choose to construct it yourself or employ a web designer. For example, a normal small business that is willing to put in the time to learn how to use WordPress may create a website for as little as $100 or less if they only need to purchase a premium theme, which usually costs between $25 and $80, and a web hosting package, which costs between $3 and $10 per month.

Because website builders are so adaptable, you can easily adjust your plan to fit the demands of your expanding staff. Many suppliers offer enterprise-level capabilities with tailored pricing if you require more capacity than even the highest-tier bundle offered by your provider. To find out more, it could be beneficial to contact the customer support team for your systems.

For larger websites requiring greater flexibility or for website builders with technical skills, WordPress is typically a superior option. If you're looking for a drag-and-drop editor and a no-code website builder, Wix is a solid option. Having saying that, WordPress templates allow you to create basic websites. More about their comparisons can be found here.