How To Start A WordPress Blog: 5 Quick Steps

One of the most appealing aspects of blogging is how quickly and easily you can get started. Blogging is one of the best ways to make money online. By using good blog software, you can go from zero to blog in about ten minutes, especially if you go with hosted blog software.

If you spend a lot of time reading blogs or talking to bloggers, you won’t be able to avoid hearing about WordPress, one of the most well-known and popular blogging software options available today. WordPress is available in two flavors: hosted and installable.

This article will walk you through installing WordPress on your server, using the administration panel, experimenting with themes and widgets, and finding out where to connect with other WordPress users in your local community and online.

Step 1: Choosing between WordPress.com and WordPress.org

WordPress.org is the WordPress platform’s open-source version. Some blog software is available as a hosted service as well as a download and install version. WordPress is one of those applications.

WordPress references are always about the version of the software that you download and install on your own server. You can learn more about it at www.wordpress.org. However, a hosted version is available at WordPress.com. Fortunately, both types of WordPress are free to use.

Many bloggers rejoiced when WordPress.com was launched because WordPress had entered the blogging mainstream. Bloggers could now easily create blogs and use the tools they had grown to love without having to tinker in the background or worry about how to maintain those blogs.

Although selecting a WordPress version may appear difficult, it is not. Simply ask yourself these questions: How much control do you want over your site? Are you concerned about not owning your content? Do you prefer liberty over comfort? If your answers are affirmative, you should keep reading! If not, WordPress.com might be the site for you.

Step 2: Installing WordPress

You can get your WordPress installation up and running without much difficulty, but you must follow some critical steps in order to get your site up and running.

1. Registering a domain

Have you decided on a name for your blog yet? Have you registered the domain name? When you’re ready to launch your blog and want complete control over every aspect, the domain is the first thing you’ll need.

A domain is your blog’s name and brand, as well as the web address (or URL). It tells visitors what your blog is about and who you are. You can have some fun coming up with a unique name for your blog! Why not look at what others have done before deciding on a blog name? The following are five examples of some of the world’s most popular blogs and their domains:

• Mashable (www.mashable.com): A news aggregation site with the purpose of informing and entertaining.
• TechCrunch (www.techcrunch.com): A technology-industry blog.
• Gizmodo (www.gizmodo.com): A blog that talks about almost anything.
• Lifehacker (www.lifehacker.com): A site that suggests ways that you can make your life better and more efficient.
• Gawker (www.gawker.com): A site featuring the most-talked-about stories on the Internet.

The domains in the preceding list make an impression despite the fact that they don’t necessarily tell the visitor much about the content at first glance. When you discover and bookmark a blog that you enjoy, you return for the great content, not the domain name.

2. Selecting a web hosting

After you choose an appropriate domain for your blog, you need somewhere for your WordPress install to live.

Most web hosts have similar configurations and should be able to handle what you need, but you can review the official WordPress requirements page at http://wordpress.org/about/requirements/.

WordPress also includes a handy piece of text that you can copy and send to potential web hosts to see if their services are compatible with WordPress. Isn’t that cool? Although the web hosting industry evolves with the addition of new hosting companies, the following are some of the industry’s top picks for providing everything you need for WordPress:

• Bluehost (www.bluehost.com)
• DreamHost (www.dreamhost.com)
• HostGator (www.hostgator.com)
• Media Temple (www.mediatemple.net) » GoDaddy (www.godaddy.com)
• SiteGround (www.siteground.com)
• 1&1 (www.1and1.com)

Each of these companies offers well-known, quality web hosting.

3. Getting the software

After you’ve determined your web host and domain name, you’ll need to download and extract the WordPress files from WordPress.org and save them to your computer. Choose a memorable location, such as a Documents or Downloads directory. Take the following steps:

1. Point your web browser to www.wordpress.org. The main WordPress page appears.
2. Click the blue Download Word Press tab in the top-right corner. The site takes you to a short instructional page that has download information on it.
3. Click the Download WordPress plus version number button. Your web browser may ask you to select a location to place the files that are downloading. If it does, choose a place on your computer that you will remember. Your Desktop or Documents folder are decent choices.
4. After the compressed file downloads, double-click it to expand(or unzip) the files it contains on your computer.

WordPress.org offers the file for download in two compressed formats: GZip (.tar.gz) and ZIP (.zip). Most computer systems now recognize the ZIP format, and you should be able to open it without the need for additional software.

You can delete the.zip file from your computer once it has been expanded. Many hosting companies will walk you through the process of downloading and installing WordPress on your site using your cPanel (control panel). Inquire with your web host about packages that include WordPress installation as part of the setup.

4. Uploading the WordPress files

Have you unzipped your files? Great! The installation procedure now becomes a little more technical. You must use an FTP (file transfer protocol) client to upload these unzipped files to your web hosting space. If you don’t already have an FTP client installed on your computer, there are numerous free options available for download and installation.

My two favorite FTP clients are as follows:

• FileZilla (www.filezilla-project.org): Available for all computer platforms
• Cyberduck (www.cyberduck.ch): Available only for Macintosh computers

Both of these programs have the capability to connect and transfer files to your new web host. To place the WordPress files on your web host, follow these steps:

1. Download and install the FTP client of your choice. Look for installation instructions on the FTP software website.
2. Start your FTP client.
3. Connect to your web server by using the details that your web host provided you for FTP access. These details usually include a URL, username, and password. The directory in which you store the WordPress files is normally the main directory that you see when you connect via FTP. Check with your web host if you’re confused.
4. Using the FTP software, upload the WordPress files from your computer to the server. In some FTP clients, you can drag and drop the WordPress files to the location on the web host. Others use arrow interfaces.
5. When the files finish uploading, close your FTP client.

At some point in the future, you may need to upload additional files (although WordPress is fairly good at doing most of its updates directly through the interface). That said, make sure to retain the information that you used to connect to your web host.

5. Setting up the database

You’re doing fantastic! But don’t get too comfortable; the next step is likely to be the most technical. Prepare to set up a database for your WordPress blog by taking a deep breath. You’ve got this! Setting up a database isn’t terribly difficult, according to some.

However, because each web host handles databases differently, I can’t give you step-by-step instructions for completing this task. Your web host is in the business of dealing with technical issues, and it also creates the environment in the first place.

Don’t be afraid to ask for help with your database setup. MySQL is the database system that you must use. (WordPress cannot be used without MySQL.) MySQL is a relational database management system.

It can save any type of WordPress data, from blog posts to sidebar widget links, as well as all of your WordPress settings.

As a result, MySQL stores your blog posts in a fast, efficient, and flexible database.

Follow these steps after you’ve learned how to access your database setup tool:

1. Log into your web host. 
2. Create the database. You need to name your database something that makes sense. If you have a blog called Joe Smith’s Wondrous Adventures, you can name the database joesmith. The length of database names and database usernames are normally limited, and you can’t include special characters in the names. 
3. Create a database user. You can make the username anything, except the name that you used for your database. The same length and special character restrictions apply, though. 
4. Assign a password to that user.

Don’t forget to write this information down so that you can use it when you run the WordPress install script. Because web hosting companies can choose for themselves which MySQL database system to include in their hosting packages, I don’t know which of the following applies to your situation. But web hosts commonly use one of the following management systems:

• phpMyAdmin: A database management tool (shown in Figure 5-5) that a lot of web hosts provide to their clients. You can create and delete databases, manage database users, and (depending on what permissions the web host gives you) manipulate the data itself.
• cPanel: A common web host interface that generally enables users to create and delete databases. You normally do any additional manipulation by using phpMyAdmin.
• Plesk: Yet another web host interface that allows users to create and delete databases and manage database users. You do any data manipulation by using phpMyAdmin.

The web host that you choose probably uses one of the interfaces in the preceding list. You can figure them out and use them fairly easily. If you’re running only one blog, you need only a single database. If you’re thinking of running more than one, you need to find out how to keep your databases healthy and separate by using tools that your web host provides.

6. Running the install script

After you put the WordPress files in the directory your web host recommends and write down the database information, you only have to run the WordPress installer. The installer is super simple. Things can go wrong, of course, but if the installer gets stuck, it does a very good job of letting you know exactly what you need to do.

Follow these steps to install WordPress: 

1. To run the installer, point your Internet browser to www.yourwebdomain.com/wp-admin/install.php. Remember to replace www.yourwebdomain.com with your domain name! The installer checks to see whether you’ve created or edited the configuration file. If it doesn’t find one, it will create it for you. 
2. Click Create a Configuration File. This creates your WordPress configuration file. Now all you need to do is enter the information the configuration file needs. 
3. Make sure you have the database name, username, password, and hostname. If you do, click Let’s Go!
4. Enter the database information. You can usually leave the database host as localhost because most web hosting environments use that host without complaint. You don’t have to change the table prefix, either.
5. Click Submit. 
6. Click Run the Install. 
7. Enter a blog title and your email address in the text boxes provided. 
8. Click Install WordPress. If everything goes well, the installer displays the word Success on the screen. The username and password of the administration user also appear on the screen. Keep a record of this information in a safe location because if your blog experiences any problems or you need to conduct any WordPress configuration or management, you will need to log in using the admin account. 
9. Click Log In. The log-in page appears, where you can log into your new installation. That’s it! You’ve done it! You can now log into your new WordPress installation and get busy publishing.

The configuration file is named wp-config.php. If your installer can’t create the configuration file automatically, follow the instructions that WordPress provides at http://codex.wordpress.org/Installing_WordPress#Setup_configuration_ file to create the file by hand.

Step 3: Getting Familiar with Settings

After you’ve installed and activated your new blog software, you can explore your WordPress admin account. The WordPress software does a lot right out of the box to simplify your blogging life.

You can make blog posts, static pages, add images and multimedia files, connect to social networking sites like Instagram and Pinterest, and chat with blog visitors via the commenting system.

These functions are either included with the WordPress installation or can be added by downloading and installing a plug-in. Each of these plug-ins usually comes with an administration page. In the following sections, I will introduce you to the blog’s administration section.

1. Logging in 

Before you can start posting, you need to head on over to the Log In page and enter the username and password that were provided to you during the installation process. To log into your new website, you may want to bookmark the following link: www.yourdomain.com/wp-admin/wp-login.php Remember to replace www.yourwebdomain.com with your domain name!

2. Setting up an Editor account

WordPress allows you to set up and maintain several levels of user accounts in addition to the administrative account created during the setup process. These account types are called roles. They are as follows:

• Administrator: Administrators have access to all features and areas of the blog software, from technical configuration to user accounts to content tools. This is the most powerful level of access on your blog; handle with care! 
• Editor: This is a user who can publish posts, manage posts, and manage other account posts. 
• Author: This is a user who can publish and manage his or her own posts.
• Contributor: This is a user role that allows someone to write and manage posts but not publish them live to the blog. 
• Subscriber: This is a user who can read comments, post comments, and receive other private information.

Even if you are the sole blogger on your website, you should still create an Editor user account for creating blog posts.

I recommend not using the administrative account created during installation as the account you use to author blog posts; it’s similar to driving a car by opening the hood and directly manipulating the engine.

Instead, create an Editor account and use the excellent steering wheel that comes with WordPress. Use the administrative account for administrative tasks such as installing new themes and plug-ins, as well as general maintenance. Set up your Editor account by doing the following:

1. Log into your WordPress installation. 
2. From the Dashboard, click Users. You see the full list of users and their roles. 
3. Click Add New. WordPress loads the Add New User screen. 
4. Fill out the user fields. You see a listing of text boxes: username, first name, last name, email, website, and password. Only three are required: username, password, and email address. I recommend filling in the first and last names as well. 
5. Select the Editor role. 
6. Click Add User. The user is created.

When you set up a new user, you can choose to send the account information to the new user’s email address. In this case, the account is for yourself, so you don’t need to select this check box. 

If you want to have additional writers on your blog, consider setting them up as Authors — instead of Editors — and notifying them as you set up their accounts. After you create your new Editor account, don’t forget to log out of the administrative account and then log in again as an Editor!

3. Using the Dashboard 

When you log into your WordPress blog, you are taken to the Dashboard page. Get to know this page well because you’ll be spending the majority of your blogging time on it. You can customize the front Dashboard by rearranging panels and turning them on and off.

On the left side of the Dashboard, a series of menus point you to the various sections of the admin

• Posts: Find links that allow you to edit posts, add new posts, and manage categories and tags. 
• Media: Get a link to upload new media files to your media library or manage previously uploaded media. 
• Links: Manage lists of links on your website. For example, group links together into categories and post them in sidebars as link lists.
• Pages: Click to go to the Page Administration section. Pages in WordPress are considered static pieces of content (pages that change only once in a while) and aren’t blog posts. Use them for pretty much any section of your websites, such as a bio page or contact page. You can then link to these pages from a sidebar menu or via another blog post. Some themes may also provide you with menus that you can use to link to different sections of your blog. 
• Comments: Post, delete, and respond to comments that readers have added to blog posts on your website. 
• Appearance: View installed themes, activate new themes, edit existing themes, and search for additional themes from the online WordPress theme catalog. 
• Plugins: View installed plug-ins, activate and deactivate plug-ins, search for new plug-ins from WordPress.org, and edit plug-in files right in the interface. 
• Users: Manage the users for your blog, including readers and additional authors. 
• Tools: Manage additional tools for improved speed by using Google Gears, import and export blog posts and comments, and conduct WordPress upgrades. Google Gears is an optional plug-in for browsers like Firefox and Internet Explorer and adds functionality to your browser.
• Settings: Make all the general changes to the blog, such as the name of the site, your email address, and the date and time-zone settings.
• General: Contains basic account information such as email address, time format, and site language. 
• Writing: Contains settings for the editor interface, as well as default settings for categories, RSS, and tags. You can also access settings to set up remote email. 
• Reading: Choose the number of blog posts that appear on the front page of your blog and the number of postings available in your RSS feed. 
• Discussion Settings: Control what kinds of communication your blog sends out. For example, you can get the blog to notify you by email when someone adds a new comment. 
• Media: Upload and manage any of your media files. You can add titles and descriptions, organize images and audio, add captions to images, and make minor changes to image sizes. 
• Permalinks: Permalinks are the permanent links to your individual posts. You can configure the format of the post URLs so that they contain both date information and keywords, or keywords only. You can also set default categories for posts and tags.

4. Checking out the panels

On the right side of the Dashboard, you see a series of panels. Each panel gives you access to parts of the administrative interface for WordPress. The default panels are

At a Glance: Contains a quick overview of what’s happening on your blog. The panel displays  

• The number of posts on the blog 
• The number of comments 
• The spam count 
• The number of categories and tags currently in use on the site

Activity: Lists the most recent comment activity on your blog and provides links that allow you to moderate and respond to comments without leaving the Dashboard.

Quick Draft: Allows you to post a quick note on your blog right from the administration panel.  

WordPress News: Contains a listing of blog posts from other WordPress blogs that talk about WordPress.

Step 4: Creating a Post

I’m sure you’re bursting at the seams to get your first blog post online. The process is quite simple in terms of using WordPress. The real challenge is coming up with good stuff to blog about!

To write a new blog post, follow these steps:

1). Click the Posts menu in the Dashboard and select Add New. WordPress opens the Add New Post page. 

2). Give your post a title by entering it in the text box below Add New Post. 

3). Add some text in the body text box. Use the formatting buttons if you want to change the style of your text, create a list, or otherwise add elements.

4). Use any of the other options that you want for this post. WordPress gives you the following options: 

• Excerpt: If you want, you can write a short summary of your post for the Excerpt field.  
• Post Tags: Tags are keywords that describe the topic of your post. Tagging your posts lets search engines easily identify the subject material you discuss and means your post is likely to rank higher in search engine listings. 
• Categories: Use the Add New Category link in the Categories box if you need to create a new category for your post. Categories are general groups that you can sort your blog posts into so that readers can easily locate the content most interesting to them. 
• Discussion: You can choose whether you want to allow readers to post comments on this posting and whether you want to permit trackbacks. Trackbacks link two or more blog posts together. 
• Custom Fields: You can add custom fields to your posts, which you fully control. Custom fields are simply fields that appear in each blog post that you can display by altering the template for your blog. For example, if your blog is a restaurant-review blog, you might choose to add custom fields for the location or rating of each restaurant that you review.

5). Click Publish to save your blog post and check out your blog to see how it looks! 

If you are not yet ready to publish your blog entry to the public, you can save it as a draft or preview it before publishing it. You can also specify a specific date if you want to publish your post at a later time. Look for a Visit Site link near the top of the Dashboard; this will take you directly to your blog.

Step 5: Customizing Your Design

After you’ve played around with a few of the WordPress features, you may be thinking, “How do I make this new blog pretty?” The answer is as simple as a menu click. Just follow these steps:

1. From the menus on the left side of the Dashboard, click Appearance. The Themes tab opens, displaying a list of themes that you can install and allowing you to install new themes. 
2. Select Add New to search for themes based on color, keyword, columns, width, features, or subject, make your selections, and then click Find Themes. WordPress returns a list of themes based on your search query. 
3. Click Live Preview to see how a particular theme looks. 
4. After you find a theme that you like, click Install to load the theme onto your server. 
5. Click Activate to apply the theme to your blog.

You can install multiple themes at the same time and then test which theme works best for your blog. Do you want to delve even deeper into the code now? If this is the case, get ready to dive into HTML. Only the brave enter this realm, as it necessitates knowledge of HTML, CSS, PHP, and WordPress’s own markup language.

WordPress code editing consists of more than just plain old HTML. Some bloggers enjoy experimenting with HTML code, while others flee as quickly as they can. However, if you have the necessary skills, WordPress developers have made accessing and modifying theme files a relatively simple task.

To access the editing interface for the currently installed theme, select Editor from the Appearance menu. The editor is simply a text editor that allows you to manipulate the files in your theme without the need for any other technology (such as FTP). It’s simple to use and lacks unnecessary frills.

The disadvantage of using the editor is that you must be very knowledgeable about HTML code, CSS, and a little PHP thrown in for good measure. If you don’t understand what these technologies do, I don’t recommend touching your theme without first doing some practice. Create backups!

Final Words

You could spend a lot of time figuring out WordPress, and I simply cannot fit everything into a single article. (I tried!) But you’re not alone in your quest to better understand your new WordPress blog. There are numerous websites and blogs that can assist you in furthering your WordPress education.

WordPress’s official documentation is available online and is regularly updated. You can learn about the most recent features as well as what’s coming up in the future.

You can participate in this large and active web community by reading the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) section.

If you need more guidance, sign up for my online business coaching.