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Wordpress - A Beginners Guide Part 1 - “Where To Start?”
Posted on June 14, 2008
Filed Under Guides |
Hi all,
I thought i’d kick this blog off with a quick little guide on how to get started with Wordpress and work my way forward on how to build it up and customize it to be exactly what you are after. This part is for beginners, so more experienced Wordpressers may want to wait until part 2…
So, you have heard about how great Wordpress is and what it can do for you but you don’t really know what it is? What is a Blog anyway? Well, i am going to assume you know what a Blog is, if not then you will need to read up on Wikipedia first. Wordpress is essentially a blogging framework that allows you to setup and maintain your own blog easily without any coding knowledge at all and also have your site looking very professional and easy to read. Who can forget that it is also free (well, Open Source to be precise), of course! So how do you install it and get started?
Well, you can i) head on over to wordpress.org and download it and go through the setup step by step (the instructions are pretty good), or ii) you can install it automatically using ‘Fantastico Deluxe‘. But what on Earth is Fantastico Deluxe, you ask? It is a web application suite which ships default with most web hosts once you sign up with them. It can be accessed through your account’s control panel (commonly known as cpanel™) and really is Fantastic, as it’s name implies. It takes all of the pain out of the installation process for you and leaves you with a working blog after about 30 seconds of setup. Nice.
Now lets just back up one step before i get too carried away. Before you can even use Fantastico to install Wordpress you will need to register a domain name and also sign up with a web hosting company, which will cost some dollars. There are many free alternatives (e.g. Wordpress, Blogspot etc), though i would not recommend them if you want your blog taken seriously or wish to monetize it in any way. Instead i would recommend paying for hosting - you know the old saying - “you have to spend money to make money”.
Standard ‘Shared Hosting’ can cost anywhere from US$4.00 upwards per month, maybe even some cheaper, but if you are after a reputable host be prepared to pay a little more. Trust me on this, reliability in a host is the most important factor above all else. I have been with several different hosts where i had some terrible experiences, such as my sites being down for a week, no replies from the support desk despite constant emails, site going down intermittently once or twice every day for no reason and many more niggles. Suffice to say, i did a lot of research and came up with my top 3 recommended hosts.
1) Bluehost- By far the best host out there, period and the host i am currently with, so i have put my money where my mouth is. From US$6.95 per month you get unlimited bandwidth, unlimited storage and unlimited add-on domains, meaning you can host unlimited websites with dedicated domain names on the one host. So you only ever need to pay that US$6.95 per month. They even include a free domain name with the package if required. The main reason i recommend Bluehost is because i finally realized you do get what you pay for. There are many cheaper hosts around, sure, but it doesn’t look very professional when your site is going down for hours every day (im not exaggerating). These guys have top notch support and i can honestly say straight out, i have been with them for over a year now and have not had a single outage. If you are serious about quality, performance and stability for your site, do yourself a favor and join them now - click here.
2) WebHosting Pad - Also an excellent host. Not much separates these guys from the number 1 spot, but they seem to be slightly less reliable, if that’s even fair to say? Lots of features and decent price, but a bit less street cred imho.
3) Yahoo Hosting - Very good reliability, but less features and slightly more expensive. Good brand name though, with solid history and backing. Won’t be going bust anytime soon.
For more detailed information on selecting the best host for you, check out Setupwebhosting.com.
I’m afraid that’s all for part 1 of this ‘Getting Started’ guide. Part 2 will be coming very soon, where i will discuss using the ‘cpanel’ control panel interface for your hosting and how to install Wordpress using Fantastico Deluxe.
To be continued…
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Hi, i am the Wordpress Ninja. My name is Paul and my goal is to be able to answer everyone's Wordpress questions (for free) and post the best solutions on this blog. So for all questions and issues please post in the Wordpress Ninja Forum
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beautiful blog merciiii
hi sir
i want to make a site like video247.tv
i know this site is made in wordpress..
i am new to wordpress.how to make a complete site in wordpress.