It’s no wonder that WordPress is the most popular and versatile CMS (Content Management System) to date. It organizes, manages, and delivers your website’s digital content to the website visitors in the most efficient way.
In case you didn’t know, its parent company is Automattic Inc. which launched it back in 2003 as an open source platform for creating blogging websites.
Since then it has come a long way and evolved to be a CMS that can create and handle any kind of website without the need for coding skills.
WordPress allows you to build user-friendly and SEO-optimized websites in minutes, not hours. The best part is that it’s completely free.
In this blog post, we’re going to walk you through the ways of building a WordPress website.
At the end of this blog, you’ll be able to build a WordPress website like this.
Why is WordPress better than other CMS?
CMS refers to a content management system that allows individuals and organizations to create digital content on the Internet. CMS is particularly useful for building a WordPress website where regular updates and content management are important.
A CMS offers a user-friendly interface that lets users easily add, edit, and organize content like text, images, videos, and more. While using the solution, users usually don’t need advanced coding knowledge to access and use it.
WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, and many others are popular CMS platforms. Each has its own set of features and capabilities. But among all of them, WordPress is the most popular and highly demanding CMS.
According to the data from W3Techs
- 43.1% of all websites use WordPress as their content management system, accounting for 63.0% of known CMS-based sites.
- The usage of WordPress has increased an average of 12% per year since 2011.
- WordPress powers 36.28% of the top 1 million websites. ( BuiltWith, 2022).
Since WordPress has so many users and the community is super supportive, you’ll never feel stranded in case you get stuck with any issues.
If you’re not convinced, this diagram illustrates WordPress’s popularity and traffic compared to other leading content management systems.
Let’s see why WordPress is the best CMS:
- WordPress has an easy-to-use interface which makes it accessible for beginners.
- A wide variety of themes and plugins are available for adding different functionalities.
- You can change the look of your website easily using the free and premium themes.
- WordPress is designed with SEO in mind.
- An active community provides plenty of resources and support for users.
- WordPress regularly gets updates to improve performance and fix bugs.
- You can use WordPress to build websites of various sizes and complexities.
- It allows easy management of different types of media like images, videos, and audio files.
- Developers can customize WordPress through code modification.
- WordPress adapts to different devices, ensuring a good user experience on mobile.
Requirements: What do you need to build a website?
You don’t need to learn any coding language to access and create a WordPress website. Here are the requirements to build your dream WordPress website:
- Domain name: This is the web address where users will find your site. You can register a domain name using a domain registrar.
- Web hosting: A web hosting service stores your website’s files. It makes them accessible on the internet providing a space for your website to exist.
- Install and set up WordPress: WordPress is a platform that allows you to create, manage, and modify digital content without needing extensive technical knowledge. WordPress is one of the most popular and user-friendly CMS options.
- Website design or theme: Choose a design or theme for building a website with WordPress. This determines the overall look, layout, and functionality of your site.
- Content: This includes text, images, videos, and any other media you want to display on your website. Good content is important to get your audience engaged on your website.
- Plugins and extensions (Optional): These are add-ons that enhance the functionality of your website. For example, you might use plugins for SEO optimization, contact forms, social media integration, etc.
- Security measures: Implementing security measures are essential. Strong passwords, SSL certificates, and regular backups are necessary to protect your website from potential threats.
How to create a WordPress website in the easiest way?
Creating a WordPress website is not a complex task. In this guide, we’ll walk you through the simplest ways to create a WordPress website.
Let’s dive into the process of building a WordPress website!
Step 1: Choose a domain name
Select names that reflect your website’s content. Make sure they’re easy to spell and remember. Then use a domain checker from a registrar or hosting provider to see if your chosen name is free or not. If not, try variations to get one.
After having an available name, register it through the domain registrar. This means creating an account, giving your contact details, and making a payment.
There are popular domain name registrars like Namecheap, Name, Google Domains, and others. Choose the one that you prefer.
Step 2: Choose a WordPress hosting provider
Look into different hosting providers. Search their offers, different plans, and features. Consider options like Hostinger, Bluehost, SiteGround, HostGator, and GreenGeeks. Choose one hosting provider that fits your needs and budget.
Providers offer various types, like shared, VPS, dedicated, and managed WordPress hosting. If you are a non-techy person go with the managed WordPress hosting. If you’re an absolute beginner with only a few traffic on your website, pick a shared hosting plan with managed WordPress hosting.
Step 3: Install and set up WordPress
Once you’ve signed up, log in to your hosting account through the hosting provider’s website. After that, log into the control panel (cPanel or hPanel). Most hosting providers use cPanel, a user-friendly interface to manage your hosting account.
Then scroll to the bottom of the screen. Then click on the WordPress installer, in the Softaculous Apps Installer section.
Finally, it’s time to install WordPress. Look for the “Install Now” or similar option.
First, set up an SSL certificate for your website. Set the “Choose Protocol” field as it is. Then you can select your preferred domain which will be your website address. Lastly, leave the “In Directory” field blank.
Now, enter your site name and site description. Also, leave the Enable Multisite option unchecked.
In this step, enter your username as the Admin Username and set a password for admin. Then you have to give your email. You can recover or reset a new password using this email.
Then select your required language for building a WordPress website. You can also install the Loginizer plug-in by checking the required box.
Now we’re going to install WordPress with default themes. So you don’t have to select a theme from this section, you can do it later.
Enter your email address in the Email installation details field. After that, click on the Install button.
Then a progress bar will appear to display the installation process.
After completing the installation, the following screen will appear.
To see your live WordPress website you can click on the top link (https://yourdomain.com). To access the backend of your website use the Administrative URL (http://yourdomain.com/wp-admin).
For your convenience, you can follow this tutorial to complete the WordPress installation on your hosting.
Step 4: Install and activate a WordPress Theme
By default, WordPress ships with a couple of default themes. If you’re not happy with them, you can get a ton of free themes from the WordPress theme repository.
Most of the free themes also have premium versions which you can get on their respective websites.
To get a free theme from the WordPress dashboard, navigate to the WordPress admin dashboard and then go to Appearance.
Now navigate to the Theme option for adding a theme.
Now, you’ll find a couple of WordPress themes (such as Twenty Twenty-Three, Twenty Twenty-One, and Twenty Twenty-Two) pre-installed out of the box.
You’ll see that by default one of these themes is activated. However, you can activate any of them. But assume that we want to install a third-party free theme. To do so, click on the Add New Theme button.
Here you can find a search bar. You can search for a particular plugin according to your choice and requirements from here. Example: We are searching for an Astra theme in the search bar.
(Please note that considering a good theme involves exploring, previewing, and selecting one that suits your site’s style and purpose.)
Then navigate to the Astra theme area and hit the Install button to complete the installation process.
Next, activate the theme using the Activate button.
Step 5: Select a template to create your site with demo data
After having a desired theme you may use a template to create your website faster and more smoothly. For this purpose, you can install a Starter Template plugin.
To install a Starter Template plugin, navigate to the Plugins.
Now go for the Add New Plugin button.
Type the starter template in the search bar.
Then you can see the starter template here. Click on the Install button.
After installing here will appear the Activate button. Navigate the button to complete the activation of the plugin.
Now the plugin will ask you to select a page builder. According to your preference, select a one-page builder. We’re selecting Block Editor for this tutorial.
Then you need to select the type of website that you want to create. You can search for the website type you want to create in this search bar.
You’ll see a list of template categories. You can select the category as per your needs.t. Here we’re going to select the Blog category.
Now select a template for your website. Let’s select the Child Care Expert one for this tutorial.
Now you can start customizing the template. For example, you can add the logo of your site and customize it here.
After that, click on the “Skip & Continue” button.
You can also set and balance all the colors and fonts as you want from the left sidebar settings panel. Each and every section is customizable with compatible themes, templates, and plugins. You can just select the suitable one and customize your site effortlessly.
Once you are done, click on the “Continue” button.
Now, you can insert your name and other information on these optional fields.
After that, click on the “Submit & Build My Website” to build your WordPress website.
At this point, the system will start building your website in a few seconds.
Finally, you made it! It’s as simple as building a website WordPress.
To view your brand new website, click on the “View Your Website” button.
It’ll look and feel like this.
Bonus tips:
You can now extend your website’s functionalities by adding a security plugin, SEO plugin, contact form plugin, or anything you like. Here we’ve come up with a couple of tips.
Tip 1: Installing a plugin
To enhance your WordPress website’s functionality, you can install and use plugins.
Navigate to the WordPress admin dashboard and then select Plugins.
Click the Add New Plugin button.
In this step, you can either search for a new plugin or upload an existing one from your local storage.
Assume that we want to search for a plugin in the WordPress repository. You might search for “Yoast SEO,” “Contact Form,” or “Social Media Sharing and so many more.”
For this tutorial, let’s search for an SEO plugin called “Yoast SEO”.
Now, hit the Install Now button from the Yoast SEO plugin section. WordPress will automatically download and install the plugin for you.
After completing the installation hit the Activate button to activate the plugin.
Now you’ll be able to see the plugin in the left menu bar. That’s how you can install and activate a WordPress plugin.
Tip 2: Create a web page or post.
The process of creating a web page or post is similar. Here we’re walking you through a few simple steps to create webpages for your WordPress website:
Head to the Pages Section from the WordPress dashboard.
To add a new page, click the Add New button.
Enter a title for your page at the top. Then, write or insert your content in the editor below.
After adding the blocks, you can also customize their styles and tinker with other settings from the block settings panel located at the right sidebar.
Finally, you can click the Publish button to make the page live.
Repeat these steps for each new page you want to customize with WordPress. This will allow you to customize and present your content effectively.
Tip 3: Some basic plugins necessary to create a WordPress website
There are some basic plugins necessary for creating a WordPress website. The requirements of plugins can depend on the specific needs of your site. However, there are several essential plugins that we highly recommend:
- Next3 Offload (Backup, speed optimization, and caching plugin): This plugin helps you speed up your website performance. It ensures you can restore it in case of any issues. Also, optimize website speed and performance by offloading media files.
- Yoast SEO (or an SEO Plugin): Helps optimize your website for search engines, improving its visibility and rankings.
- Akismet (or a Spam Protection Plugin): Protects your website from spam comments and forms. Also ensures a clean and secure environment.
- Contact Form 7 (or a Form Plugin): Allows you to create and manage contact forms, which are important for user interaction.
- Jetpack (or a Security and Performance Plugin): Provides a suite of tools for security and analytics.
- WPForms (or a Drag-and-Drop Form Builder): Offers an intuitive way to create various types of forms for your website.
Choose and install plugins based on the specific needs and functionalities of your website.
Tip 4: How can I design or customize a WordPress page using page builders like block editor?
The Block editor is a modern way to build and publish on WordPress. It uses blocks to arrange and style content, allowing for versatile layouts on websites and digital products.
You can simplify the process of adding and formatting different types of content elements, making it more accessible to users of varying technical levels.
Since the Block Editor is a native page builder solution, it’s quite fast compared to any other third-party page builders.
Now, let’s see how you can edit a page using the Block Editor.
After logging in to your WordPress dashboard, go to the page you want to edit.
(However, you can also create a new page using the Add New button from the same page).
Select the ‘+’ icon to access the Block Editor.
Feel free to pick a block you need using the block window.
Similarly, you can also click the ‘+’ icon to add different types of content blocks like text, images, and more from any part of the editor.
For instance, you can set an image by selecting the image block.
Upload an image as your preference.
You can also adjust settings and add styles using the block settings from the right sidebar.
At last, it’s time to preview and publish. Click “Preview” to see how your page looks from the front end.
When you’re satisfied, click Publish to make the page live on your website.
Following these steps will help you efficiently design a WordPress page using the Block Editor. Remember to save your progress and explore various blocks for diverse content options.
Wrapping up
Building a WordPress website is an accessible and easy task when done right. We hope by following the steps outlined in this guide, you can take the first crucial steps towards creating your online presence.
Remember, the journey doesn’t end here; continue to explore and customize your website to align with your vision. With just a few clicks, you can build a stunning WordPress website. The website will also engage more active visitors to your website.
We’ve shown you the entire process with the free version of the theme and the free templates. But you can also consider the premium version in case you are not satisfied with the free ones.
Embrace the creative possibilities that WordPress offers, and watch your website flourish. So, what are you waiting for?
Have a great and smooth journey with your new WordPress website.
Quick Tips:
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