wordpress for beginners

WordPress For Beginners

Over the past decade, WordPress has grown to become one of the largest content management systems (CMS) for building websites and blogs. According to a recent survey by Netcraft, over 455 million websites make use of WordPress. Although relatively easy to implement, building a WordPress site can be a challenging task for a beginner. That’s why we’re going to explore WordPress for Beginners in this post. 

What are CMS and WordPress?

Creating a website from scratch requires an adept understanding of programming. CMS was created to equip non-technical personnel with the ability to create, modify and manage content on a website. WordPress is the most popular CMS that’s built on the PHP scripting language. WordPress and other CMS make website development very easy. 

How to Install WordPress, Themes and Plugins

Before installing WordPress on your local computer, you need to install PHP since WordPress is written in PHP. You also need to install a SQL database like MYSQL and MariaDB. You need to install a web server like APACHE. Then you can install and setup your WordPress.

Since this is WordPress for Beginners, a simpler route is to make use of hosting sites like BlueHost and HostGator. After purchasing your domain name, installing WordPress is just one click away and you can move on to what matters – building your website. 

To login to the admin site for your website, visit https://{domainname}/wp-admin. To install a theme, on the menu, click on appearances, then themes. This opens up several themes available of which some are free and some are paid. You can then preview the ones you like and after making a choice, you can install the theme with just a click.

To install a plugin, on the Menu tab on the left-hand side, click on plugins and then click on ‘add new’. This opens a page with several plugins to choose from. Plugins help to give your website added functionality.

For instance, WooCommerce plugin can help turn your website into a shop, adding features like carts, order page and the likes. On the other hand, the MailChimp plugin can be used to automate your email sending process. Once you find the plugin you require, just click to install.

Navigating WordPress Dashboard

To access the WordPress Dashboard, log in to https://{domainname}/wp-admin. The WordPress Dashboard helps you modify your website and also monitor current activities on your website. From the dashboard, there are links to create or add a blog post. You can also customize your website from your dashboard. Finally, the dashboard shows your recent website activities. 

How to Publish Content

Publishing a blog post from your WordPress admin is very easy. On the Dashboard page, click on the Post button, then ‘add a new post’. It opens a text editor where you can fill in the post title, copy and paste the content and even include a featured image.

Once you’ve customized the post to suitable colour and font size, you can just click on the publish button to make your post live.

Conclusion

As you can see from this WordPress for Beginners guide, creating your first website with WordPress is quite easy, especially if you know exactly what to do. And by now, you probably know how to go about it. However, building a website is more than just having it run. 

First, you need the designs to be attractive so as not to turn off visitors. Second, your website needs to be light-weight so that it doesn’t take too long to load. Achieving this requires an in-depth understanding of the workings of WordPress.

Also, as a beginner, you are limited to the functionalities that come with the template, and that means you cannot add custom features. Finally, you have search engine optimization to worry about.

For these reasons, it’s advisable to outsource your website to a tried-and-true WordPress website design company like WP Tangerine. With our robust team of developers, designers, and SEO specialists, you can be assured of a WordPress Help  that will generate the traffic that you desire at an affordable cost.