How to Make a WordPress Website – Step-by-Step Guide for Beginners

Are you trying to figure out how to create a website? Today you will find out!
An easy step-by-step website setup guide was written by a web designers who has created hundreds of websites and helped thousands of others to create their websites.
At Colorlib, we review products and provide good reading content for our readership. Many of them are familiar with the workings of a website running on WordPress. This guide will help anyone creating their first website, likely with WordPress. It’s the platform we recommend and use for our website.
A step-by-step tutorial starts with finding the right content management system, choosing a domain name, then the right web hosting service, adding suitable themes plugins, and customizing your site’s appearance. When you finish this how-to make a WordPress website for beginners guide, you’ll have a full-fledged website ready!

This guide contains three simple and easy-to-follow steps:

STEP 1: Choose the right platform for your website
STEP 2: Choose the right website name (domain) and hosting
STEP 3: Configure your newly created WordPress website

Step 1: Choose the right platform for your website

What is a Content Management System?

A content management system (CMS) is a platform or mechanism that permits you to create and publish your content on a website. Let’s say it is a coat hanger stand with the coat being your content.
It is software that is installed on your host’s server. Your host provider will likely have a one-click installation process to help you get your CMS installed. Once installed, you can log in to your site as the admin and add photos, text and other content. You can use the content you’ve added to create blog posts and other forms of content like a product page or display a work portfolio on your website.
A CMS is way more than just a means to an end, you can install a theme that is a modified template to suit the specific niche and purpose of your site. With the template added, you can customize the appearance of your site. You can add plugins to add function to your site, for example, a social sharing plugin to help spread the word about your site via social networks.
All of this and more can be accomplished with a Content Management System.

Which CMS is best for you?

An overwhelming majority of websites use WordPress. The other two options lag way behind in comparison to WordPress (certainly in popularity) are Joomla and Drupal.

WordPress

The ideal option for someone who’s creating their first website. It has considerable scalability and works well with low and medium-traffic websites. We receive 9 million views every month, and we run WordPress, which gives you an idea of what medium traffic constitutes if you were wondering. Even large websites such as TIME Magazine, CNN, TED, Techcrunch, and NBC use WordPress to server millions of pageviews daily.
WordPress has many points that can be made in favor of its use.

• Easy To Install: Most hosting services have one-click installation options for WordPress, given the number of people who use it.
• Strong Community & Open Source: It is free and used by many people. There are many free themes and plugins that you can leverage for your site. Apart from the freebies, premium themes and plugins are cheap and come with excellent support services from their providers. If you ever have a doubt or a problem, a simple Google search can answer your query. I’ll go so far as to say you’ll find the answer to your doubts answered by the first three Google search results. A strong community will aid in your WordPress initiation process if you ever encounter hiccups. And you can always drop your comments here. Either Aigars or I will be sure to respond to them at the earliest opportunity.
• Ideal For Non-tech-savvy online entrepreneurs: Most of the products associated with WordPress, such as themes and plugins, are fairly straightforward and intuitive to use. Installing a Content Management System like WordPress is only the first step; there is much more to website creation beyond that. Like WordPress, which is easy to install and configure, the tools you’ll require to make your website whole are easy to handle.

Two not so quite favorable things about WordPress

• One drawback of WordPress, it may become unwieldy if your site grows far too large and receives an enormous amount of daily traffic. The cost of your hosting goes up. But we are talking about traffic in the order of millions here and it isn’t something you should let bother you for now.
• Another potential problem is the quality of free plugins and themes. While most are good and have fairly high-security standards, you’d be wary of unknown third-party plugins. WordPress is a secure platform out the box, but adding third-party software while exercising poor judgment is a bad idea. That being said, security vulnerabilities are generally fixed as soon as they are detected.

As you can see, WordPress is by far the most popular content management system and is used by 65% CMS powered websites worldwide.
You need to know that all CMSs have one drawback or the other. And for a new web admin, WordPress is the best way to go! But I’ll talk about Drupal and Joomla, all the same. You should undoubtedly be aware of them should you decide to switch your CMS at a later point in time. And it will also tell you why perhaps Joomla and Drupal are not best suited to the needs of beginners.

Drupal

Drupal is an open-source CMS primarily utilized by big corporations with vast websites and high traffic loads. It has customization possibilities with themes and plugins created to add value to Drupal sites. Unlike WordPress, Drupal is not well-suited for the technically inept or a first-time website developer. Drupal websites are a bit faster and less taxing on the host’s server resources.
But if you’re new to web development, it isn’t for you. Why? It is more complicated than it needs to be to meet your requirements. It is designed for complex, vast websites with high traffic loads, which your new website will not be to begin with. Given that, there is no need to unnecessarily add to the difficulty of the website creation process. And besides, you can always switch to Drupal at a later date.

Joomla

Open source and free like the previous two platforms. It is easier to handle than Drupal and offers more than WordPress in terms of performance and tweakability. It is a tad better than the other two when creating a community of users (like a small social network or tight-knit community for your readers) and is far more amenable to creating social websites with a lot of interaction and engagement from users.
And again, my reasons are the same for not recommending it for you, unnecessary complications you do not need.

WordPress – Probably the best option for you!

If you start with a new domain name without traffic, you are better off with WordPress. It is exceedingly easy to use and has many premium quality free themes and plugins. The cost of hosting is low, and many hosts provide for easy one-click installation of WordPress. And since many online entrepreneurs do not know how to program in HTML, CSS, and PHP, WordPress is the best choice. It offers excellent customizability even to WordPress newbies.

Click here to summarize, why WordPress is the best choice, if you still harbour any lingering doubts. (Optional)

• Free – Who isn’t happy about this?
• Strong Community – Someone to answer your questions, if it isn’t answered on the hundreds of niche WordPress sites.
• Frequently Updated Platform – Updates are important (Fix bugs, security, constantly improving features and performance and ensure compatibility with all WordPress products)
• A host of themes and plugins that are free – Keep costs low.
• Excellent options for premium plugins and themes – That little extra at a reasonable price.
• Easy to use and beginner friendly – Designed for you and non programmers.
• Secure platform out of box – Important for revenue generating websites
• Scalable for medium traffic – For when you grow fast and need to accommodate more traffic.
• Multiple options for hosting including managed hosting services (Managed hosting – You focus on content, your host takes care of everything else)
• Wealth of choices for running site backups – Site Backups are a big deal and extremely important for medium traffic sites, it ensures minimal downtime if your site should ever be hacked.

Do not get confused with WordPress.com, which is a blog site built with WordPress. What you are building here is a yoursitename.com as opposed to yoursitename.WordPress.com. And if you do not know the differences between the two, please read <this post that elaborates differences between two.>
Now that you have chosen the best platform for your website you can proceed with the next step.
Step 2: Choose the right website name (domain) and hosting
Before you choose a domain name, you’ll need be sure of the niche you’d like to concentrate on. Selecting a niche area to focus on, is an important task in and of itself. To create a revenue-generating website, you must research the target keyword pool and the niche it is derived from. For now, just make sure it is something you like and are genuinely passionate about. And ensure that you have good expertise in the subject matter involved.
You can register any available (not registered yet) domain name but here is something I recommend:

• Business website – If you are making a website for your business it would be best to choose a domain name that is your company name or brand. An example domain name would be YourComapanyName.com or YourBrandName.com
• Personal website – If it is going to be your personal website it would be great to go with com
• Hobby website – The sky’s the limit 🙂

Most popular domain names extensions (the end part of website address, like .com) are .com, .org, .net, but in recent years, many new domain extensions have been introduced (Wikipedia). Now you can register crazy domain names such as YourCompanyName.pizza, YourCompanyName.green, or YourName.ninja.
New domain extensions haven’t gone mainstream yet and might confuse your visitors. Even some social networks, services and apps have problems displaying these new domain names that’s why I advice avoiding them, at least for now. However, I recommend sticking with .com, .net and .org for your first website.

Choosing The Right Domain Name

The next step in our process involves choosing a domain name. A domain name is the URL one types into a browser’s address bar to visit a particular website.
Getting the right domain name is crucial. You need to keep in mind a few things while considering domain name choices.

• Short – Shorter names work better when it comes to remembrance and are easy to type as well.
• Brandable – Remember your domain also runs to your brand, make sure it isn’t memorable for all the wrong reasons.
• Memorable – People forget easily, come up with a name that first time visitors to your site are likely to remember.
• Catchy – You want a domain name that rolls off the tongue and describes what you do.
• Easy to type.
• Includes keyword (optional) – Identify the right keywords or combination of keywords. The closer your domain name is to your site’s niche, the better for search engine optimization (SEO)
• Niche specific (optional) – If you are writing a website about a specific niche check if there are popular abbreviations that you can use. For example, in WordPress there are many highly ranked websites with “wp” as part of their name. WPEngine.com, a managed hosting service for WordPress.

Funny domain name mistakes

Here are some domain names someone have registered without realizing what a huge mistake they have made:

• Speedofart.com – Speed of Art
• Choosespain.com – Choose Spain
• Gotahoe.com – Go Tahoe

Advanced Tips on Picking a Domain Name

1. To get a domain, you need a domain registrar. A domain registrar is someone or an organization that reserves your right to use a domain for a given period. Usually, web hosting companies perform the function of a domain registrar and a web hosting service provider. So you do not have to be concerned with this specifically as your web hosting service will also play the role of domain registrar. This option is excellent if you have multiple domains and tend to switch your hosting provider regularly. Not that we would recommend it, but it does happen. Also, it is more secure to keep your hosting separated from a domain registrar. In case your hosting accounts get compromised hackers won’t get access to your domain.
2. If you are exceedingly confident of your ability to generate revenue, you might consider buying a domain name parked by someone else. For various reasons, sometimes, the premium you end up paying for a domain name may be well worth the expense. You can buy domain names on Flippa.com or Godaddy.com but consider this wisely, we wouldn’t want you to pay a hefty price only to find out that the domain name isn’t worth it later.

Hosting

You have two options for hosting provider types recommended for WordPress newbies.

• Shared Hosting
• Managed WordPress Hosting

I do not recommend anything other than a shared hosting plan for first-time webmasters. All other forms of hosting that you may have heard of like Virtual Private Hosting (requires reasonable technical know-how), managed WordPress hosting (too costly) might not be the right choice for your first website. As your knowledge and business grow you might consider VPS or fully managed WordPress hosting but let’s leave that for another post.
Shared hosting is the way to go; later we can discuss upgrading your host. We’ve recommended two shared hosting services and added elaborate installation processes for WordPress. Both hosting providers offer domain registration and website hosting, and that’s exactly what we need to create an excellent website.

BlueHost

We have created a short video to guide you through the installation process to simplify the WordPress installation process. We might receive a commission if you decide to purchase through these links.

Click here to visit Bluehost and proceed with your first website setup.
If you had some problems understanding the setup process outlined in a video, follow the steps below.

1. Choose the right hosting page. I’d suggest the starter package. It offers plenty of speed, performance, functionality and storage for your first website. You can upgrade your hosting plan as your website grows>

1. You will be prompted to choose a domain name as the example below. Double check your domain name to avoid typos.

1. And on the next screens, enter your personal information and credit card details. And complete payment.

1. In Bluehost cPanel (administration panel), find a button which says Install WordPress

1. Click on a green Install button to proceed with WordPress installation

1. Choose if you want to use your website with or without “www.” at the front of your website name (www.YourWebsite.com or YourWebsite.com). We recommend using it without “www.” for the sake of simplicity.

1. The details for the WordPress installation like email ID, username and password can be set. And tick all the necessary conditions under a licence agreement.

1. And install.

1. Once installation is complete, you will see a clear message on top saying “Your Install is Complete!” and button saying “View Credentials”

1. By clicking on that button you will be sent to a page where you can find your newly installed WordPress login credentials.

1. Now you can login on your website by clicking link that says YourWebsitName.com/wp-admin.

SiteGround

SiteGroud’s shared hosting plan has a similar, equally easy-to-use WordPress installation and domain registration process. The site asks you whether you have a domain name or need to register one, in our case since you are creating your first site you need to register a domain.

SiteGround vs BlueHost

I suggest that you look at both and decide based on whatever domain registration and WordPress installation process seems more manageable. But I feel it doesn’t matter much, and you shouldn’t worry too much over which of the two hosting services to go with.
Check out our WordPress hosting guide if you’d like a far more elaborate list of shared hosting service providers.
Now that your domain is registered hosting paid for and your WordPress installed. What’s next?
Step 3: Configure your newly created WordPress website

WordPress Admin Screens

• Go to yourwebsitename.com/wp-admin.
• Type in the username and password you previously entered during the WordPress installation process.

Your WordPress admin menu is available on the left side of the screen. Allowing your cursor to linger over them will open sub menus.

• Dashboard
• Posts
• Media
• Links
• Pages
• Comments
• Appearance
• Plugins
• Users
• Tools
• Settings

So for this post I will not be talking about Settings, Tools, Users, or Your Dashboard. That is a lot of stuff which you deal with. But I’ve promised to get your site up.
I will talk about the rest of the menu options which are part of your WordPress menu. Let’s get started.

Customizing your site’s Appearance and activating a WordPress Theme

Themes (Appearances > Themes)

1. Open Appearances > Themes. From here on have a look at the heading of each subsection if you have doubts about accessing a particular part of the WordPress menu from the admin screen.

1. And click on the “Add New” button on the top. And choose from one of the themes displayed or search for a specific theme. For a list of awesome free themes you should check this page.

1. Install a new theme that you fancy and activate it.

1. The next part involves customization of a theme. You can access this under from Appearance > Customize. You can do a number of things to your site’s appearance from here. But that’s not the crux of this post, a theme is sufficient to start a website.

Widgets (Appearances > Widgets)

Widgets are preset modules or pieces of code that add to a certain function that will be helpful for your website in some capacity or the other. Your sidebars, footers and headers can be loaded with widgets.
As you can see in the above screenshot, there 6 widgets in the sidebar. These widgets include a search bar, a recent posts widget, recent comments, archives, categories, and meta. Then you can see 4 footer areas where you can add widgets just the same. The number of footers, header, and sidebar areas available depends on your theme.
Widgets are not plugins, but they are small chunks of code that add a bit of function. Sometimes it may help with navigation, sometimes with social media, you can even use it to add HTML to a text widget which will function as coded to do so. So widgets are a very useful tool, but you need to learn a bit about them before using them to the fullest.

Menus (Appearances > Menu)

Menus are extremely important for any website. They offer a means to navigate your site and its content. After all, what’s the point in creating captivating content if your visitor can not find it easily on your site. Bad menus and navigation can lead to a high bounce rate (the number of visitors as a percentage who leave your site after just viewing just one page).
You may have seen websites with menus on the top of the side and even at the bottom. We can do all of this.
You’d like to include pages like “About,” “Blog,” “Contact” and “Our Services” as part of your primary menu. Any page you’d like displayed on your menu can be added. The number of menus and their placement on your site depends on your WordPress theme.
You can add all the stuff that you see on the left to the menu ranging from pages to products as part of your menu. Again what you can include as part of the menu depends on your WordPress theme.
A good menu,

• Is concise and minimal.
• It is a representation of all your site’s offerings.
• Very intuitive to use and maneuver around your site.

Keep that in mind and you should be fine.

Background (Appearances > Background)

Many websites choose to have a plain single color background and I am big fan of that.
The Colorlib blog has a plain white background and it keeps things simple. But the site’s homepage is pretty awesome with a purple background and our tagline.
Use a powerful background image if you want your website to send a powerful visual cue to your audience. Websites that are media heavy, including photography sites or portfolio websites have great backgrounds. Otherwise, you can opt for a plain color appropriate for any blog that emphasizes readability.
The background should not be confused with a slider image, a constantly changing image that moves across your screen or changes with fancy animation.

Adding New Plugins (Plugins > Add New)

Plugins are scripts or code written to perform a particular function or set of functions on your website.
A simple example would be the social sharing plugin, it helps share your content across different social platforms and helps get the word out that your content is awesome. Similarly, people have developed plugins for search engine optimization, security purposes, creating and maintaining a portfolio of images, to create contact forms, for caching, the list is endless.
If you want to read a detailed list of plugins that we think is essential, read this comprehensive list of essential plugins.

Adding Pages (Pages > Add New)

Pages on a website help divide your website into a requisite number of pieces to present the different sections of your site’s content. Pages are to themes like widgets are to plugins. With pages, you can create specific template styles called on command for different purposes requiring the same or similar design. Pages are more than posts and are used for specific purposes on your site. You can create pages specifically to cater to the requirements of a Contact Us Page or perhaps create landing page.
And you are greeted by a New Page, which you can now fill up. You can create a new page and assign page attributes from this new screen.
If you need to create a template that you’re likely to use often or recreate a section of your site for a specific purpose, creating a page is the way to go.

Comments (Access from WordPress menu)

Websites need readers to make them successful. Comments are a compelling means to establish a great debate on your site, which only adds value to your site. One percent of the traffic that visits your site will hardly comment. And that is assuming that the content is great to begin with. Driving interaction with passive readers on your site is difficult and takes time and effort.
A great post with a pre-existing comment history helps your site receive more comments. Aigars wrote an awesome post on Colorlib a while back, yet it still keeps receiving comments and remains a great traffic source.
And remember, WordPress allows you to link your site when you comment on another person’s blog. And this may send visitors your way, if you play your cards right and make genuine attempts to offer something constructive. For this same reason, many people will leave their comments on your blog.
If I feel your content is great and a particular post you’ve written is awesome, then I’ll almost jump at the chance to leave my comment first and best anyone else first to comment. Because I know, eventually it will lead a few visitors back to my site.
Comments are a great way to build an awesome readership and a loyal following for your site.

Adding Content

Content is king may be a cliched line. But it is true now more so than ever before. There are many more websites now than there ever were before. You name a niche, any niche and it is bound to be saturated to the hilt with websites producing content about it. WordPress is a very profitable niche. Why? 50% of websites use it, and many are new to WP. WordPress newbies and even intermediate level users require a few resources to help them get started up and make changes to their WordPress sites, not too dissimilar to the content on Colorlib 😉 But a website like Colorlib works well and generates revenue only when we offer value to our readers.
We publish many articles on premium WordPress themes, and should you choose to buy one of them after clicking on our links, we receive a small commission on your purchase. But truth be told, our most popular and widely read articles aren’t the ones that describe premium WordPress themes or plugins instead they are WordPress tutorials and posts dedicated to free themes, plugins, and other WordPress-related articles because it is only when we offer value to readers that our site grows.
So based on your site’s niche and expertise, you need to produce content that genuinely offers value to would-be readers. If you intend to create your site purely for monetary purposes, it will not be successful in the long run. No wait a minute, it may still be profitable but certainly not as successful as it could have been had you tried to help your audiences genuinely. So focus on good content.
Pick your niche and offer great value to your readers. And watch your traffic grow steadily and if you are lucky, perhaps even go through the roof!
So how do you publish your content on WordPress? What are the formats available to you apart from just plain ol’ text?

Posts (Posts > Add New)

The beating heart of your site or most sites anyway. At the end of this tutorial when all’s said and done, you’ll be here to populate your site with posts. WordPress has a very easy-to-use posting mechanism, which is one of the reasons it is so popular.
You have two ways to write your posts: one is the visual editor, and the other is the HTML editor. You can opt to use the visual editor, but you should know the HTML editor (referred to as text editor) is a potent tool to help you create the right formatting for your posts. The sooner you are comfortable with the text editor, the better you will be. You may notice I am using the visual editor and truth be told, once I’ve added all the necessary formatting I prefer the visual editor.
The visual editor is very similar to most text editors and permits you to add bold/italic effects to your text, change its font, add bulleted lists and numbered lists, align content differently and add hyperlinks. There is also a distraction-free writing mode which gives you a fullscreen version of the editor.

Categories (Posts > Categories)

Categories are a means to divide your content. Categories are important when your site publishes content on several issues. You can add categories from your Post editor or access it under Posts > Categories.
Now you can name the category to create one, and then you can add a slug, a URL add-on of sorts for all your site’s posts on that specific category. For example, if I know that Colorlib produces many theme collection content, I can Google search “Colorlib + any keyword/category,” and the first search result link is – https://colorlib.com/wp/popular-wordpress-themes/. With this, I can view only the posts published under the category “Collections.”
So it is a very effective way to divide your site’s content and make finding stuff on your site much easier for a visitor.

Tags (Posts > Tags)

Tags are very similar to categories, except each post generally has its tags. Tags are a tad more specific than categories, but they are the same, and they aid in helping visitors find your content more easily.

Media (Media >Add New)

Media, as in photos and videos are important to normal websites. They are even more so for media-heavy websites. Adding media is easy with WordPress. You can either add media from Posts or add media directly to the media library.
You can add the image title, a caption, description to the image. But it is also important you also add the alt text, which helps search engines identify your image. It is a small step in ensuring good search engine optimization.
You can add many effects and stuff to your imagery, like popping it up or using a lightbox with WordPress plugins. But that’s for another day.

Your Profile

Setting up your WordPress profile is relatively easy to deal with. You can edit your profile from the “Edit Your Profile” on your WordPress admin screen on the top right-hand corner. You can describe yourself and add the necessary social media links as well.
And to add a profile picture for your WordPress ID, you’ll need to get a Gravatar account. You’ll need an account from WordPress.com with which you can log in to your site’s admin panel.

Just Start!

We have far too many inhibitions; starting stuff is one of them. It opens the door to failure.
Creating the website and generating revenue is no joke. It is hard work, sometimes seemingly unrewarding work.
Over the next few weeks and months, we’ll launch our “Getting Started With WordPress” post series to help you out.
And apart from that, if you need anything else, do let us know in the comments below! Aigars and I will always be happy to help you out 🙂