Creating an account

In order to create your very own WordPress.com blog, you need to sign up for an account following these steps.

1. Direct your web browser to www.wordpress.com, shown in Figure 5-2.
2. Click Get Started in the upper-right corner of the screen.
3. If you have a free Google account and would like to create your WordPress.com account using your Google account, select Continue with Google, as shown in Figure 5-3. This will expedite the registration process.
4. If you choose to create a new account, fill in the requested information and click Create Your Account to continue.
5. Select Blog on the site type selection page and click Continue.

6. Share a word that describes your blog’s focus and click Continue.

   Not sure what the focus of your blog should be? Check out Chapter 8, Finding Your Niche. Still not sure? Don’t worry, a keyword submitted at this point in your blog account registration will not force you to never write about another topic. In fact, bloggers change their focus all the time! Don’t let this step of the registration topic overwhelm you.

7. Name your blog on the Help Customers Find You page and click Continue.

8. Create your blog’s domain name.

   If you know the exact name you want, select Show Exact Matches Only by clicking on the gear symbol at the end of the search field, as shown in Figure 5-4.

   If you have purchased a domain name (see Chapter 3), you can assign that purchased domain name to your WordPress.com blog at this point in the registration process. Please note that assigning a custom domain name requires a paid WordPress.com account.

9. Select a domain name from the free and paid domain options provided, as shown in Figure 5-5.
10. Select your pricing level for your account, as shown in Figure 5-6.

Congratulations! You now have a WordPress.com blog! At this point, you have the option to take a number of additional steps, including creating a tagline and uploading an image for your site icon. You are not required to take these steps in order to begin blogging. However, you do need to select Launch Site, as shown in Figure 5-7, before your site can be viewed by the public.

Using the dashboard

Much like Blogger (refer to Chapter 4), your WordPress.com blog is customizable via your Dashboard, which is shown in Figure 5-7.

The vertical menu in the left sidebar provides you with access to the following features:

• View site: See your site the way it appears to the public.
• Stats: Learn more about the number of visitors to your blog.
• Site activity: Receive a log of all recent site activity.
• Plan level: View the current plan pricing level for your blog and make changes.
• Site pages: Create and edit pages on your blog.
• Blog posts: Create and edit posts on your blog.
• Media: Create and edit images on your blog.
• Comments: Moderate reader comments.
• Feedback: Provide WordPress.com with feedback.
• Plugins: Edit and install plug-ins to change the features on your site.
• Import: Import content from another site.
• Customize theme: Make changes to the appearance of your site.
• Earn: Earn money on your blog. This option is available for Premium accounts or higher only.
• Share: Share your blog content via linked social media accounts.
• People: Add additional administrators and writers to your site.
• Domains: Purchase or add a custom domain name to your blog.
• Settings: Change a variety of aspects of your blog (discussed in more detail in the next section).

Changing site settings

At the bottom of your left sidebar dashboard you will find a gear icon, which takes you to the Settings menu as shown in Figure 5-8. From this menu, you can change the following aspects of your WordPress.com site:

• General: This is where you can make changes to your site identity, from the title of your blog to your tagline.
• Performance: WordPress.com provides you with many opportunities to upgrade from a free plan to a paid plan. This area of your Settings menu is one place where you are provided with this option.
• Writing: This area allows you to customize how your content is displayed, including how many posts are visible at a time.
• Discussion: The Discussion section of the Settings menu offers many optional changes for your site ranging from commenting rules for readers (see Chapter 10) to email notification choices related to those comments.
• Traffic: In this section of your Settings menu, you can link a Google Analytics account to your blog. Learn more about Google Analytics in Chapter 19.

Selecting a new theme

After you have identified the Customize section of the left sidebar, begin by clicking on the Themes button.

One of the best aspects of a WordPress blog — hosted or self-hosted — is the ability to customize your blog’s appearance with themes designed specifically for the type of blog you’re creating. For example, there are themes that create the feel of an online magazine, others that focus on displaying your photography, and still others that resemble the original online journals from the early days of blogging. I suggest that you take some time to try out a variety of themes before making a final decision. And truth be told, no decision is final! You can always come back to this section of your Dashboard and change your theme entirely if you’ve grown tired of the current look of your blog.

Once inside the Themes page, notice the following:

• Your current theme is displayed at the top of the page. You can make changes within that theme by clicking on the Customize button next to it. You can also learn more about the theme by selecting Info.
• By filling in the search field “I’m creating a site for…”, you will be shown a variety of theme options that fit nicely with your blog type. You can also choose to see all related themes, free related themes, and premium (fee-based) related themes.
• Want more ways to narrow down your theme options? The theme page allows you to search by feature, layout, column number, subject, and style.
• The bottom of the page shows you themes from which you may select.

But wait! There’s more! Return to the Customize button on the left sidebar and click on it to open the WordPress.com Customizer. Even the name sounds exciting!

My best advice is to take some time to click around the Customizer for your selected theme as shown in Figure 5-14. Every theme will provide you with slightly different options, but some areas where you can make design changes include the following:

• Colors and backgrounds
• Fonts
• Header image
• Menus
• Homepage settings
• Theme options

Registering a domain

Have you already chosen a name for your blog? Have you purchased the related domain? When you're itching to get your blog online and want to control every aspect, the domain is the first thing that you need.

As explained in Chapter 3, a domain is the name and brand of your blog, and the web address (or URL). It gives visitors an idea of what your blog is about and who you are. You can have some fun getting creative with your blog name! Before committing to a blog name, why not see what others have done? The following list gives you five examples of some of the world's top 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 quite an impression despite the fact that, at first glance, they don't necessarily tell the visitor much about the content. If you find and bookmark a blog that you like, you keep going back for the great content, not the domain name. In Chapter 3, I talk about acquiring domains in detail, in case you need a refresher about how to do so.

Selecting web hosting

After you choose an appropriate domain for your blog, you need somewhere for your WordPress install to live. In Chapter 3, I tell you what to look for in web hosting and make some recommendations. Don't forget that you can also ask other bloggers what host they use and what their experience has been.

If you've read Chapter 3 of this book, you already know that web software such as WordPress has certain technical requirements. The requirements for WordPress are

• PHP version 7.3 or greater
• MySQL 5.6 or greater or MariaDB version 10.0 or greater
• HTTPS support
• Nginx or Apache with mod_rewrite module

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 has a handy bit of text that you can copy and send to potential web hosts to see whether their services can handle WordPress. How cool is that?

Although the web hosting field changes from time to time with new hosting companies popping up, the following are some of the industry’s top picks for providing everything that you need for WordPress:

• Bluehost (www.bluehost.com)
• DreamHost (www.dreamhost.com)
• HostGator (www.hostgator.com)
• Media Temple (http://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, but if you want to continue looking, compare notes with other bloggers and refer to Chapter 3 for good advice about choosing a web host.

Getting the software

After you sort out your web host and site domain, you next need to install WordPress files from WordPress.org onto your server. Most, if not all, web hosting companies make this process simple. The cPanel (control panel) of your hosting account should have an easy-to-find button, such as the Bluehost WordPress installation button shown in Figure 5-15.

You also have the option to download and extract the WordPress files from WordPress.org and put them on your computer. Choose a place you'll remember, such as a Documents or Download directory. Follow these steps:

1. Point your web browser to www.wordpress.org.

   The main WordPress page appears.

2. Click the blue Download WordPress 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.

   The files are saved on your computer, as shown in Figure 5-16.

WordPress.org provides the downloadable file in two compressed formats: GZip (.tar.gz) and ZIP (.zip) format. These days, most computer systems recognize the ZIP format, and you should be able to open it without installing any additional software. After you expand the .zip file, you can delete it from your computer.

Uploading the WordPress files

Do you have your files unzipped? Great! Now, the installation process gets a little more technical. You need to upload these unzipped files to your web hosting space by using an FTP (file transfer protocol) client. If you don't have an FTP client installed on your computer, you have plenty of free options that you can download and install. The following are my two favorite FTP clients:

• FileZilla (www.filezilla-project.org): Available for all computer platforms (see Figure 5-17)
• Cyberduck (www.cyberduck.io): Available for both Macs and Windows 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.

Setting up the database

You're doing great! But don't rest on your laurels; this next step is probably the most technical. Take a deep breath and prepare to set up a database for your WordPress blog. You can do it!

Arguably, setting up a database isn't actually terribly difficult. However, each web host handles databases in different ways, so I can't give you straightforward instructions for accomplishing this task.

Your web host is in the business of handling technical issues, and of course, it sets up the environment in the first place. Don't hesitate to request assistance with your database setup.

The database system that you need to use is called MySQL. (Without MySQL, you can't use WordPress.) MySQL is a relational database management system. It can store all kinds of data for WordPress — from your blog posts to sidebar widget links, as well as all your WordPress settings. So, MySQL stores the blog posts that you write inside a database that's fast, efficient, and flexible.

If you want to know more about MySQL, pick up a copy of PHP & MySQL For Dummies, 4th Edition, by Janet Valade (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.). But take my word for it that after you set up your database, you won't need to know anymore about MySQL for the purposes of using WordPress.

After you know how to access your database setup tool, follow these steps:

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 5-18) 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.

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 (see Figure 5-19).

   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.

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!

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.

If you are the only person blogging on your website, you should still go ahead and set up an Editor user account for creating blog posts. I recommend that you don't use the administrative account created during installation as the account you use when you author blog posts; it's a bit like driving a car by opening the hood and manipulating the engine directly. Instead, use the perfectly good steering wheel that comes with WordPress by setting up an Editor account. Reserve the administrative account for administrative tasks like installing new themes, plug-ins, and any other general maintenance.

Set up your Editor account by following these steps:

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!

Using the Dashboard

Each time you log into your WordPress blog, you end up on the Dashboard page. Get to know this page well because you spend most of your blogging time here. You can configure the front Dashboard to your liking by moving panels around and turning panels on or off. You can see the Dashboard in Figure 5-20.

On the left side of the Dashboard, a series of menus points you to the various sections of the administration panel. You likely visit some of these menus on a daily basis and some only once in a while:

• 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 website, 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.

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 pages on the blog
• 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 Events and News: Contains a listing of blog posts from other WordPress blogs that talk about WordPress.