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WordPress tutorial for beginners

WordPress tutorial for beginners the simple guide. Are you trying to create your first website? Let me show you the smart, cheap and easy way to do it – step by step. 

Time: Around 2-3 hours and you will have your own website.
Price: Around $6 a month for Hosting and Domain name.
No coding skills needed, everything is Drag-and-Drop.
wordpress tutorial for beginners

Step by step guide for your first WordPress website.

  1. Domain name
  2. Hosting provider
  3. DNS
  4. SSL
  5. Theme
  6. Pagebuilder
  7. But now what to do ?

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1. Domain name

WordPress tutorial for beginners - domain name for website

WordPress tutorial for beginners - Domain name

First, we need a Domain name “www.domainname.com” so find something short, descriptive and easy to spell. always go for a “.com” domain it just ranks better on google.

Go to Godaddy.com and find your domain name. I use Godaddy for my domains, it’s fast and easy and one of the biggest providers in the world. Having your domain one place and your hosting another is just ‘best practice’.

1. Find a domain name.

2. Continue to Cart.

3. No thanks to extra security.

4. Unclick “Start your website for FREE”.

5. No Thanks to “Linux Web  Hosting”.

6. The Email option is up to you if you want to look professional then I would recommend that you say yes and choose “Email Essentials”. 

7. Create an account and remember to check “1 year” and uncheck other offers under that, Godaddy is really aggressive in their selling methods, so they will often offer you an UK domain or extra domain privacy, just uncheck those and you will end at around ~$12 for the first year. 

8. Remember to save your username and password, you will need it later in the tutorial. If they offer you a Promo Code then use it.

2. Hosting provider

We got our domain name and now we have to get a Hosting provider (the place where you have your website) It’s the company that runs the site, so it’s important that you get a reliable and fast provider. The best place to start is SiteGround.com, They are fast and they make it really simple to set up your hosting. 

They provide you with a free SSL certificate(a very important security certificate) It will change http://www.domainname.com to https://www.domainname.com and google like those pages better.

WordPress tutorial for beginners - Hosting

WordPress tutorial for beginners - Hosting provider

Now choose “WordPress Hosting” This will automatically install WordPress and optimize your site.

Here you can pick a plan that fits your need, to start off with you can just choose the “StartUp” plan that supports 1 website. If you already know now that you want to create more than 1 site then the “GrowBig” plan is the choice. You can always upgrade later if you need to and it’s really simple.

Choose “I already have a domain” and write in your domain name.

Now it’s time for all your private info and password etc. Pick a 12 month period and use the next year to see if this is what you want.

Pick a “Data Center” that is close to your customers/audience if you have some. 

You don’t need to buy extra security when you sign up but it’s of course your  choice.

Remember to write down your username and password(you will need your password further down). Password should have numbers, signs and small and big letters to make it as safe as possible, like this “22vikinGs!”).

dns info

You will now receive an email with your username. In the mail, you will get two lines of text that will need in a moment (DNS settings).

1. Now in your mail push the button “GO TO USER AREA”.

2. Sign in with your username and password.

3. Choose “I already have a domain” and enter your domain name. (domainname.com)

4. You don’t need extra security.

5. Now press complete setup.

6. Pres “Proceed to Customer Area”.

 

Now proceed to “3. DNS”

3. DNS

WordPress tutorial for beginners - DNS

WordPress tutorial for beginners - DNS

Go to Godaddy.com and sign in.

dns settings

Find your domain name, press the three little dots and choose Manage DNS.

Scroll down till you see “Nameservers” Click “Change” and choose “Custom”.

Here you have to enter the DNS names that you got in the email from SiteGround.

Only copy the blue text and paste one in each box.

Then press save.

Now this will take a few moments before it gets updated. You can take a little break and get some coffee. (It can take up to a few hours, normally 1).

 

You can check once in a while by writing your domain into your browser and searching for it “www.domainname.com”. If it works it will show you something like the picture above.

4. SSL

WordPress tutorial for beginners - SSL

WordPress tutorial for beginners - Theme

Go to your SiteGround.com account and choose “My Accounts” 

Press the big red button that says “Go to cPanel” and after that the “Proceed button”. 

WordPress tutorial for beginners - let's encrypt

Now scroll down and find the section called “SECURITY” and choose “Let’s Encrypt”. 

Now Click “Install” and “OK” after that and you’re done. 

It will take a little time before you’re certificate gets validated but normally only ~10 minutes.

You can continue with the next step.

Now to login to the website you find your email from SiteGround with your login information, you go to your browser and write your domain name and then “/wp-admin” like this “www.domainname.com/wp-admin” That’s how you always login to the website and wordpress.

This is your login page and a page you will be using often. Sign in and let’s continue with our theme.

5. Theme

WordPress tutorial for beginners - Theme

Soo you have finally arrived to your wordpress site.

This is where all the magic happens but to make things A LOT easier for you I’m gonna fix the “Theme” and get you started with a DRAG-n-Drop pagebuilder.

First go to “settings” and then “general” look at the picture above and add a site title, this normally is the name of your site “domain name” and the tagline is some text describing your site.

Now change the two domain names (put an “S”) in front of the HTTP. and go done and click “Save Changes”.

You will need to login again after that and your site should now be running a secure connection SSL (HTTPS instead of HTTP).

theme plugin

Time to install the WordPress Astra Theme(it makes you site look good on all devices). This is the best Free Theme you can use. Go to “Appearance” and then “Theme”. 

Click “Add New” and search for “ASTRA” 

WordPress tutorial for beginners - theme

Click “Install” and then “Activate” you can delete all the other Themes in there if you want to (to safe space) but you don’t have to.
The WordPress Astra Theme is now installed and you can move on to the next step.  

6. Pagebuilder

WordPress tutorial for beginners - Elementor pagebuilder

WordPress tutorial for beginners - Pagebuilder

Now it’s time to install the Elementor pagebuilder. Go to “Plugins” in your sidebar and search for “Elementor” and click “Install Now” and then “Activate”(You can get a Elementor Pro version  but the Free one is enough for almost everything). This is your new best friend, Elementor is a drag-and-drop plugin and very easy to use. 

After a couple of weeks using Elementor, you will be able to build websites like you never thought possible.

First i will show you the fast way, by using a premade site from the Astra Theme and after that i will show you how to do it yourself in Elementor.

WordPress Astra Theme

Watch the video to get a detailed tutorial, explaining how to use the WordPress Astra theme and all the features. You can also move on and watch the next two slides and play around with it later.

Now let’s install our starter site plugin. Go to “Appearance” in your side tap and choose “Astra Options” from there choose “Install Importer Plugin”. Then choose “Elementor” and click next.

This is Probably the fastest way to get a site up and running, click “Free” and find a site that you like.

Click preview to see the site that you like and in the left side you can import it, after that your website will look like the website you imported. Now you can change all the info to your info and change the pictures to something else.

Elementor for WordPress

This Elementor tutorial video will show you in detail, how to use Elementor for WordPress and build your own custom website.

The Elementor page builder is the fastest and smartest way, to create a custom website on WordPress. If you use it for a couple of weeks you will be able to build beautiful websites for people and actually earn money from it.

7. But now what to do ?

But now what to do? Well that’s up to you, only your own creativity will set boundaries for you.

This was just the start now you have to get creative and make something with all the info you just learned. The World of online content spans far and wide and the sky is actually not the limit here 😉

I hope this wordpress tutorial for beginners was of help to you and i wish you luck in the future. Kind Regards Glenn

The End