How to Host Your WordPress Site with Weebly
You can use a tool like Weebly to easily create and manage a professional-looking website for free. In this article, you’ll discover how to host your site with Weebly so you can begin building your online presence.
Create A Free Weebly Account
To get started, simply visit weebly.com and click the “Get Started” button at the top of the page. Next, you’ll be taken to the “Dashboard,” where you can access your free website space.
On the left side of the dashboard, you’ll see a list of the sites you’ve created or for which you’ve been given access. Choose your own unique URL (Uniform Resource Locator) for your site by clicking the “Create A New Site” button. You’ll then be taken to the “Home” page of your new site. Finally, click the “Get Started” button to continue to the “Weebly Blogger” dashboard.
Set Up Your Blog
Once you’re on the “Weebly Blogger” dashboard, click the “Add a New Blog” button at the top of the page. You’ll then be taken to the “Create A New Blog” page where you can give your blog a name and select a theme for it.
For the purposes of this tutorial, we’ll create a new blog called “How to Host Your WordPress Site with Weebly.” If you head to your blog’s dashboard, you’ll see that you can click the “Settings” button to access the control panel for your site.
In the “Settings” control panel, you can configure different aspects of your blog – from the theme you’ll use to the settings for your ads. For the purposes of this tutorial, let’s leave the theme settings as they are and click the “Save Changes” button to continue to the next step.
Install WordPress To Your Blog
WordPress is a powerful content management system (CMS) that can be used to build completely customized websites and blogs. If you’ve never used WordPress before, it might be a good idea to try out some of the free online versions (like WordPress.com) to get a feel for it. You can install WordPress to your blog by following the onscreen instructions. Once you’ve installed WordPress to your site, you can access its control panel by clicking the “Tools” button on your toolbar (near the top of your browser window). From there, you can configure different aspects of your site – such as the look and feel of your blog, whether you want to display posts from the blog above the fold on your page, and how you want your blog’s posts to be presented.
In this case, let’s assume that you want to create a minimalist blog with an uncomplicated design and no flashy ads. To make this happen, you’ll need to go to your WordPress dashboard, navigate to the “Appearance” section, and choose the “Minimal” theme.
Once you’ve made this selection, simply click the “Update Theme” button to activate the new design. You’ll now be able to go back to your site’s dashboard and click the “Tools” button to access the WordPress control panel. From there, you can change the color scheme and style of your site by selecting different colors for the background, text, and links.
Secure Your WordPress Site
There are several ways you can make your WordPress site more secure. One way is to install a WordPress security plugin. You can also add a login requirement to your WordPress dashboard so users must enter their username and password to access certain areas of your site. You can use something like LastPass to create a unique, password-protected login for each site you have. If you’ve got enough space, you could even set up a WordPress powered email account so anyone who wants to get in touch with you can do so via email.
When you’re creating a new blog, you’ll likely want to come up with a unique blog name that’s both SEO- (search engine optimization-) friendly and easy to remember. To find a perfect blogging name, you can use a tool like Google Suggest to enter your keyword (the topic you’ll be blogging about) and get a list of suggested blog names to choose from.
If you find that the name you chose is already taken, you can use Word Searches (within Google Suggest) to find alternative names for your blog.
Use Weebly To Host Your WordPress Site
Wondering how to host your WordPress site? Simply use a tool like Weebly to create a beautiful and fully customizable website for free. In this case, we’ve used the above steps to create a WordPress blog called “How to Host Your WordPress Site with Weebly.” Next, you’ll need to copy and paste the WordPress blog’s URL (Uniform Resource Locator) into the Weebly field on your “Settings” page. This is also where you’ll paste the URL of your chosen theme (in this case, the TwentyFourteen theme) so it can be accessed by your readers. Finally, click the “Save Changes” button to continue to the next step.
Once your Weebly blog is live, head to its “Settings” page and click the “Continue To Blog” button to bring you to the dashboard for your new blog. From here, you can click the “Add New Blog” button to add more blogs to your Weebly account.
Customize Your Blog’s Layout
Weebly’s blog editor is easy to use and enables you to completely customize the look and feel of your blog. If you’re not familiar, a blog’s layout determines how posts will be displayed on your site – such as whether you want to display posts in a grid or a list, the font size, and what color the text should be.
To change the layout of your blog, simply go to its “Settings” page and choose one of the existing layouts (like the TwentyFourteen theme we used above). You can upload a new header and footer to the “Settings” page, as well as choose the amount of space you want between blog posts (known as the “Reading Inspiration” button under “Design”) so your content doesn’t feel too cramped.
Add Multiple Social Media Accounts
If you’ve got a Twitter account, you can add it to your blog by simply clicking the “+” sign located next to the “Settings” button on your blog’s dashboard. You’ll then see a screen with a list of your available Twitter accounts. To add a Twitter account to your blog, simply click the “Add” button next to the account you want to add.
If you’re a Facebook fan, you can also add it to your blog by clicking the “+” sign on your blog’s dashboard. You’ll then see a screen with a list of your available Facebook accounts. To add a Facebook account to your blog, simply click the “Add” button next to the account you want to add.
Add Extra Pages
On the other hand, if you’ve got a group of pages (like a FAQ [Frequently Asked Questions] page, a product review page, or an About Us page) that you’d like to make available on your site, you can do so by clicking the “Pages” link at the top of your WordPress dashboard. From there, you can select the three categories (FAQ, Product Review, and About Us) you’d like to include and click the “Create” button.
You can then configure the content of these pages by going to each one’s dashboard. To create a new page, simply click the “Add a new page” button at the top of the page. To make changes to an existing page, select the “Edit” button next to the page you’d like to modify.
Manage Your Blog’s Comments
Every blog has comments – even those that are completely static and never update. To manage your blog’s comments, go to its “Settings” page and click the “Comments” button. From there, you can moderate (delete or edit) comments, as well as publish new ones.