How to Upload a WordPress Website
When you have a stunningly beautiful and professionally designed WordPress website, the logical next step is to try and get as many people as possible to visit it. However, in order to do this, you need to know exactly how to go about it. Below, we will teach you how to upload a WordPress website so that it can start racking up the views.
Find a Hosting Provider That Suits You
WordPress is a free blog and content management system inspired by CMS (Content Management System) like Drupal. One of the things that makes WordPress so versatile is the fact that it can run on a pretty much any hosting provider’s web server. This means that you don’t necessarily have to tie your website to a specific hosting service. As long as the host provides the basic functionality that WordPress needs to operate, everything from there on out is gravy.
This is why it’s crucial that you find a hosting service that suits you. You don’t want to end up with an unresponsive, over-priced web host that doesn’t meet your needs. The last thing you want is to have to take your site down for a couple of days until you can figure out where the problem lays. So, to avoid this, make sure to sign up with a hosting provider that offers a great service and support team that is available 24/7/365. In addition to this, make sure to check out their web servers’ speed and reliability before you commit. You should also do your research online to see how others have rated the company – both positively and negatively.
Install WordPress To Your Heart’s Content
Once you have found a suitable hosting provider for you, it’s time to move onto the next step. The first step is to install WordPress to your heart’s content. This entails copying all the files from the downloaded WordPress installation package to your hosting account. You can also configure WordPress to automatically update itself whenever there is a new version released.
While this may seem like a straightforward process, there are various things that you need to lookout for. For example, make sure that all the files are copied over successfully. If there are any missing files or folders, then it could be hard for you to get your site up and running. In this case, it’s better to download the WordPress files and install them manually. This is especially important if you are doing this for the first time as an amateur web developer or web designer. In this case, you need to be extra careful so that you don’t end up with any errors or mishaps during the process. This is why it’s advisable to install WordPress in a separate folder or drive so that you can keep all the files safely in case of any mishaps. Remember, safety first!
Create Your Analytics Account
Once you have installed WordPress successfully, it’s time to create your analytics account. This is an important account that you need to create in order to start tracking the traffic on your website. You can use Google Analytics to create this account. Just navigate to your Google account, click on + and then click on Analytics.
Once you have signed up for Google Analytics, it’s time to confirm your email address. You will then be able to log in to your Google Analytics dashboard and start tracking your website’s traffic.
Install Third-Party WordPress Plugins
Now that you have a Google Analytics account set up, it’s time to install some WordPress plugins. These are essential for most WordPress websites that want to be successful. Without them, your website may work perfectly, but without any visitors, it will still be somewhat of an empty shell. So, make sure to install at least the following plugins:
- Akismet – spam filtering
- All In One SEO Pack – SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
- AkaoChat – online forum
- Bidvertiser – monetization
- CMB 2 – customer relationship management
- Crowd – profile & contact management
- Ecotalk – customer feedback
- Fresh Posts – daily newsletter
- Genesis – magazine-style content
- Harvest – member management
- Hello Bar – responsive live chat widget
- Intercom – customer support
- Livestream – video archiving & live video
- Life into Words – theme customizer
- Member Login – user authentication
- Minify – compressed HTML
- Pingbacks – trackbacks
- Premier Event Calendar – event management
- Redactor – web content management
- Scribe – story podcasting
- Shopify – online shops
- Sociable – community building
- Unlimited Revisions – unlimited revisions
- WP Bakery – wordpress bread
- XML Sitemap – XML sitemap
- Youtube Video – video embeds
- Yoast SEO – SEO
- Zoomer – image cropping
After you have installed all of these plugins, it’s time to test your site’s speed. To do this, login to your Google Analytics account and then click on Behaviour. From here, you can find a Speed Test tool at the bottom of the page. Simply click on this tool and then click on Run now.
The speed test tool will then analyze the accessibility of your WordPress website and report back to you with the results. If you would like, you can also choose to display more detailed information in the form of a graph or table. When the speed test is finished, you will get a PDF containing all the information about the test.
Configure Your Website To Work In Any Browser
Now that you have all the necessary plugins installed, it’s time to make your WordPress website work in any browser. The great thing about WordPress is that it was designed to work in any browser. This means that, even if you are viewing this information on your mobile device, you will still be able to access all the content easily and comfortably. This is thanks to the miracle of CSS (Cascading Style Sheets). Simply put, this is a set of rules that enable you to dictate how your website looks across different devices (phones, tablets, laptops, etc.).
To make your WordPress website work in any browser, all you need is CSS. One of the best ways to learn about CSS is to visit W3Schools.com and enter your preferred browser into the search bar. Once the results come back, click on the CSS Tutorials link to access the tutorials. To use these tutorials to actually start creating your website, you will need to have a WordPress account. If you don’t have one yet, it’s time to create one. Once you have a WordPress account, log in and click on the gear icon on the top right. Here, you will see a variety of settings and options. From here, you can set your blog to private or public, or choose to make it password protected. Once you have set these options, click on the gear icon again to save your changes.
From here, you can browse through your WordPress dashboard’s Appearance section to see all the different themes and Plugins installed on your site. You can either activate or deactivate these plugins individually or click on the Settings icon to go to the Settings page for that particular plugin. Here, you can change the settings for that plugin, such as the site’s name, email, and privacy settings.
Organize Your Content By Creating Navigation Menus
It’s time to make your content easy to find. This is where the magic of WordPress truly comes into its own. In order to do this, you need to create navigation menus for your website’s primary categories and sub-categories.
To create these menus, click on Tools from your WordPress dashboard’s menu and then click on Menus. This will bring you to a new page where you can create and organize your menus. Click on the + icon on the top left to add a new menu.
On this page, you will see a short-code called Nav Menu. Simply copy and paste this short-code into your webpage’s header area (often located just above the <h1> tag).