How to Host WordPress on 1&1 with Confusion

Many WordPress hosting providers, like 1&1, offer a great value in terms of price and features for customers who want to run a blog. In this guide, we will teach you everything you need to know about setting up and running a WordPress blog on 1&1.

Step 1: Register for a 1&1 account

One of the first things you need to do is register for a 1&1 account. You can use our 1&1 comparison tool to find the best plan for your needs. As a rule of thumb, it’s not a bad idea to select the cheapest plan, as long as you don’t mind having a bare-bones website. The plans start at just $2.95 per month, with the Standard plan offering excellent features and a free domain name. You can also get a free domain with some paid plans.

Once you’ve signed up, you should get a confirmation email from 1&1. Open a new tab and copy the web address from the email, you’ll need this in the next step.

Step 2: Login to your 1&1 account

The next step is to log in to your 1&1 account. You can use the password you set during registration or the login info from your social media account (if you use the same account on both platforms).

After you’ve logged in, you should navigate to the **Planning** page. Here, you can find all the resources you need to build your website, from hosting to taking care of emails to picking a domain name and more.

To build a successful blog, you’ll need to have a good understanding of **SEO** (search engine optimization). For that reason, we highly recommend you invest in 1&1’s **SEOTools**. These tools will help you analyze your site’s SEO performance and take the right steps to make it happen.

Step 3: Choose the right domain name

The very first thing you need to do is pick a suitable name for your blog. Bear in mind that this is how people will **find** your blog. The best practice is to use a keyword in your domain name. In our case, we’ll use blogger as our domain name.

Nowadays, it’s also important to have a visually appealing name. Nobody wants to read a boring blog post! For a blog that deals with web design and development, we chose bloggerDEV as our domain name.

If you’re running a travel blog, you might want to consider tripadvisor or travelblogger as your domain name. Just remember that these are some of the most popular domain names, so you’ll need to come up with a **catchy** name for your blog. Just type in your preferred domain name into our search bar to get started.

Step 4: Choose hosting that’s right for you

After you’ve picked a domain name, the next step is to pick a hosting provider. There are many options to choose from, so it’s important to do some research before making a decision.

When it comes to hosting, there are two types of businesses: those who offer **shared hosting** and those who offer **VPS (virtual private servers)**. Both have their perks. Let’s take a quick look at each type of hosting in detail.

Shared hosting

Shared hosting is the cheapest and simplest way to get started. With this type of hosting, all the accounts on the server are put together and shared between all the websites that are hosted on the server. This type of hosting is perfect for individuals or small businesses who want to start a blog but don’t have the funds to invest in a VPS.

The downside to this type of hosting is that if you have more than one website on the same server, your performance will be slowed down because all the sites compete for resources. This type of hosting is best used for blogs or small businesses who don’t do a ton of online marketing.

VPS hosting

A VPS hosting is, as the name suggests, a VPS (Virtual Private Server) powered by a reliable company, which gives the customer full control over the server and its resources. This type of hosting is great for individuals, creative businesses and big corporations who want to run a website but need the security of having their own dedicated server. A VPS gives you the flexibility to scale up or down as needed by installing additional servers or swapping out existing ones.

The downside to this type of hosting is that it’s not as cheap as shared hosting. Also, if you need to swap out hosting providers, it can be a major pain to transfer all your sites from one host to another.

Step 5: Install WordPress

Once you’ve chosen a domain name and a hosting provider, the next step is to install WordPress. On 1&1, the process is simple and quick. All you need to do is click on the **Get Started** button. 1&1 will then walk you through the installation process. The first thing you’ll need to do is enter a name for your blog (this will be your WordPress username). Then, you’ll be presented with a shortcode box, where you can paste in the code for the domain name you chose in the previous step.

After you’ve pasted in the shortcode for the domain name, 1&1 will walk you through the rest of the installation. Once you’ve finished installing WordPress, you’ll be taken to your **Dashboard**. From here, you can manage all the settings for your blog. You can use the search bar to find any topic relating to blogging or website building and then use the sidebar to navigate to other relevant pages (like this one).

One of the best parts of 1&1 is that, as a customer, you get access to a wide array of free features. These features are only available to WordPress customers and are designed to make setting up and running a blog as easy and hassle-free as possible. Some of these features are

• free backups
• free domain privacy
• free security scans
• free dedicated IP addresses
• free site transfers
• free domain redirects
• free social media integration
• free analytics (like Google Analytics)
• free SEO tools (like Yoast)
• free template builders
• free forum software (like X-Chat)
• free webmaster tools (like GoDaddy’s Email Center)
• free cloud storage for domain and content (like Google Drive)
• free templates for website builders (like Hexo)

Step 6: Create your first post

Once you’ve set up your WordPress blog, the next step is to create your first post. To do this, you’ll click on **Posts** in the navigation menu. You’ll then be presented with a list of all the posts you’ve already created. To create a new post, just click on the **New Post** button and start typing.

It’s important to add that WordPress’ UI (user interface) is not the most user-friendly. Especially, when you’re just getting started, it can be a bit daunting to know where to click and what to do. For that reason, we recommend you use a tool like Hootsuite or Tailwind to manage and schedule your social media posts. Hootsuite is the #1 social media management tool used by over 10 million people worldwide. Tailwind lets you connect all your social media accounts and then schedules tweets for you based on your preferences.

To wrap things up, let’s take a look at the key differences between Blogger, SquareSpace, and WordPress.

Features

Here’s a short comparison of the three most popular blog platforms.

• Blogger
• SquareSpace
• WordPress

The first thing you’ll notice is that Blogger and SquareSpace are both free. WordPress, on the other hand, starts at $5 per month plus taxes (if you’re in the US). However, the cost of WordPress includes everything you need to run a successful blog (like domain privacy, backups, etc.).