Step 4: Make a New WordPress Site and Pick a Theme
So you have gone this far and have picked a name you like, or at the very least you can work with. You have setup the legal structure of your business and all of the other business setup parameters. So now you are ready to build your online business which begins with the setting up of a website and choosing the basic look of it.
But first things first, you need to setup on more thing, a web hosting account. Now I highly recommend you stay away from web hosting accounts that make you setup your site for you on their own web hosting account. You should use a site that gives you your own control panel, server, or virtual server. This allows you better access to your account and the freedom to build and design things without restrictions.
Make a New WordPress Site and Pick a Theme is our topic. We suggest you setup using a hosting company like Blue Host, we have used them for going on 12 years now and they have been nothing but bullet proof when it comes to our sites.
We have a great guide on how to setup a new Blue Host account.
You can setup your new hosting account and get your first domain for free all for as low as $6.95 per month. Then once your account is setup you can download WordPress and get your website setup in less than 15 minutes. For more information see our video on this process.
So now that your WordPress is setup and you have tested it and logged in you can now get your first theme and choose the look and feel of your website. Take some time and look through all of the free themes that WordPress has to offer, make sure you choose one that has a high rating and is supported well.
Learn how to pick the perfect theme for your WordPress installation.
Now that you have your theme setup and it is installed you may want to install a child theme so that when the main theme is updated (and WordPress us updated often and a good theme developer will update their theme as well) your site will not lose all the changes you have made.
To learn how to setup a child theme so you don’t lose your changes you should read this article.
Now you have the WordPress installation setup, you have picked a theme and setup your child theme. All is good right? Well not actually no, you need to make sure you have a few more things setup. WordPress uses what they call plugins which allow you to enhance your website with easy to place code or widgets withing your site.
We recommend you use these plugins on your WordPress site to greatly enhance your website user experience.
As a final step you can setup a coming soon page with a creative countdown clock or a date when you will launch. You will want to make sure you have an email signup for your newsletter and a nice image or video. And that is about it. Once you have this setup you can now focus on getting on with our next major step which is designing the website into a full functioning website that your users will love.
But before we go into that there is one final thing you should do to make sure you are ready to begin your design work. And that is to setup all the necessary support accounts you will need like social media, technical support programs, and assisted site selling accounts.
Read this article on what accounts you need to setup for your new WordPress site.
So now that all the basics are setup you are now ready to move on to designing your site, setting up the navigation, and writing the first bit of content for your site. This is what we will discuss in our next major section…
