Creating a Website with WordPress.org

Crea%ng a Website with WordPress.org

Eileen Lonergan h7p://www.eileenlonergan.com

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•  WordPress is an open source website building tool.

•  Open Source means that the basic soAware is free and code is shared among developers.

•  It began in 2003 and as of 2013 more than 60 million websites/blogs have been built using WordPress.

EileenLonergan.com 2


•  We are working with WordPress.org to discuss building a website or blog.

•  The term website / blog is oAen used interchangeably. WordPress is the soAware which gives you the ability to have sta%c pages and blog posts. –  You can have a website with only pages, only posts or a combina%on

of both. •  Visit h7p://www.eileenlonergan.com/wordpress-‐org-‐vs-‐

wordpress-‐com for an overview of the difference between the two.


•  A Page is sta%c content on a website. This is considered your “evergreen” content, %meless pieces of informa%on that you want your visitors (clients) to be able to access easily. –  About You, Your Services, Loca%on, and Contact Informa%on are a few examples of typical website pages.

•  The format can be wri7en, images, video or audio.


•  A blog can be thought of as an online magazine or newspaper.

•  Blogs can have many authors who contribute or be the work of just one blogger.

•  Readers can add their comments to ar%cles, which encourages feedback to the blogging process.


•  A single entry on your blog. •  The format can be:

–  Wri7en –  Video –  Audio –  Images –  Or a combina%on of all of the above

•  Entries are organized sequen%ally by date, the latest appearing at the top of the page.

•  You can also organize your blog entries into categories. For example if you have a cooking blog your categories could be: baking, sautéing, crock pot meals, grilling, desserts, etc.


•  You will need hos%ng. Think of hos%ng as paying your rent to be on the Internet. This allows you to choose your domain name, which is also referred to as a url. (ie: www.eileenlonergan.com or www.BestBakery.com, etc.)

•  I recommend BlueHost because it is designed around open source plaborms (WordPress). They have 24/7 phone support

with customer service based in the US and they have automa%c backups of your website.

•  Hos%ng is not created equal. •  Cheaper is not always be7er. •  Look for a provider that will support WordPress. •  Look for a provider that has one click installa%on. •  Look for a provider that offers phone support.

•  Part of the registra%on process will be selec%ng your domain name. –  What is a domain name?

•  Your address on the web. •  Consider using:

–  Your name (EileenLonergan.com) –  Your business name (Amazon.com) –  A combina%on of your business name and geographical loca%on (InsuranceinTulsa.com) –  Be crea%ve! (Bit.ly – a popular url shortening tool)

•  Once you are registered you need to install WordPress onto your domain. Your hos%ng provider (BlueHost, GoDaddy, etc.)

will most likely have tutorials for you on how to execute this.



Refer to h7p://codex.wordpress.org/Dashboard_Screen for details of your Dashboard.


Eileen Lonergan h7p://www.eileenlonergan.com EileenLonergan.com 11


•  The theme is the appearance of your website. •  There are literally thousands of op%ons. •  Free:

–  WordPress will have a few themes installed by default that are fine to use. –  In general free themes are not well supported or documented.

•  Paid: –  Most paid themes will cost between $30-‐$100, are well supported, come with documenta%on

which includes tutorials and have customer service (help desk). –  Themes I use and recommend:

•  The SmallBiz Theme – great for a local business. •  Genesis by Studio Press – great for bloggers. •  Divi – good for e-‐commerce, porbolios, or photographers.

–  You can switch themes and your content is saved within WordPress.

•  Pro Tips: –  If you have modified any of the code (how your site works) or the CSS (design) then you will

lose this informa%on if you change themes. –  Informa%on in your widget areas may be lost when you change themes.


Divi Theme SmallBiz

Genesis


•  Plugins add func%onality to your Website / Blog. •  Consider Plugins as Apps for your website.

–  Popular Plugins include: •  Search Engine Op%miza%on (organic

search ranking – ie showing up in a Google search)

•  Forms (contact or request a quote) •  Music Players – MP3 players •  Slideshows •  Sharing – allows people to Tweet or

Like your blog posts –  I suggest that you research plugins before

adding them to your website. •  Look for the number of %mes the

plugin has been downloaded. •  Look for the number of ra%ngs. •  Look to see if the plugin has support.

•  A widget adds content and features to the sidebars of your pages / blog. •  There are default widgets that will automa%cally installed with WordPress. •  Many themes also have widgets that will automa%cally be installed when you upload their theme.

–  Commonly used default widgets: –  Recent Blog Posts –  Text Editor –  Custom Menus

•  Some%mes plugins that you install are found in the widget sec%on. •  There are some themes (Genesis & SmallBiz Responsive), which use widgets for their homepage content. •  There are some themes which allow you to add as many custom sidebars as you would like, so each page on your site could have a different sidebar. •  Widgets are organized by individual boxes and configured by dragging and dropping in the order you wish them to appear.




1.  Give the post a %tle. 2.  The next large box is where you add the text. 3.  The sec%on above the text box has op%ons

for styling. The op%ons are very similar to a Word document.

4.  If you click the li7le camera icon that says Add Media you can add an image into your page or post.

Eileen Lonergan h7p://www.eileenlonergan.com



The right hand side of the page is where you can save your post or page as a draA, preview what you have done or publish.


1.   Bold 2.  Italic 3.  Strike-‐through 4.  Unordered list (bullet points): 5.  Ordered list 6.  Blockquote (a way of displaying quoted text; each theme will style this differently.)

Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much. 7.  Align LeA 8.  Align Center 9.  Align Right 10.  Insert/edit link 11.  Unlink 12.  Insert More tag 13.  Proofread/Spell Check 14.  Toggle Distrac%on Free Wri%ng (this removes the visual editor and you will only see your text on

the page.) 15.  Show/Hide Kitchen sink (enables the second row of edi%ng icons)


1.  Style – various formarng styles defined by your theme

2.  Underline 3.  Align full 4.  Select text color – change the text color 5.  Paste as Plain Text 6.  Paste from Word 7.  Remove formarng 8.  Insert custom character 9.  Outdent – move text further leA 10.  Indent – move text further right 11.  Undo – undo your last ac%on 12.  Redo – redo your last ac%on 13.  Help – display some informa%on about using

the editor, as well as keyboard shortcuts.


•  Visit my blog: h7p://www.eileenlonergan.com/ar%cles •  I have set up a page:

h7p://www.eileenlonergan.com/etl-‐blog-‐class I will have informa%on from class and you can post your ques%ons or %ps to share with the group.

•  WordPress.com support h7p://en.support.wordpress.com/ •  YouTube •  WordPress TV: h7p://wordpress.tv/ •  h7p://www.expand2web.com/blog/ •  h7p://learn.wordpress.com/ •  I posted to my blog, now what?

Gerng People to Read Your Blog


Technology

Creating a Website with WordPress.org