Before we get started, however, let me just say that I am by no means an expert nor do I have all of the answers.  The information written here is based on my experience and my learning through trial and error.  What worked for me may not work for you, so please keep that in mind.

I have to admit that I love Wordpress (Wordpress.org, not Wordpress.com as they are different).  I’ve used other programs — Typepad, Blogger, Square Space, even Site Sell – and Wordpress is by far my favorite.  It has so many options and it’s incredibly user friendly.  And once you understand a few basics, you can do things on your own.  This is what the dashboard of your site will look like once it’s set up.

Downloading Wordpress

If you’re just starting your website, this is your first step.  After purchasing your domain name (the name of your site) and choosing your site’s host (where everything will be stored), then you’ll need to download Wordpress.  A quick word about choosing a host.  There are a lot out there with prices varying from free to $50 a month and more.  Just starting out, you could use something like what I went with which is Dreamhost.  For $6.95 a month, I hosted a couple of websites and it was all I needed.  I eventually switched to Liquid Web for $25.00 a month simply because they offer better service.  If there’s ever a problem with my site, I can call them at any time of the day and they look into it.  Doesn’t get much better than that.

Depending on who you your host is, downloading Wordpress will more than likely be an automated process.  I know with Dreamhost, for example, you just click a button and it downloads for you.  So easy.  If you have questions, you can ask your specific site host or look through their tutorials.

Choosing a Look

Once you have Wordpress downloaded, your blog will look like this:

Not bad, but kind of plain.  You can dress it up a bit by changing the colors, but if you really want to do something fancy, you’ll want to find what’s called a “theme.”  For this, do a Google search for Wordpress themes and you’ll get hundreds of hits showing themes under every possible topic and style.   There are themes with three columns like this one:

Or there are the traditional two-column themes such as this one: 

You may have seen plenty of sites featuring what’s called the “magazine theme” which looks like this:

or this:

This is the basic style from which my site was based.  It’s classifed is a magazine theme called Flash News.  Do you recognize it?  From Single to Married looks different after some tweaking and adjustments, but this is the bare bones theme and it can be found on Woo Themes.

If you’re looking for themes, some of the best sites to start looking are Smashing Magazine, Free Theme Layouts, and Daily Wp.  If you don’t mind paying for your themes, then you’ll definitely want to check out Woo Themes, Studio Press, and Elegant Themes.   Expect to pay anywhere from $50.00 to $100.00 for one of these themes. But keep in mind that you get what you pay for.  Typically these themes are well made and uploading and customization is fairly easy.  Also keep in mind that if you want to add something to the theme such as the items in the sidebar, you’ll want to choose a theme that is “widget-ready” (more on this in a second).

You Found Your Theme, Now What?

Now that you’ve found the theme you want to use (out of the thousands of themes available), it’s time to upload it.  There are tutorials online that walk you through this if you need more details, but I’ll give you the overview.  You’ll want to use a File Transfer Protocol (FTP) software.  I use Filezilla because I find it very easy to use.  It’s basically a way for you to transfer files from your computer to your server where your website is stored (remember, at this point you have your website that is stored with a hosting facility).  Download the software from the Filezilla site and open it up.

On the left hand you’ll see all the files of your computer and on the right side you’ll see all the files on your server.  Look for the folder that contains your website (you can ask the host if you are not sure what it’s called).  Inside that folder will be several other files.  You are looking for the one labled “wp-content.”  Inside that folder is a file called “themes.”  Open the folder.  As you can see on mine, I have a lot of themes uploaded.  Now all you have to do is drag your folder from the left side (your computer) to the right side (the server) and drop.  It’s as easy as that.

Now go to your Wordpress dashboard and look for “appearance” on the left-hand side.  Click on “themes.”   Here is where you’ll find the themes that you have uploaded.  All you have to do now is click on it and activate it.

Now comes the fun part.  The theme will look like it was custom designed, with the exception of a few things that may need a little tweaking (the Woo Themes need some behind-the-scenes work such as a graphic to be used as your title and some other work if you’re using pictures).  If your theme is widget-ready and you want to add things to the side bar(s), look and see what came with the theme.

Just click on “widgets” and you’ll see your list.  The great thing about widgets is that you can download all sorts of things to add to your site.  You can add Flickr photos or allow pictures of your last commenters such as on my Experiencing Motherhood site:

Have fun with it, there are a lot of options and things you can add to your sidebar.  Go to Wordpress.org and look at the available widgets, just make sure they’re compatible with your version of Wordpress before downloading them.  To put them on your site, you’ll use the FTP server again only this time you’ll look for the folder in “wp-content” called “plugins.”

The whole process is really pretty straightforward but it may take a little playing around before you get the hang of it (at least it did for me).   If all of this seems like too much work or you want some additional customization to your theme, you can contact a developer to help you out.  I work with Jeremy of Papertree Designs (who is fantastic, btw).  He is fair and honest and charges me for the work performed without taking advantage of my lack of HTML knowledge.  So now, when I create a new site and it still needs some adjustments made, he’ll do the work for me at a reasonable price.

Of course if you have the money to spend and want a custom-made site, that’s always an option too.  Just be aware that it will usually cost you usually anywhere from $600 to $5,000, depending on the site.  That’s why I like themes, you get a professional, clean site without all of the cost and you’re still able to customize it.  It’s a win-win in my book.

Do you use Wordpress?  Do you have any questions?

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YOU CAN DO IT:  Building a Website

The steps to putting together a website were written by Arin Fishkin who manages Web graphics and designs for a living.  She said that, “Anyone can have a Web site, and it can be “about” absolutely anything.”  How true that is!!  I’ve listed her steps and given some examples of what I did to get started.

Step one:  Decide what kind of site to build. 

I can personally attest to how important this step is.  I initially wanted to start a website to make money as I had heard about all of these people who were making a living off of their websites.  So I did some research to see what were the key topics and areas of interest.  The first topic I decided on was weight loss products, so I wanted to do a website that featured reviews of various products.  Here is what the site looked like (more on development in a minute).

Before going any further, I want to stress how important it is to choose a topic that you enjoy.  The weight loss product idea is a good one and someone can probably make it profitable with time and effort.  The problem is, after I got it up and running, I realized it was a lot more work than I had anticipated.  It was difficult to find time to do it and I ended up dropping the site.  

I can’t stress enough: choose a topic that interests you and that you think you can write about long term.  It will make the work rewarding and satisfying rather than feeling like an obligation.  

Step 2:  Plan Your Site.

What do you want your site to look like?   Will it be full of pictures or just text?  Will you have a blogroll which includes links to other sites? What will the home page for your viewers look like and what will the landing pages be?  (By landing pages, I mean the places you want people to visit after landing on the home page.) 

Here is my home page for this site.

And here is an example of one of my landing pages.  I have my landing pages listed as categories:

You’ll also want to decide what your 2nd tier pages will be, in other words, when someone is on your landing page, where will they go next?  My 2nd tier pages are my subcategories, which are shown below.  

Step 3: Choose Your Host

By this point, you should have your topic and you should know what you want your site to look like (and have hopefully written down a list of your various pages and tiers).  Now you need to set up your site.  First you have to decide where to host it.  If you’re like me when I got started, you have no idea what a host even is!  It’s actually pretty easy - all of the information that you put on a website has to be stored somewhere, or hosted.   Just like you save your pictures to your computer (hard drive), the posts and images and comments all have to have a home or a place where they’re stored.  There are several options to choose from, but I believe it depends on what kind of site you are going to have and what software you will use to design the look of your site. 

My very first site, the one I used for the Avon charity walk, was hosted through Square Space.  It was great because everything was kept on their servers and they had very easy-to-use software that allowed me to choose a pre-set look for my site.  It only took about a half hour to set it up and this was the end result:

For the From Single to Married (FSTM) site I went a little more complex.  The site was created using Wordpress.  Wordpress uses HTML coding which allows a web designer to create whatever design he/she wants.  Since I don’t know how to use HTML, I purchased a site template from Woo Themes (Wordpress offers several free ones as well) and had Jeremy from PaperTree Designs set it up for me.  He has made numerous tweaks and customization to get the look I want, which is the benefit of using HTML.  The site is self-hosted, meaning that I pay someone to host it for me.  There are hundreds of hosts to use – I chose Liquid Web.  For a monthly fee, all of my data is stored on a server with them and if there is a problem, I can just call them or email them and ask them to check on it for me. 

If you don’t want go the HTML coding route or self-hosting route, you can always use other services such as Blogger (which is free, I believe) or Typepad (which has a monthly fee).  Typepad is actually really nice too.  I used it to create this site:

and this site

by simply setting up an account and creating my page by using their software.  Then I contacted a web designer (DCR Design) who designed the headers for me and voila!  Easy as pie.

Step 4: Name that Website

I personally think that this should be step two, but for the sake of following the book, I’ll just leave it here as step four.  You need to name your site or give it a “domain.”  (For example, my domain name is www.fromsingletomarried.com.)  Ideally your domain name will include your business name, if that’s what your site is about, or it will have your topic, if you’re trying to use the site to make money.  The problem is that manyof the “good” names are gone so you may have to be clever.  But you don’t want to be so clever that it’s difficult for people to remember your site.  For my Organic For Baby site, I chose www.organic4baby.com.  It is simple, easy to remember, and tells what the site is about.   

To see if the name you want to use is available, go to  Go Daddy (or a similar site) and enter the site name.  If the domain name is available, you will be able to purchase it for around $10.00- $30.00 a year. 

Step 5: Build Your Site

Now it’s time to actually put your site together.  If you are using Typepad, Blogger, or another similar service, this process will be outlined for you so you just need to follow the steps provided.  If you’re self-hosting your site and using Wordpress or another development program, you will need to create the site or have someone do it for you. 

This part can be a lot of fun.  I’ve learned so much just by playing with the different sites and trying to add various features.  Of course I’ve messed my site up a couple of times too and had to get help to fix it, but in the end it’s worked out.  Just be sure that you save your work (back up your site) so that your information is not lost.

Step 6: Refine Your Site

Once everything is put together and you’re ready to start posting, send your site to some family members or friends.  Ask for their opinions or suggestions and be sure to see how your site looks on different computers.  If the flow of the site is not easy to follow or if the font shows up as unreadable, you’ll want to make the necessary changes before publishing your site.

After that, you can start posting to your heart’s content.  Keep in mind that It takes awhile to get your site for search engines (such as Google or Yahoo) to pick up your site, so be patient.  I find that it helps to reach out to authors of other blogs and to link to other sites as well. 

So that’s it!  Those are the YOU CAN DO IT steps to building a website with some of my personal suggestions and experience thrown in. 

Are you ready to build your site now?  What are you going to write about? 

Good luck and send me the link to your site… I’d love to see it!

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YOU CAN DO IT: Building a Website

YOU CAN DO IT:  Championing A Cause

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