Technical Stuff for Online Marketers

This is an edited version of a post I wrote last year.  After installing umpteen WordPress blogs I have a much better idea of what works and what doesn’t! I have also decided to strip out the sections on Plugins and Themes, and post them separately. Keep in mind that revisions come out all the time, so your versions may differ from mine.

Let’s go ahead and set up your first WordPress blog. If you don’t have a good FTP client already, now is the time to get one. I use FileZilla (it’s free). Oh, and one more thing. I honestly hope you are not dealing with those user names and passwords manually. This will eventually become a veritable nightmare if you don’t take control of the situation now, so download Roboform or something similar. Roboform will store up to 10 login combinations in its free version.  Please remember to distinguish between (a) the login details (user name, password) for your hosting account control panel, and (b) the login details for your Wordpress installation.  They are totally different things!

(1) Domain Name

That’s the ‘www.joebloggs.com’ thing. By the way, you don’t need the ‘www’ part. I am going to assume that you do not already have a domain name. Get one straight away, as you will need to get going on your hosting account. There are different views on this subject, but I prefer to separate my domain name registrar from my hosting company.

Most of my domain names are registered with GoDaddy, but there are many many others. So go to your preferred registrar, check the availability of your favorite domain name, and purchase it.  You will be inundated with add-on offers; you can happily skip them all.  Do this first, as it may take time for your new domain name to propagate through the system.  In theory it could take up to 48 hours, although it sometimes takes no more than a minute or two.

Bill McRea is a reseller for GoDaddy. If you go to mcreadomains.com you will get your dot-com domain name for around $3 less, simply because he does not take his share of the profit. By the way I am not gaining financially through this, I am simply mentioning this alternative because it’s cheaper!

(2) Hosting Account

I cannot tell you which hosting service to use, but if you want to perform your ‘due diligence’ you need to  go to WordPress.org and check the WordPress minimum requirements.  Also check that your prospective hosting company offers a cPanel management interface.

I chose HostGator. They are technically top-notch, have a good reputation, and a 24/7 help desk.  Go to HostGator.com and click on ‘view web hosting plans’.  There are different types of account ranging from around $4.95 to $12.95.  This is a personal decision;  I chose the more expensive one as it has some desirable attributes that the other others don’t have, such as a fixed IP address.  But if you are on a budget, the cheapest one will also do.  If HostGator asks you for a coupon code,  enter ‘WordPress’.  That will give you a few dollars discount on the first month.  When you sign up, click the radio button that says you already have a domain name.

(3) Nameservers

HostGator will email you the details of your new hosting account.  These include the domain names of two nameservers,  e.g. ‘ns1593.hostgator.com’ and ‘ns1594.hostgator.com’.  Go back to GoDaddy.com, or whoever administers your domain name.  Log into your account, find your domain name, and edit the nameservers to the two shown in your HostGator email.  The procedure will differ from registrar to registrar, so you will need to ‘feel’ your way through this.  With some registrars you need to unlock your domain name to make changes, and lock it again afterwards (just click on the appropriate buttons).
The confirmation email from your hosting company will tell you how to access your account in the interim period before your nameserver details have propagated through the system.

(4) WordPress installation

Go back to your HostGator welcome message and find the link to your cPanel. You might have to use the temporary link if your domain hasn’t propagated yet. Log in to your control panel with the user name and password in your confirmation email.

If you chose the hosting option with the IP address, check the email for your address e.g. ‘175.121.32.122′ and log in via ‘http://175.121.32.122/cpanel/’ or’ http://175.121.32.122:2082′, substituting your real IP address for the one shown here.  The ‘http://’ is actually redundant, you don’t have to type it. ‘175.121.32.122:2082′ will work. Once your domain name has propagated you can simply type ‘joebloggs.com/cpanel’.

Once you are logged in, scroll down and look for the Fantastico de Luxe button (a smiling face). It’s towards the bottom, under Software/Services.  Within Fantastico, under the navigation on the left, choose ‘WordPress’ and then click on ‘New Installation’ to install WordPress. For security reasons please do not use the default user name of ‘admin’, and make the password very hard to guess. Make it something very complicated; that’s why you are using Roboform.

If you want people to ‘land’ on your blog if they type your domain name in their browser search bar (e.g. ‘joebloggs.com’), then install WordPress in the root. If you want to put someting else there, like a landing page, you will have to install Wordpress in, say, a subdirectory ‘blog’ so it installs into ‘joebloggs.com/blog’.  Please do not worry about the name of your blog at this stage.  Enter anything during the installation process, since you can edit it later from tour WordPress ‘Dashboard’.

Installing WordPress in a subdirectory creates a minor problem as visitors to your blog need to type in ‘joebloggs.com/blog’.  If they simply type ‘joeblogs.com’, they will end up on your root, and there’s nothing there except your cPanel program unless you do something about it!

To fix this you need to add an ‘htaccess redirect’ on your home page.  Let the people at your hosting company give you a hand.  Or you can put a very simple ’splash page’ in the root directory, with a link to your blog. As you can see, it might be a good idea for a beginner to install straight into the root directory.

We’re done! Log into your WordPress account (NOT your cPanel) and click on ‘Visit Site’. Not very exciting, hey! Our next step will be to choose, upload and configure a theme, and after that we will take care of the plugins.

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