Setting Up Your WordPress Blog For Your Church
Step 1 - Determine whether you want to go with a free Wordpress blog hosted at Wordpress.com or a hosted blog with your own domain name. The drawback of the free blog is that you are limited to only the themes provided and you can not customize them other than the header. So you would not be able to use the free church themes I provide here. If you want to use your own domain name with the free blog there is currently a $15/year fee. Perhaps the biggest drawback of the free blog is that you can not use available plug-ins. One nice plug-in used on my hosted sample church blog easily creates photo galleries. With the free blog you would not be able to use that plugin (or any other plug in). But the free blog is FREE and you can always post photos, one at a time, within a blog post or page if needed. The hosted blog costs $5-$8 per month in hosting fees. For a summary of differences between the free and hosted blogs, go to Free Wordpress.com vs. Hosted Wordpress.org. If you would like to have a free blog hosted at WordPress.com, refer to this WordPress.com Blog Tutorial. If you would like to have a hosted WordPress blog, go to Step 2. |
| Step 2 - Obtain a domain name. This is fairly simple and I have a detailed tutorial showing how to get a domain at NameCheap at this page. |
| Step 3 - Get hosting and set up your domain to redirect to the hosting, as shown here. My preference is hostgator since their servers virtually never go down and even if you are getting over 500 visitors per day (like on one of my sites), you will not overload your allowed usage. Any hosting that provides a WordPress blog will do however. There is a step-by-step tutorial on getting hosting here. A day or two after getting the hosting, you will be sent an email with your NameServers. You will need to enter these NameServers where your domain is hosted. |
Step 4 - Log in to your hosting account Control Panel. If you use HostGator, you can always log in at yourdomainname.com/cpanel. At this page you will be prompted for your User Name and Password. Once in the control panel, scroll down to the Fantastico Deluxe option and click on it as shown below.
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Step 5 - Click on WordPress as shown below.
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Step 6 - Now click on New Installation as shown below. Bookmark the log-in address as this is the place where you will create blog posts.
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Step 7 - Fill out the information as shown below. Write down your User Name and Password - you will need it to log in! Then click Install WordPress. Note that by leaving the directory box blank, your blog will be installed in the root directory. So if someone enters yourwebsite.com, they arrive at your blog.
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| Step 8 - Click on Finish Installation on the next page you see. You may then log into your blog and modify the first sample post. You may then modify the appearance by logging into the control panel, choosing Appearance and then searching for a new theme. To use free Church Themes, go to my free church theme page and follow the directions given. |
Step 9 - Make use of the free and excellent WordPress tutorial given at siteground.com. IMPORTANT NOTE: In the last few months, WordPress has been setting new blogs to have a default setting such that it shuts off your blog to the search engines. To make your blog available to the search engines, log in to your blog, go to the dashboard, and select Settings, and then Privacy, and then check the box as shown below.
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