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Setting up Wordpress
Setting up Wordpress is a very easy job, but there are some
elements that you need to get right so that it is properly optimized for search
engines. Following is a step by step guide
to set up Wordpress with a Bluehost.com account.
Begin with the instructions on the article titled Fantastico
and once they are completed follow these instructions to add themes and
optimize Wordpress to suit your needs.
1) Go to Wordpress.com and pick out the theme
you would like to use. I prefer three
column themes because they keep most of your links in the top section of you
blog where they are easily accessible. The
most important thing is to keep it simple and legible. There are a lot of options; fancy themes,
script fonts and colored backgrounds, which are fine for a personal blog. However, you should always be mindful of your
reader and these themes may be hard to read or too ornate. Even if you are beginning with a personal
blog, at some point you may want to use it to market something, so keep it
simple. Your audience will want to
navigate your site with ease.
2) While you are browsing for themes you will also need to
download two plugins from Wordpress.com.
The first is called tinyMCE Advanced
and the second is called All in one SEO
pack. Download them both and
remember where they are on your hard drive.
After the plugins and themes are downloaded you will need to unzip them
with whatever unzipping program you use.
3) After you have
downloaded at least a few themes from Wordpress.com, log into your bluehost.com
account and locate the c-panel link that reads “unlimited FTP” (the icon looks
like a street sign for two way traffic).
Click on it and it will bring up a Java run screen program that will
allow you access to the contents of your hard drive. Remember where you downloaded the themes to on
your hard drive and in the left hand side of the screen navigate to where they
are located. If you have problems at
this point save the themes to your desktop so they are easy to find.
4) On the right hand side of the screen you will see the
contents of you hosting account; look for the link “Public html.” This is where all of your website folders are
stored. Find the website you will be
working with and click on it. If
Wordpress was set up correctly you will see links that read “wp-admin”, “wp-contents”
and “wp-includes.” There will also be
other files and folders which you can ignore for now.
5) Click on the link that reads “wp-content.” There are three folders including “plugins”, “themes”
and “uploads”. Click on the folder titled
“themes” and drag the themes you downloaded from the left hand side and drop
them in the right hand side. It will
take a minute for each theme to move to the server or longer depending on the
size of the folder. Just make sure you are
loading the unzipped files because the zipped files won’t do you much good.
Now you need to load the two plugins to the server.
6) “All in one SEO”
pack is easy: simple locate the “wp-content” folder on the right side and
double click. Find the folder that reads
“plugins”, double click and drag the unzipped plugin you downloaded from the
left side to that folder.
7) The tinyMCE
advanced plugin is a little more difficult because it has two steps. On the left side or your hard drive double
click on the folder titled “tinyMCE-advanced.”
When it opens it will have two more folders. Select “tinyMCE-advanced” and drag it to the
same folder as “All in one SEO” pack. From
the right side Double click the folder that has the name of your website on
it. You will see three folders that read
“wp-admin’, “wp-contents” and “wp-includes.”
Open the folder titled “wp-includes” and the folder titled “js”. From “js” you will see another folder titled “tinyMCE.” Open “tinyMCE” and locate the folder titled “plugins”. Stay right there you are in the right
place.
8) On the left side you need to open the folder that reads
“add to tinymce directory.” Inside of it will be a folder titled “plugins.” On
the right side there is already a folder titled “plugins.” Drag and drop this file below the one that
reads “plugins.” NOT INTO IT. You are
replacing the folder on the right not putting something into it. When you do this a screen will eventually
pop up that asks if you want to replace the existing files. Click on replace all and after a few minutes
you will be done.
I know this is a long article but I promised the step by
step so bear with me there is still more to do in order to make Wordpress fit your
needs.
9) Open your browser and sign into the dashboard of your
Wordpress blog. First let’s take care of
the blogroll. Click on the link titled “blogroll”
and when that page loads there will be a list of preloaded links to other
sites. A blogroll link is actually a
very powerful link because you will be linking to these other sites from every
page of your blog. May not sound like
much now but when you have 100 pages in your blog that will be 100 links to
these other sites.
10) Remove the preloaded links. On the top right of the grey header boxes
there is a check box that if you check it will check all of the other boxes, go
ahead and check it and then scroll down to the link that reads delete. Click on delete and then confirm in the pop
up and all of those links will be deleted.
Find the link that reads “add links” and click on it.
11) Add a link to netrat.com by typing “how to build a
website” in the name box and then http://www.netrat.com into the address box. You don’t want to add a description for any
of your links, so leave that box blank then click “add Link” just below and to
the right. You are ready to add another
link. It isn’t mandatory that you link
to us but it is much appreciated and if you let us know about it we will
definitely get a link back to you from one of our other sites (MORE than one,
most likely). Add links to some of your
favorite sites like netrat.com (hint hint).
And you are done with the blogroll
12) Click on link titled “Options” near the top right of the
screen. On the first pop up screen type
the title and tagline of your blog. We
will get into this in a lot more detail in the article “Choosing a Niche” but
for now put in something. The next two
boxes are very
important. Change them both
so that they include www dot
prefix. For example they probably read http://yoursite.com and they should read
http://www.yoursite.com. That step is
crucial to helping with SEO. Do not skip
it.
13) Scroll down to verify your email address is correct and
decide if you want people to be able to leave comments and register. It doesn’t really matter either way if you
don’t mind dealing with spam.
14) The only other
two things you may want to change are the time and calendar, If you are in New York the time should be -5
if you are in California it will be -8, if you are somewhere in between figure
it out. I usually change the calendar to
start on Sunday but that is just my preference.
Click on update options and you are done.
That’s it for the General tab. The next tab is for writing preferences.
15) Click on the “Writing” tab and change the first box from
10 to 20, which provides more room to paste and look at articles. This is a personal preference so you can skip
it if you want. Click update options and
you are done again.
16) Click the “Reading”
tab to manage the number of posts to display on the front page. If your posts are as long as this post you
may want to make it a smaller number but most likely you can leave it
alone. Click update options and you’re
done again.
17) Click the “Discussion” tab and make sure that the box in
front of “An administrator must always approve the comment” is checked. Click update options and you’re done with
this screen.
18) Skip the tab titled “Privacy” and click the tab titled “Permalinks.”
When this screen opens click the radio button that has “Date and name based”
next to it. Then click “Custom, specify
below” and take out everything in the box so that all you have left is “/%postname%/”
left in the box. Make sure the beginning
and ending slashes are there. Click on “update
permalink structure” and you are done with one more screen.
19) The final options screen should be “Miscellaneous.” All
you have to do there is check the box that reads “Track Links’ Update Times”
and click update options.
Whew, it really isn’t a lot to do but it takes a lot of time
to write out how it is done. And we
aren’t done yet.
20) Find the link at the top of your dashboard that reads
“plugins” and click on it. If the two
plugins were loaded correctly you should see them listed among the plugins. On the right hand side of this screen you
should be able to click on a link for each on them titled “Activate.” Click
activate for both. You are done here.
Now that one was nice and easy wasn’t it?
21) Click on the link
at the top that reads “manage.” The first screen should be the posts tab. There should only be one post listed here
titled “Hello world.” Click “delete” at the far right and confirm deletion.
22) Click the next
tab titled “Pages.” There should only be one page listed titled “About.” This one is up to you, but unless you are
going to fill something in for this page right away, I would suggest you delete
it also. You can always create a new “About”
page later if you so choose. That’s it
you are done again, another clean and simple task.
23) The last thing to
do is to click on the link that reads “Presentation.” Go ahead and click on it and you will see all
of the themes you just loaded and a couple of preloaded themes. Pick out the theme you like best and click on
the screen shot of it. That will
activate it as your theme and you are now ready to check out your brand new
blog. I always make some alterations to
the themes but that requires snipping and moving code, so I’ll save that for a
later date. For now it really isn’t anything
you need to worry about and if you get it wrong you will need to completely
reload the theme to the server. I don’t
want to be responsible for getting you angry.
When I do write that article, it will be a ‘use it at your own risk’ kind
of deal.
Come to think of it all of these instructions are ‘use it at
your own risk’. So far there really
hasn’t been anything that could get messed up beyond repair, so no
worries. That’s it I hope you enjoyed
the article and if you did I sincerely hope that you will consider giving us a
link in your blogroll. If you do please
use the name “How to make a website” and link to http://www.netrat.com. Thanks!
Last update : 09-04-2008 05:08
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