Building a simple website using WordPress.
Recently I was asked about simple and cost effective ways of creating a website. I always recommend WordPress to do just that. Of course the first response I would get when recommending WordPress, is that it is used to create blogs and not websites. While that is true at first glance, there are, however, ways to use WordPress to create a website while still retaining the flexibility and ease of use.
Please Note: While this article makes use of the latest version of WordPress, the functionality in older versions remains the same even though the location of the links I refer to might be different.
I will be using a free online WordPress domain to illustrate the concepts. You can view this example site at any time by visiting http://bwguide.wordpress.com
Whether you are using your own domain or hosting on a WordPress domain, the concepts and functionality remains exactly the same.
When you have created your WordPress powered site and have logged in you will see the following initial dashboard:
Your site at this point will look as follows (This is the default template and look you get when you start):
The first step in the process is to choose the visual theme for you site. In this guide we will only be using the normal pre-installed themes and graphics.
Firstly, you need to click on the “Appearance” link:
This will bring up a list of available themes to choose from. You can make use of the filter drop-down to narrow down the available themes. I recommend using the filter to choose a two-column theme initially, even though any theme is workable.
For this example I have decided to use “Benevolence”. Once you click on the theme it will pop up a quick preview of what it will look like. If you are happy, click on the “Activate [Your Theme Name Here]” link. This will apply this theme to you website.
So, now the site looks as follows:
Not quite a website yet, but we are getting there. Next up we need to get rid of the blog look and feel. The main difference between using WordPress as a website rather than a blog is that you will be adding Pages rather than Posts. Click on the “Pages“ link in the left-hand bar:
You will note that an “About” page has already been created. Let us quickly edit the “About” Page first.
Click on the word “About” in the middle of the page. This will take you to the Page editor. Change the default content. After changing the content there are two other options you need to change. First uncheck the boxes that says “Allow Comments” and “Allow Pings”. Secondly, change the order from 0 to 10. Once everything is done, click on the “Update Page” button.
Once the Page has been saved you will see the following at the top:
Click now on the “go back” link as seen above.
We are now going to add the “Home” page. Click on the “Add New” link as seen below:
At the top subject text box type in “Home”.
Type in some content for your Home page, and uncheck the “Allow Comments” and “Allow Pings” check boxes. Keep the page order on “0″ for now, as this will always be our first page.
Once you are happy, click on the “Publish” button.
You can add a few more pages if you wish. Examples would be a Product or Services page. Maybe even a Gallery page. Just make sure that the two check boxes are always un-checked. The order field is important for the menu we will be creating, so make sure that you always specify the numerical order you want the Pages to appear in your menu. This will become clearer at a later stage.
Now that you have added some pages, it is time to specify some settings to make the “blog” act more like a website. Click on the “Settings” link:
The settings we will be changing will be “Reading” settings:
You will see the following:
You need to click on the radio button next to “A static page (select below)”. In the “Front Page” drop down select “Home”. This is the Home page you have just created. What this setting does, is force WordPress to look at the pages (in this case your Home page) rather than the blog posts.
Ignore the rest of the settings and click on the “Save Changes” button at the bottom of the page.
Having a look at the site will now show that it’s starting to look more like a website:
Now let us add a menu on the left-hand side, since we do not want to see any of the blog related information.
We will do this by activating a simple widget.
You start by clicking on the “Appearance” link again:
Now click on the “Widgets” link:
You will note that currently no widgets have been added.
We will be adding the “Pages” widget.
Click on the “Add” link. You will note that a “Pages” block appear on the right-hand side.
We now need to specify a few quick settings. Click on the “Edit” link as seen above.
It will expand the “Pages” box, giving you the option to make some changes to its behavior.
You firstly have the option to specify a title to be used. If you leave it blank it will default to “Pages” as the title. In my case I decided to use “Navigation” instead.
Secondly you need to specify how the Page titles will be ordered in the menu. Change the dropdown to use “Page order”. It will now make use of the “Order” numbers you changed when you created the pages.
Once you have made the above changes, click on “Done” and then on “Save Changes”.
Having a look at the website now you will see the following:
You will note that the other sidebar functions disappeared when you added the widget, leaving you with a nice clean menu only.
And there you have it. A simple website in a matter of hours, with a consistent look and feel.
In future articles I will be looking at some slightly more advanced topics to be used when customizing your WordPress blog or website.
vincenthofmann
SheBee
AcademicGeek
gogi
gobz
cath-jenkin
JuicyJustin
BlindCripple
supercopygurl
Green_Guerrilla
Cassey
romeogeek
steve-tech
beetle001
Gluggie, what an awesome article.
Can I request a how-to from step a. registering a domain and pointing it to wordpress, thats the one thing I *don’t* know how to do yet.
nice one babe!
Awesome, simple nice ‘how to’ article – I think many online natives take this basic stuff for granted. Now I can use this article to send to my mates who don’t know where to start.
V Cool – agree with SheBee re: first steps, also can you touch on wp.org at all in time?
Thanks!
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Hey thx for this blog! I think its realy hard to take one’s choice
Wishing you all the blessings of a beautiful Christmas season.
omg! i don’t know how.. will someone tell me how 2 get this page saved inside my iphone touch so my brother can take a look at it?
Yeah really good story.. Thanks for sharing
Great article dude Thank you
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