With our digital generation, learning to build a website is

1- more important than ever, and

2- easier than ever.

Once I took what, to me, was a step into the unknown and began building a website, my life changed. Websites are the simple reason that I have a side business, a personal website, have excelled in my career, and have learned a new skill. I can’t recommend building one for yourself enough! Whether it’s a blog, a business, a personal website, or all of the above!

When building your own website, I highly recommend using WordPress. WordPress allows you to build your website from scratch. But don’t worry, you don’t need to know how to code in order to build one. I am going to walk you through the entire thing!

To use WordPress, you need a service to host your website. I use and highly recommend Bluehost. It’s very inexpensive, the customer support has always been very helpful to me, and I’m going to walk you through the whole process below. Let’s jump in!

This post contains affiliate links. All opinions are my own. For more information on my affiliate marketing, please see my disclosure page.

Step 1- Choose your domain

To begin building a website, you first want to choose your domain name. This is the URL of your website. Do put some thought into what you name your website as you can’t change this! You don’t want it to be too long, hard to spell, and so on. I also recommend using the website Namechk. It allows you to search potential domain names and find their availabilities, as well as their availabilities in social media accounts.

There are two ways to obtain a domain name:

1- Purchasing a domain

You can register your name at websites like Hover.com. I do not recommend GoDaddy after seeing this video.

This part is pretty straightforward, but if you’d prefer to purchase with a step-by-step tutorial, Hover has one here.

2- Free domain with my Bluehost link

Another option is to register your domain with your server, Bluehost (I’ll get into detail below). This is a free option with my link below.

 

Step 2- Choosing your server

There are a handful of server options out there. Servers are services that will host your website. You can use websites like Blogger.com, Wix, or Squarespace. I highly recommend using WordPress.

To how your WordPress site, I highly recommend using Bluehost. All three of my websites are set up through Bluehost, and their support is outstanding. This was especially important to the non-techie likes of me. Plus, their pricing starts at $3.95/month, which you just can’t beat.

To begin, go to www.bluehost.com/track/urban20something/. Please note this is my affiliate link, so I may receive a commission if you purchase through it (thank you so much for your support!). But, it’ll also ensure you’re getting the most up to date deals and best pricing.

Here we go!

Once you enter my URL, you’ll go to a screen that looks like the below. This is Bluehost’s home page.

Go ahead and click the green button that says “get started now”.

You’ll come to the pricing page next (screenshot below). You can choose whichever plan sounds the most in line with your website goals. But, I’ve been running all three of my websites with one basic plan on the left and it’s done all I’ve needed!

Next, you’ll come to a screen that asks you if you’re beginning with a domain name or without. So, if you did the first option when choosing a domain above, you’ll put it in the right box. If you want to get your free domain through Bluehost, you’ll put it in the left box.

Next, you’ll just fill out your information.

Then we come down to pricing options. If you drop down the top “account plan” option, you can choose to pay 12, 24, or 36 months upfront. I recommend paying all 36 if you can because you’ll get a much better deal. Please also note that if you cancel your account at any time, Bluehost will refund you for whatever you didn’t use in your plan. So, it’s very low risk.

As far as the other options, I would skip them for now. The only one worth noting is the “Domain Privacy Protection”. This will only be there for those who register their domain with Bluehost, and that one is something I’d consider strongly.

Below you’ll put in your credit card and you’re ready to go!

Congrats! You have your account.

 

You’ll end up here:

Go ahead and click “create your password”.

Create your password using all of Bluehost’s password requirements and you’re in! Please note that this password is for your Bluehost account. NOT your WordPress account. This means that is not the password you’ll be using to login to your website. Do write this down, you don’t want to lose track of it.

Your Bluehost account

You’ll then be taken to your Bluehost account home page. Welcome. Importantly! this is not where you run your website from (which is what I thought at first).

Step 3- Installing WordPress

Now we will want to install WordPress.

If you scroll down on your Bluehost homepage, you’ll see the “website” section. In there is an icon that says “Install WordPress”. Click that.

.

You’ll be brought to a page that will let you install WordPress. It’ll look like this:

Go ahead and click the green “get started” button in the bottom right corner.

You’ll be brought here next. Choose your domain from the drop-down menu. Then, once WordPress recognizes it,  you can click the green “next” button on the right.

Step 4- Your WordPress account

You’ll then be taken to a screen that allows you to set up a WordPress account. It looks like this:

Enter the info like I did above. Keep in mind you can change your site name later, so no pressure. Make sure to keep track of your password. Please note that this is your account information for WordPress. The login information you check here is what you’ll use to login to your website. Check all three gray boxes on the bottom left. Click “Install”.

Volia! Soon you’ll see that green check on the top that means your installation was complete.

Now you can officially visit your website and begin creating it. To reach it, you’ll enter your domain in the search bar, then add wp-admin to the end. (wp-admin stands for WordPress administrator). It will be: www.yourdomain.com/wp-admin

 

Then, you’ll be asked to login to WordPress. It’ll look like this:

Enter your username and password and you did it! You’re in your entire own website. It’ll look something like this:

Now you’re in WordPress. Play around here a little and try to get to know it. It takes time, but WordPress is pretty intuitive.

 

Step 5- Redirecting your domain

If you purchased your domain through a different website (not Bluehost), the last step is to redirect your domain to your server. This shouldn’t take more than a minute or two.

Go to the website where you purchased your domain (Hover, GoDaddy, etc.) and under your account select “domains”. Select your domain and push “edit”. In the Nameserver part, push “edit”.

There will be two Nameservers to edit. By default, they’ll say: 

Nameserver 1
ns1.hover.com OR ns1.godaddy.com

Nameserver 2
ns2.hover.com OR ns2.godaddy.com

You need to change them to say: 

ns1.bluehost.com
ns2.bluehost.com

For Hover’s instructions on how to do this, click here.

Your WordPress blog is now officially set up. You did it. 

What to do now…?

Plugins

One of the first things you should do when you create your WordPress site is install a couple essential plugins. Plugins are sort of like “apps” for WordPress. They can change your website and help you have control over it without you having to code your site. In other words, they’re the best things ever.

Sign up below to get my top 7 essential plugins that you won’t want to launch your site without with a complete guide on how to use them. They’ll help with your security, ease of use, aesthetic, and to track your progress. They’re all in my side hustler resource library below!

If you have any questions about this, please let me know below. Congrats!