4 October 2020
How to Create a Website Under $100 in One Day: The Ultimate Guide
Do you face these problems?
I would like to build my own website but…
- it’s too technical for me
- I don’t know coding or programming
- I don’t have time
- it’s expensive
- it’s too difficult for me
- I don’t know how to start
Then you are at the right place!
It was tough for me.
I faced the same problems some years back when I had to abandon the website that my web developer had done for me
As a result, I had to do it on my own.
That was in 2014.
I learnt it the tough way, exploring bits and pieces on my own.
Today, I am going to show you how I created them based on my experience
(Step by Step)
so that you will not make the same mistakes as me.
In fact, this will be the most comprehensive guide you will ever need to build your website.
I will explain in detail the tools that I use so that you will be able to understand clearly.
Let’s begin! Follow me!
What will you achieve at the end of this guide?
A decent website that you can show to your customers or target audience!
Some Casual Things to Take Note
- I assume that you have thought about your domain name (e.g.
sleekpage.com) and have your logo ready. - In my demo, I will alternate between
sleekpage.comandbigfatpocket.com. Hope you won’t be confused. - It costs less than $100 for the first year to build a website based on domain registration and web hosting. If you purchase additional tools, it might cost you more than $100. Also, typically, web hosting costs more in the second year.
- If you follow the guide completely, you will take one day to setup your website. If you pause and do some research along the way or decide to go for another tool, you will take more than one day.
- Apart from domain registration and web hosting, I will be using free versions of the tools for demo (although I am using the premium versions for some).
Let's learn some website lingo!
Basic Terms.
There are some terms that we need to understand to realise the importance of building website. Let’s go through them.
As you go through the steps, you will explore the tools that I use, and you might find that there are many tools out there.
(The ones that you see are those that I personally use and recommend.)
However, don’t be overwhelmed by the choices out there. The main aim is to get the website up and running.
Domain Name. GoDaddy. Address.
The domain name of this website is sleekpage.com. It is different from sleekpage.org.
Domain name is like your home address. Every domain name is different, just like no one can have the same address as you.
Although choosing the right domain name is important, it is not the most important. Do not spend too much time on it. For me, I spent 2 days to research, decided on it and moved on.
Here are some tips on selecting a good domain name:
Description | Ideal Example | Not so Ideal |
Must be short (max. 15 letters) | apple.com | renovationfornewhomes.com trendingfashionshoes.com |
Easy to type and remember | amazon.com | sportingoods.com |
Must not be confusing or inappropriate | talkingteachers.org | teacherstalking.org therapist.com |
Don't use hyphens or numbers | gadgetsforyou.com | gadgets2020.com |
Don't be too specific until you cannot expand your scope in future | phonerepair.com | iphonerepair.com |
Preferably .com | sleekpage.com | sleekpage.biz |
Many people make the mistake of spending too much time on this.
Just remember as long as the domain name is decent, it’s good enough. There’s no perfect name, you have to stop somewhere.
Where do you get ideas for your website name?
I usually go to Namelix to get ideas. It has helped me to generate lots of combinations where I can decide on a name.
You should try it too.
Step 1: Insert ideas and generate.
Step 2: Select name length. I prefer medium length (6-12 letters)
Step 3: Select a name style. There will be tons of names generated. I am sure you can find a suitable website name here.
Step 4: Go to godaddy and see if it's available
I have been using Godaddy for many years.
I like their interface and it’s very user friendly.
These are the current websites that I have registered with them:
Remember to choose a .com domain. People still prefer and are more comfortable with .com websites.
If you are just targeting people in your country, you can for go country domain. For example, if you want to target people in the UK, you can go for .co.uk
It’s cheaper per year if you go for a 2 year plan. But I will go for a 1 year plan because I don’t know whether I will continue with the domain name after 1 year.
(Note that this is the first investment that you need to make.)
Web Hosting. Siteground. House.
If domain name is your address, then web hosting is your house. It stores all the files like this page that you are looking at.
I have been using SiteGround since 2017.
I like their prompt and friendly staff service. I would rate their service 5 stars.
And the speed of their server is very fast. Furthermore, they are always improving on their control panel interface (very user friendly indeed!).
It is important to find a good and reliable hosting company (just like you want your house to be sturdy). I have done a thorough comparison on why I think Siteground is the best.
In the next section, we will talk about using WordPress to manage the website.
For now, select WordPress Hosting.
If you only have 1 website, you can go for the StartUp plan:
After domain name registration, this is the second investment that you need to make.
For the rest of the guide, you can choose to use the free versions of the tools. If you find them useful, then go for the premium versions.
For your convenience, I have compared the difference between the 3 plans. It is very comprehensive, so I hope you take a look!
Linking Domain Name to Web Hosting
After you have gotten the web hosting plan, you need to setup the domain name.
Go to Websites >> New Website:
Click on Existing Domain and enter the website that you have just created:
If you didn’t buy the domain yet, you can choose New Domain.
In fact, I bought this domain name sleekpage.com in SiteGround.
So I used bigfatpocket.com to show you what happens when the domain name is from GoDaddy and web hosting is from SiteGround.
Start New Website and select WordPress.
You can setup login email and password for your wordpress at this time.
Choose the email that you want to receive messages, password reset, etc from WordPress. Keep in mind that you should choose a strong password to prevent hackers from entering your website.
You can skip SG Site Scanner and finish the setup:
You will see the SiteGround nameservers. It’s time to connect to SiteGround to the domain name!
Leave this page on and open a new window. Login to GoDaddy and click on DNS or Manage DNS.
Paste the SiteGround nameservers as follows:
Done! You have linked the domain name to SiteGround. It will take a few minutes to take effect.
(Do not use mine as yours might be different.)
Still remember that I briefly mentioned WordPress just now? Next, we shall talk a little bit about WordPress.
Are you excited? Let’s go, follow me!
Content Management System. WordPress. Home Layout.
When a person lands on your website, it is akin to entering your house.
The system that manages your website is like the layout of your house.
It’s like Windows and Mac OS. Both are different Operating Systems but serve the same purpose.
WordPress is a very advanced CMS. I have been using WordPress all these years to create my websites (since 2014).
It can be used to create any website that you want, literally anything that you want.
And because WordPress is the MOST popular, there are lots of plugins (e.g. image compression, website builder) that you can use to suit your requirements.
(When I mean MOST popular, I mean way way more popular than any others.)
I strongly recommend it to anyone who wants to build a website – from beginner to advanced level.
Do you know?
WordPress powers 37% of all the websites in the world, the largest of all.
The next closest is Joomla, at a mere 2.6%.
That's how established WordPress is.
Are you excited on creating your first post/page on WordPress?
Wait! We shall go through some settings first.
Before We Start Building The Website
SiteGround Settings
01.
Security
02.
Speed
03.
As you can see, these settings are fundamental to building your website.
For example, you definitely need an email address (a professional one, not a gmail).
So first up, go to Site Tools:
Security
SSL Manager
Head to Security >> SSL Manager:
By default, a free SSL certificate, Let’s Encrypt, is installed for you.
If you are running a small or medium website, this is good enough. Don’t worry about the expiry, it will automatically renew every 3 months.
If you are running a large website, you might want to purchase the premium version.
Why is SSL Certificate important?
Have you seen this padlock symbol beside the URL in your browser?
When your visitors interact with your website - providing credit card details or logging in with password, they want to make sure it's secure.
If your website is not secured, attackers can intercept the information.
A SSL certificate is needed to make your website secure.
HTTPS Enforce
Next, go to HTTPS Enforce and enable the toggle button.
I already have a SSL certificate, why do i need to do this?
Sometimes… even if you have a SSL certificate, the URL of your website might still show http, which is insecure.
This happens because some images, videos or content are still using http. The above setting will ensure that the files on your server will load as https.
How to check that your website is secure?
Type in your website URL and you should find a padlock beside. Click on Certificate (valid).
Now you should see that this certificate is issued by Let’s Encrypt.
Congratulations! Your website is secure!
Speed
Caching
Next up, head to Speed >> Caching >> MEMCACHED and enable the toggle button.
Why is Caching important?
If you website takes a long time to load, visitors will click the back/close button.
In caching, some parts of the website will be made easily available for your visitors to load.
(E.g. Every morning before you rush off to school or work, you will put your shoes, clothes, bag in convenient locations so that you don't spend time looking for them.)
Thus, caching makes your website load faster, enhancing visitor experience.
Cloudflare
Cloudflare is a Content Delivery Network (CDN).
If you are targeting visitors that are in your country, it is not necessary to activate Cloudflare.
If you are targeting international visitors, activate Cloudflare.
Why is Cloudflare important?
Imagine your web hosting server (base) is in U.S. and you are targeting visitors from all over the world.
A person in Australia will have to travel 15,000 km to locate your server and travel another 15,000 km to send your website files back to load on his computer.
What if there is another server in Australia, and this person can access the same files from there?
You got the answer. Cloudflare makes multiple copies of your website files all over the world, enhancing visitor experience.
Let’s setup Cloudflare now!
Create a Cloudflare account if you don’t have one:
Activate the free version of Cloudflare:
(Remember to tick the box on IMPORTANT!)
Obviously, the premium version is better but at least you get started and reap some benefits of the free version.
Next, go to Cloudflare >> Speed and enable all the 4 toggle buttons. This will help to speed up loading time.
Cloudflare External Login and Settings
Once you have changed Cloudflare settings on SiteGround, we shall login to Cloudflare’s website to configure the settings.
You just have to set it one time and your website will experience the benefits of Cloudflare (fast loading speed) from then on!
Go to Quick Start Guide and Review Settings:
Get started to configure the settings:
By default, for SSL/TLS Encryption Mode, it should be Full.
I know that you have enforced HTTPS under SiteGround Security settings.
But let’s just set it again to Always Use HTTPS:
Check the boxes for JavaScript, CSS and HTML to speed up loading time of your website:
Make your website even faster by toggling on Brotli compression:
Brotli is a data compression algorithm which reduce the size of your website files.
It’s not important to know the mechanics behind Brotli.
Just have to know that websites now tend to have more images, text and applications.
And because your website might be accessed by visitors on the other side of the globe, it is essential to have fast loading speed.
Click Finish to wrap it up and you are all set to go with your lightning fast website!
We are not finished yet!
An important aspect of your website is to have an email address with your domain name. That way, it will be more professional.
So, for mine, it’s [email protected].
In SiteGround, you can create an email for yourself and your team. Let’s get started!
First, go to Email >> Accounts. Create a short email name that is easy to type and remember.
If you want to create a general enquiry email, don’t use [email protected]. A better alternative will be [email protected] or [email protected].
Login to your mail account:
You can access your mail account via yourdomainname.com/webmail:
However, most of us use Gmail. For me, I like to send and receive all my mails through Gmail. That way, I won’t need to login to multiple accounts.
Go to Gmail >> Settings >> Add a mail account:
Enter the email address that you have created above:
Click Next. You only have one choice.
Copy the fields below but using your own domain name.
As for the check boxes, usually I will select the first three.
In case you want to know where to find the settings for the above, you can go to mail configuration:
Alternatively, you can go to mail configuration via this way:
You have just setup your email in Gmail to be able to receive mails!
Now, you need to be able to send mails as well.
Enter a name that you want your recipients to see:
Same thing here… copy the fields by using your domain name:
And lastly, you have to do a verification:
You can send a test email to yourself from another email.
You should be able to receive the test email quickly.
Notice that [email protected] appears beside the emails I received. That’s because I have labelled incoming messages as [email protected] in the settings above.
This makes it easy for me to identify emails from this website.
You can even change the colour of the label.
That way, you won’t miss your emails!
Alright, tada! That’s it, you have successfully setup your email.
Now, you can receive emails from your visitors!
If you manage to reach this step, good job! Give yourself a pat on your back!
Setting up can be simple
WordPress.
01.
WordPress Starter
02.
WordPress Settings
WordPress Starter by SiteGround
SiteGround has made things easier for us by providing a starter kit for WordPress.
It’s catered for beginners and I find it useful for me as well.
Let’s begin! Go to WordPress >> Install & Manage >> Log In to Admin Panel:
WordPress Starter by SiteGround is actually a plugin in WordPress. Start Now to go to the next page.
It’s time to select a theme. A theme is like your house decoration. It sets the ambience of your website.
If you scroll down, there are tons of themes.
For now, select Twenty Twenty first. You can switch to another theme any time.
This is how your page will look like. Not that nice… but it’s ok, we are not going to use it.
Click Continue.
Next, SiteGround has listed some plugins for you to get started.
We shall not install them first, otherwise we will be overwhelmed by the amount of things to handle now.
Google Analytics and Yoast SEO are important to install. So, we shall select them.
Don’t worry, we will not touch them for now. They will be explained in another guide.
Once you have completed your setup, go to Dashboard:
And tada! You are now in WordPress area!
Good job! Give yourself another pat on the other shoulder!
If you didn’t know what you have just done, the WordPress Starter by SiteGround is helping you to install a theme and some plugins.
I know it has been quite some work so far. Just a little more to go before you create your first page or post.
WordPress Settings
There are some settings we have to do before we begin creating the first page or post.
Head to Users >> Profile.
Update your
- First Name
- Last Name
- Nickname
- Display name
Under Settings >> General, key in your Site Title and Tagline.
Your Site Title should bring out the message about what your site is in one sentence.
Ensure that both URLs start with https.
Set your date and time format.
Now, go to Reading.
Most likely, yours won’t be like what the screenshot is, where you can choose your homepage displays.
That’s because you haven’t created a page yet.
I will select a static page as my homepage.
And so, I have to create a page first:
We will be creating the homepage later. Just make sure after creating it, you come back to Settings >> Reading and select it as my homepage.
Next, go to Permalinks and double check that post name is selected.
Do not select Day and name or Month and name as they are not useful for SEO.
As a good practice, you want to name your post name such that your visitors will know what this post is about when they see the URL.
And lastly, create a Privacy Policy page.
You can check out their guide. We shall not go through it here as our main priority is to create the pages to get your website up and running.
Theme sets the ambience
Neve Theme.
01.
Installing Neve Theme
02.
Create your Homepage
Still remember we installed the default WordPress Twenty Twenty theme?
It’s a simple theme but it’s difficult to get you started.
A basic website should have 4 things:
- Homepage
- About
- Contact
- Content (E.g. articles, blog post, product pages)
However, Twenty Twenty theme does not come with these ready templates for you. You have to create your own.
Get Neve Theme to help you Start
A very popular theme, it has free and premium version.
Neve theme is able to help you kickstart by creating the essential posts and pages that you need – homepage, contact, about, etc.
Whether you are running a restaurant, shop or fitness business, you will be able to select a template from Neve.
We will only use the free version here.
Hence, if you wish to know more about the premium version, take a look at what Neve can offer you to build a better website.
Right now, let’s go to Appearance >> Themes >> Add New. Search for Neve.
Install and activate it.
Go to Starter Sites to select your desired template.
Before that you have to install and activate this plugin:
Next, select Free from the drop down list and Elementor as the website builder.
I will explain more about Elementor later. By the way, I really love this tool. I have been using it for 3 years and it has helped me create beautiful websites like this one.
Elementor is by far the most popular and downloaded website builder in wordpress.
There is a free version and premium version. We are using the free version here as well (I am using the premium version).
There are 34 free templates to choose from.
(The premium version has 122 templates.)
For simplicity, I shall select the Web Agency template.
Feel free to choose the one that suits you. Otherwise, just select Web Agency and edit it to suit your needs.
Here are some templates. If you run a restaurant, there’s a free template for you.
After you have decided, click on Preview.
Take a look and see how it looks like.
Click Import when you are done.
You will import some pages, posts, Elementor plugin, etc.
Close the window when you have successfully imported the template.
Now, take a look at the Pages section.
You will notice that it is now filled with essential pages like Homepage, About and Contact.
Neve has also created some posts for you to kickstart your blog.
Creating Your Home Page
Your Home page is one of the most important pages (but not the most important).
The other being About page.
We will only be doing simple editing for you to get your website up.
You will be using Elementor but don’t be overwhelmed by this tool. It is actually very easy to use if you don’t use the advanced features.
If you like Elementor and wish to learn more, I have prepared a complete guide for you.
But before that, I shall change my Site Title and Tagline.
Go to Pages >> Home, and click on Edit with Elementor.
Let’s first edit the Heading.
By double clicking the Heading text box, you can edit directly.
But if you need to separate into 2 lines, you need to insert <br> on the left side.
Also, you will notice that I have created and inserted my logo on the top left hand corner of the page.
We have to do some customisation for that. We will touch on it later.
To edit the text below the heading, you can either double click or go to the left side.
Do the same thing for the orange button LEARN MORE.
If you wish to change the colour, you can take a look at my complete guide on Elementor.
You can link the button to a page or post. I shall show you how to do that later.
For now, I don’t need the black button so I shall delete it.
How do you do that?
Right click and select Delete.
The button is gone but you will realise that the orange button isn’t taking up the space.
You have to delete the column by right clicking it and select Delete.
Use the same method to delete text boxes and others if you wish to.
The orange button now spans across the screen. Under Alignment, select Center to centralise it.
Before we proceed, save your work by clicking UPDATE in the green box on the bottom left.
Next section involves icon box feature.
This is an interesting feature that can be useful at times. Like what I have done, you can replace the existing icons, change the title and description.
The next 2 images show the usual editing of heading, text editor and button.
So far, I have been using the images provided by Neve Theme.
Now, we shall see how to use our own images.
Click on the image and select Choose Image.
Click Select Files and upload images from your computer.
Select the image that you want. Copy the Title and paste it under Alt Text.
For SEO, it is important to have an Alt Text. As the name suggests, it means alternative text.
Once you can see that your images are loaded, you can change the image size.
You can leave it as Large, or change it to any size you want, or even custom size.
(Usually, I will use Large.)
We are going to try something new here by placing headings under the images.
Click and drag the Heading box to the image below.
Under HTML Tag, change the Heading to H3.
It looks just right for me. But feel free to edit it to suit your taste.
I don’t need the review section so I shall delete it.
To delete a section, click on the Cross.
Elementor is very user friendly and it’s catered for beginners. You will find it easy to use it to your advantage.
Alright, as mentioned, I will show you how we can link the button to other pages or posts.
I shall link this orange button to the Contact page.
Under Link, type in Contact and a list of pages/posts will appear. Without saying, you should select the Contact page.
In the footer, I have changed the text for copyright and all rights reserved.
And remember at the start, I put in my logo.
These are customisations of the Neve Theme that you can do and the settings will apply to every post and page.
So, this is what we are going to do next!
Neve Theme Settings
Customisation
Neve Theme has a set of default settings installed for us. However, we still need to change some of the settings to suit our website.
You will know what I mean in a while.
If you haven’t saved your work for a while, click Update. Be sure to save occasionally – I have lost my work before and you wouldn’t want to be like me!
Neve Theme Customisation
In this section, we will only perform some basic changes, enough to get your website in a proper shape.
Go to Appearance >> Customise:
Header
Skip Layout and go straight to Header.
Header is an important part of your website as it sets the right impression for visitors when they land on the page.
Every website or business must have a logo. Here, I assume that you have a logo already.
If not, I have a guide on how you can create a logo quickly.
Click on Change Logo.
Before we change the logo, you might want to disable the toggle for Site Tagline and Title.
It’s up to you. I prefer to just show the logo only.
After which, let’s proceed to change the logo.
Upload your logo image, fill in Alt Text and Select it.
Something to take note here. I named my Title and Alt Text as “logo”.
It’s better to name it “big fat pocket logo”.
It’s a small thing but it’s good to inculcate a good habit when naming images.
If your logo image is not rectangular, crop it, otherwise the header will look very tall in height.
You will know what I mean.
We can also set the Site Icon. This is the small little icon you see on the toolbar and browser tab.
This is not as important as the logo. But it’s nice and presentable to have one.
Same thing here.
You can actually select the same image as the logo but I have chosen a transparent image.
By right, I should use a transparent image for my logo but it’s ok. My header background is white in colour.
Just take note of this.
You should crop the image with just a small border around the logo.
(Site Icon is always a square in shape.)
Footer
The footer usually consists of the copyright statement.
Remember we talk about it earlier on.
This is something that you definitely want to change.
You can just copy the text that I have done (Don’t copy the name of my website!).
Menu
The menu bar in the Header requires some editing as well.
Here, I am going to delete Portfolio from the Menu.
Notice there is an down arrowhead symbol ˅ beside Portfolio. This indicates a sub heading.
I am not a fan of sub heading. It’s entirely up to your own preference. But I prefer to keep my menu clean at the first layer.
We shall delete the main heading first…
followed by the sub heading…
Widgets
Next, we are going to delete some widgets from the Sidebar.
Nowadays, we no longer require the following widgets Recent Comments, Archives, Categories and Meta.
Long time ago, we often see these in blogs. But today, blogs have evolved to be more presentable and most are doing away with these.
Homepage
And finally… homepage settings.
The page Home should be the Homepage.
So whenever, visitors land on bigfatpocket.com or click Home in the Menu, or click the Logo in the Header they will land on this page.
For posts (blog posts), they will appear under the page News.
Let’s say you wish to change the name News to another name, for example, Blog.
Go back to Menu and change the Navigation Label.
I have renamed it to Blog to give you an idea.
You can also reorder the menu items by clicking on Reorder or just simply dragging the items.
Wala! There you have it!
Now your website has a decent customisation and home page!
Almost there!
By now, on your own, you might be able to edit the rest of the pages for About Us, Blog and Contact.
If not, you can continue to follow me till the end!
An Often Ignored But Important Page
About Page
I used to think that the About page is just part of the process when creating a website.
Was it important to me in the past? No.
But today, I feel that it is largely ignored and should be given more attention.
Why?
Think about it. The About page is like our resume, our LinkedIn profile and how your visitors get to know you or your business, especially when they don’t know about you or your brand.
Now, does it make sense to say that it is an important page?
There are a few things that we should highlight in this page. You need not follow all of them but you can pick some.
(I did not change the images provided by Neve Theme. I will just go through the content. I hope you don’t mind that the content is quite brief as I just want to bring across the point.)
You are at the right place
Let your visitors know that they are at the right place.
It’s ok that not all your visitors share the same sentiments as you but for those audience that you target, you must touch their pain points.
How can they benefit from you?
They know that you understand their problems but…
Can you help them?
If you can’t help them, they will not stay on your website for long because they can’t find the solution they want.
Therefore, mention how you can help them.
Your Story - The Most Important Aspect
Everyone has a unique story to tell.
What’s yours? People like to hear stories, especially emotional ones.
For every website that I come across, I always like to read about the author’s or business journey – how they began and the experience they went through.
Stories can build emotions and relationships with your audience and help in your SEO.
If your story is interesting, your visitors will stay on the page longer, improving your website’s ranking.
In your story, write about the hardship you went through and the fruit of your labour (achievements and accomplishments).
If you don’t have achievements or accomplishments yet, you can set an ambition or goal, like me.
But be sure to try your best and achieve it, so that one day you can proudly update this page with it!
Take Action
And lastly, when your visitors reach the end of the page, you should prompt them to take action.
Taking action can be a purchase, reading an article on your website, contacting you or subscribing to your newsletter.
You can edit the button and direct them to the action you want them to take.
Alright! We have completed an important page that you might have casually missed out.
With that, I hope you have gained some valuable insights so far.
Now, I shall move on to Contact page.
Less Important than About Page But Must Have
Contact Page
Contact page is very straightforward.
There’s nothing fanciful about it.
Just something to take note:
Don’t provide too many contacts or social media channels. Otherwise, your audience will be confused.
And also if you provide a contact, you must be confident of managing it well.
If you provide your Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and LinkedIn accounts, you must respond to their queries or comments.
Email (Default Contact)
By default, you must have an email.
That’s because it is very important to collect email address and keep in touch with whoever emails you.
(Remember… earlier we setup your email. It is used to communicate in a professional way. Imagine you put your gmail in your LinkedIn, it doesn’t sound professional right?)
Only collect email address from your target audience. This means these emails should come from your visitors who subscribe to your newsletters or contact you.
Imagine you have 1000 targeted email addresses, and you just launch a new product that sells for $50.
Are you going to text or call them? No, of course.
If you send an email to them and 5% purchase it, you will rake in $2500 in revenue. You get what I mean.
This is how powerful email is.
So, in your contact page, you should always have a form where your visitors can submit their name, email and message.
Key in your email address that you want to receive queries from this form.
Another thing that you should have is a pop up box that you can capture their name and email address when they signal an intention to leave the page.
It is an effective way to collect emails. You can use Elementor Pro to design that. I will show you how.
Nowadays, with everyone spending loads of time on social media, you might want to include your social media channels.
If you are not confident of promoting through social media, then don’t do it.
There is no point posting articles on your Facebook page everyday where there are only 10 views a day.
So that’s it for contact page! It’s simple and straightforward, right?
Putting your blog posts together
Blog Page
Apart from Ecommerce websites, many websites now have articles or blog posts.
(Actually some Ecommerce websites also have articles on the products.)
For any kind of business, you can write articles or blog posts. They will help in your SEO and keep your customers on your website longer.
Imagine you are looking to buy running shoes. You land upon 2 websites selling the same shoes that you are after.
One is just a typical store with description, pictures of the shoe and some reviews.
The other also have the same description, pictures and reviews. But they include an article on how this shoe can help to reduce impact on your knees and minimise injuries.
With both selling at the same price, which one will you buy from? The answer is obvious.
Not saying that it is a must to have a blog. There are many websites and ecommerce sites that do very well without a blog. But it’s good to have if you are starting out with no sales.
Go to Pages >> News. Or look for Posts Page if your Neve Theme template is not the same as mine (Web Agency).
Change the Title to Blog. Most will call it Blog.
You can set your own Title if you wish to.
Next, scroll down to Yoast SEO >> Slug, and change it to blog.
This will change my Blog URL to sleekpage.com/blog.
Click Update.
Confirm the Title and URL:
And…
That’s it!! You are done!
Till now, we haven’t setup any post or page. This will be the last item of this guide.
Actually, posts and pages are essentially the same. It’s just the structure that is different.
Post vs Page - Which one should I choose?
Pages are for home page, contact, about and our history, etc. They come without comments.
Posts are for articles, blog and news. By default, they allow for comments.
Posts can be articles or News
Create Post
Creating a post or page is not as difficult as it seems – only a couple of steps.
Once you get the hang of it, you might want to start writing posts on a regular basis like I do.
Despite my busy schedule of working in the day and taking care of my baby at night, I find writing articles fun and enjoyable.
To create a new post, go to Posts >> Add New.
Give your post a Title [1]. This is one of the most important things when writing a post.
The title must be short and it should attract attention from your target audience.
Once you get this right, the rest depends on your content.
Even if your content is superb but your title is boring, some people will miss your content because they don’t click on your title!
And make sure your title is not too long.
Your URL slug [2] should be short and concise. People should know what the article is about just by looking at the URL.
I have a complete guide on how to come up with great titles and URL slug. Read it when you have the time.
Save it and edit with elementor.
We are going to use the tools from the free version of Elementor.
I am using the Pro version but you can stick to the free version.
Add a Text Editor and Image.
I designed the image using Canva, another great tool that I always use for designing images and infographics.
I will talk about Canva in another article.
Continue adding a Text Editor.
Add a Video and put in the link.
That’s it!
It’s that simple. These are basic steps for creating a post or page.
Of course there are more details when it comes to creating a post but we shall not go through them here.
Alright, you have finally finished setting up your website! Sorry for the long wait.
Give yourself a pat on both your shoulders.
You just created your website
Congratulations!
I did not go through everything in detail, otherwise it will take you weeks to finish.
I only provide the necessary steps to get your website up.
I spent many hours on this guide and I hope it has helped you saved time, money and effort to create a website on your own, rather than getting someone to do it for you.
I would appreciate if you can leave a comment below!
Here are some questions to get you started:
- Has it helped you?
- Is it too technical for you?
- Is there any area that I can improve on?
- What kind of content are you looking for that I didn’t include?
Jay T
Jay is a blessed husband and a cheery father who dotes on his son.
He smiles everyday and blogs at night and on weekends.
His passion is writing on topics about building websites and the tools he recommends.