Starting a blog can be a very simple process or very complicated, depending on what you want or rather, the requirement specifications. It can also be totally free or very expensive. There are several platforms where you can set up a blog. Knowing how to do so needs to be simple so you can enjoy the process and look forward to blogging.
For the purpose of this tutorial, we shall focus on how to set-up a blog on wordpress.
GETTING STARTED
From your browser, go to www.wordpress.com (not wordpress.org) Pick a web address that you would prefer for your blog. The Free version will end with “wordpress.com”. Example: wordpresstutorialone.wordpress.com. You will be able to change this later if you decide to buy a domain. WordPress will give you options for buying your own domain.
On the page that follows, fill out all the required information. If the web address that you selected is already being used by someone else, you will be given an opportunity to try another one. WordPress will also give you suggestions of addresses available.
Scroll down the page to see the various options provided by wordpress. If you want to pay for any of the listed services, you can do so at this time. For this tutorial, we will go with the free option.
Click on the “Start a Blog” button from the screen shot above. The next page will give you an option to type in your blog title, the tagline for your blog and an option to change the language for our blog.
The next step is picking a theme for your blog. A theme is the general look and feel of your blog. You can choose a free theme or buy a theme. You can change your theme at any given time.
Your next step should be to customize the theme. You can decide not to customize the theme by simply going to the next step, but it is more advisable that you do. Customization will give you an opportunity to make your blog more personalized and unique.
Once you are done with the customization, you need to link the blog to social media sites. This is done through the social icons tab. Linking the blog to social media will allow posts to be shared on the various accounts you have.
After this, your blog should be up and running and you can start posting. The only last thing that you have to do is to confirm your email address by logging in to the email address account that you provided during registration, and clicking on the confirmation link that was sent to you.
To access the back end of your blog at any time, once again from your browser go to wordpress.com. On the wordpress.com start page, click on the login button and you will be presented with a login page as below. Key in the email or username and password that you provided during registration, and click on the login button.
You will be forwarded to a page similar to the one below. If you have created many blogs, you will see all of them on my sites section. You will also be given an option to create another blog. There are many options of things you can do from this page including changing your domain, but most of them can be done from the dashboard. Go ahead and click on the My Sites option.
The my sites section is the ultimate control panel for your blog. There is a lot that you can do from here. Go ahead and click the menu options one at a time and see what is possible in every option. All these can be done at any time. They are not required in order for you to start blogging.
To start blogging immediately, on the top menu, click on the “Write” option to be taken to the posting page. Type or past your content on the area provided and submit to post.To edit the post, click on the posts option on the menu on the left and follow instructions.
This tutorial was an introduction to wordpress and creating a simple free blog. The next tutorial will cover the many operations that can be done using the dash board. There will also be a tutorial on how to use wordpress.org CMS to develop much advanced web sites and web based systems for advanced users.