Wordpress. Step by step for beginners, part 4

Hi again.

So far you're still waiting for money to pay me for a new Wordpress website, and to pay for the new domain name that you have almost decided on. At this point you need to remember the hosting also needs to be paid, so, right after this, e-mail your aunt and let her know how much more you will need. For a year it will be R780-00, and you get the best Wordpress hosting anyone could want.

I did miss writing Wordpress. Step by step for beginners, part 4 last night due to real work commitments, so this lesson had to be postponed.

Wordpress purist wannabes will try to involve you in adding widgets, and activating Akismet, but I really don't see the point. Akismet is an anti-spam plug-in, and for a site that has no traffic yet, and even less content, Akismet is just not necessary.

Anyway, we activate it for you, and adding other Wordpress widgets comes later. In point of fact, when we first start talking to you, we find out exactly what it is you want your website to do, and we will load up to two widgets for you. In addition to that, we will send you to look at themes.

Themes dictate what your site will look like. You tell us what you like, and we load and activate your first free Wordpress theme for you.

If you want slight alterations made to the appearance of your theme, our generosity disappears. You will have to pay for that.

Please understand, we do try to give as much as we can, but we do also need to make a living, as this is our business. We do make some money on the hosting, and we do take a handling fee on the domain registration. These fees cover our costs. On top of that we charge R120-00 to load Wordpress, a theme, and two Wordpress widgets. We don't make much, so please, don't ask for discount.

People are just people, and their likes and dislikes change. Wordpress know this, and to keep you happy they provide, free of charge, 1193 (and counting) themes for you to choose from.

To change a theme, go to your dashboard. A little way down the left is a button that says:"Appearance". Click it.

It will open, and look something like this:

Click on "Add new themes".

Click on the image above to enlarge it, and you will see that this page is an extremely comprehensive search filter. My problem with it is that very often the designer's tags, on which the search is based, and my kinda english are not the same. So, what I do, is I start my search with just a single color. You can do the same. Click in the box next to the colour, scroll down, and click "find themes".

Once you have found the free Wordpress theme you want, it is plain sailing.

Preview the theme, click install, and let Wordpress do its magic. When the theme has been loaded to your server, you get a message that says "Activate". Click on the word "Activate".

Now go to the top left of your monitor where it says "visit site", and go visit your now re-themed site.

I may have mentioned it before, but if I have not, Wordpress is Awesome!

In the next Wordpress:Step by Step for beginners we're going to take a look at the difference between a Wordpress Page and a Wordpress Post. This is probably the one area that most confuses new Wordpress users.

Until then, rest well...

The full, growing list of Wordpress, step by step for beginners, tutorials is here