Installing Wordpress - The Easy Way

If you took my advice and purchased web hosting from CostCutterDomains.com, HostGator.com or BlueHost.com, you already have a very special tool that will make installing Wordpress a breeze.  The tool, a special tool for installing multiple scripts or programs on your website, is called Fantastico.  And boy is it fantastic!

When you first created your web hosting account you picked or were assigned a username and password.  This username and password allows you access to your domain’s control panel.  The control panel will give you many options, such as the ability to check your websites, add new email accounts, upload files from your PC to your website, and much more.  One of those “much more’s” is the Fantastico tool. 

To login to your cPanel control panel using HostGator.com, for example, you simply go to http://www.yoursite.com/cpanel — where “yoursite.com” is the actual name of your domain name.  When you try to visit this url address you’ll be asked for your username and password.  Once you enter your login info you’ll see a large website with many icons and labels underneath each icon noting what function you control or access by clicking on the icon.  The Fantastico icon is like a large light baby blue happy face with the label Fantastico De Luxe.

Click on the Fantastico icon and you’ll see many different programs and scripts on the left-side menu of the next page.  Underneath the “Blogs” programs you’ll see several different blog managers you can install with Fantastico.  One of these option is Wordpress.  Click on the Wordpress menu option.  Then, in the right-side column click on “New Installation” option.  This will bring up a blog configuration page.  On the configuration page leave the “Install in Directory” field leave it blank.  This will install Wordpress in your root directory.

Next choose a username and password for your blog.  Then, type in the nickname you want to appear as the “author” for all blog posts you write.  You might want to type in your first name or a ghost name if you want your name to remain a secret. 

The “Admin Email Address” field will have your default email address listed.  You may wish to change this to a custom email address, like sales@yourdomain.com or yourname@yourdomain.com, for example. If you haven’t already added a new email address that matches what you want to put in this field you can do so later, through the “Mail” menu option on your control panel.  At any rate, type in the email address you want to use for anyone responding to your blog.  Don’t forget to add this new email address via your control panel later.

Next pick a site name for your site (Fantastico will prefill this option with your domain name, but you can edit this and write any site title you choose.  Next type in a short 25 to 30 letter (or less) description for your website.  This is like a subtitle or by-line. 

If you opted to use a custom email address for the admin, you’ll need to change the e-mail account username to the email address you’ve chosen.  For example, if your username for your website is “makemoney” then you’ll see  the phrase “makemoney” in the E-Mail account username slot.  Feel free to change this to your new email address if you wish.  Thus, if your new email address you want to use for all correspondence is andy@yourname.com then your email account name username slot should be modified to read “andy.”

Lastly, add your email account password and click on the menu button below that says “Install Wordpress.”  Next, click on the option that says “Finish Installation.” 

You’re almost finish.  When a new page appears you’ll see a slot that says “Email the details for an installation.”  Add your email address here.  Lastly, click the “Send e-Mail” button and the username/password instructions and notes about the installation will be sent to you.

Now go and visit your site.  Just type your domain name into your web browser window using the following format -  http://www.yoursitename.com (substituting with your domain name, of course) and you should see a website appear for your domain with a generic blue and white website template.  You are now ready to start posting to your blog, but chances are you will want to change the template, what Wordpress calls the “theme,” so that your website won’t look so bland as the generic template you’ll see immediately after Wordpress is installed.  In my next post, I’ll provide instructions on how you can change the look and feel, or theme, for your new blog’s web design.