How to Start Your Own Website

When Do You Need a Website?

You may need your own website if any of the following are true of you:

• You have a lot of content to present.
• You want control over your identity, your customers, and your products.
• You want to give your company a legitimate presence on the web.
• You want to have an online store with multiple products. (Use the Woocommerce WordPress plugin to host your own store, or use the full-featured Shopify hosting service.)
• You want to present your products in a custom way, with bundling, packaging, and other options.
• You want to send and receive email from your personal domain (e.g., john@mylastname.com).

1. Start Your Website with Bluehost Web Hosting

Your website can be hosted on a free service like WordPress.com, or you can host your site on your own service. I recommend hosting your own site for better control and design. There are many hosting options available, but I recommend registering your domain name and hosting your site through Bluehost. Detailed help can be found in Bluehost’s article, “Getting Started @ Bluehost.” See this glossary of terms for helpful definitions of things like CMS, home page, cPanel, SSL, and other words you’ll encounter as you set up and manage your website.

Set up an account with Bluehost.

I recommend that you use Bluehost as your web host. They provide a free domain registration and a one-click installation of WordPress (to manage the content of your site). The basic plan should suffice to start, and you can upgrade later as needed.

Register your domain name.

You can register a new name for free, or you can transfer an existing domain registration you already have. Here are some tips to help you choose a good domain name.

Provide your personal information.

Note that this information will be available publicly at WHOIS, unless you select a paid Domain Privacy service (recommended) during registration. (You can also purchase this service later through the Bluehost control panel.)

Choose the web-hosting package

Select the package you would like to purchase, including the length of your initial registration, domain privacy protection (recommended), and other options at your discretion. You can always add these services later through the Bluehost control panel.

Finish your account registration.

Use a secure password. I recommend generating and storing passwords using the secure Lastpass password manager.

2. Install WordPress

Bluehost provides a one-click installation of the WordPress software, which you will use to manage the look and content of your site. Follow the procedures on this Bluehost blog post, under the heading “Installing WordPress.”

3. Build Your Home Page

From your WordPress dashboard, hover over Pages in the left-hand navigation menu and select Add New. Supply the title of your page, like “Home.” Add any text, images, videos, and other content you would like on this page. You will designate this page as your home page when you customize your theme.

4. Customize Your Site

Choose a theme. WordPress themes manage the look and layout of your site. There are many free themes available that may suit your needs quite well. For a paid theme, I use and recommend the Divi theme by Elegant Themes. Whatever you do, make sure that your theme is responsive to desktop and mobile screens. Update your site title and tagline. Specify your home page. Create a primary menu.