What is WordPress? A guide to using WordPress for beginners
You’re probably acquainted with WordPress as an active player in the realm of SEO. However, you may be astonished to find that WordPress now has a dominant presence, powering around 23% of all websites globally. It is at the forefront of popular open-source content management systems. It is the favored option for both organizations and individuals owing to its simplicity and wide variety of functions. But just what is WordPress? How does one go about learning how to use it? Rankmarket.org is here to answer these questions and give insights in this article.
What is WordPress?
WordPress is an open-source system developed in PHP that makes use of the MySQL database. It allows you to develop a variety of websites, such as e-commerce sites, informative portals, online portfolios, and discussion forums, all with a user-friendly, intuitive administrative interface for simple content generation and modification.
WordPress’s main features are as follows:
- Word Press is open-source software provided under the GPL license, which allows anybody to download and use it for free.
- User-friendly and beginner-friendly: The WordPress interface is very user-friendly, allowing newbies to get up and running fast.
- Word Press is translated into many languages and allows for the building of multilingual websites.
- Vast user community and many resources: The Word Press ecosystem has a vast user community, a multitude of themes and plugins to select from, and an abundance of resources for users.
WordPress’s origin and development history
WordPress was created in 2003 by Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little. Word Press began as a blogging platform and has now developed into a robust Content Management System (CMS) capable of generating a wide range of websites.
WordPress has grown rapidly over the years and is now the most popular CMS on a worldwide scale. Many well-known websites, including The New York Times, CNN, Forbes, and the BBC, use it.
WordPress development milestones:
- 2003: Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little initiate the development.
- 2004: The first plugins for it are introduced.
- 2005: It becomes the most widely used blogging platform.
- 2007: The theme library is launched, enabling easier customization of interfaces.
- 2010: WordPress reaches 12 million websites built on its platform.
- 2019: WordPress captures a 34% market share of websites and global CMS.
- 2021: WordPress 5.8 “Martha” is released with significant interface and speed improvements.
In little over 15 years, WordPress has risen to become the world’s top Content Management System, with over 42% market share.
Diverse types of websites you can build
Personal blog: WordPress is an ideal tool for creating personal blogs to share articles, ideas, and hobbies with the world. Features such as post management, tags, and categories make blogging more straightforward. Users can customize the interface with thousands of available free blog themes. Some popular WordPress blog themes include Newspaper, Illdy, Mesmerize, Astra, and OceanWP.
Business website: Businesses can easily build websites to introduce their company, showcase products or services, or create e-commerce platforms for online sales using WordPress. WordPress provides themes and plugins for building professional and feature-rich business websites, such as WooCommerce, Elementor, Divi, and Avada.
Community website: WordPress is suitable for constructing community websites and forums where people can exchange information and share experiences. The BBPress plugin facilitates the easy setup of forums and discussion groups within WordPress.
News website: WordPress serves as an ideal platform for online newspapers and magazines. With features for post management and news categories, online magazines can be created effortlessly. Newspaper is one of the most popular WordPress themes for building news websites.
Why should you use WordPress for website design?
User-friendly and beginner-friendly: In contrast to understanding sophisticated programming languages, WordPress enables users with no programming expertise to begin developing a website after a short learning time. The WordPress admin interface may seem complicated at first look, yet it is naturally logical and simple to use. Beginners will soon understand how to add posts and pages, create menus, and tweak themes and plugins.
Free and open source: As open-source software under the GPL, WordPress is always free for users to download and use. Users have full control over their websites and are not tied to a platform-providing company. This is crucial for the long-term sustainability of a website.
Easily customizable: WordPress users may easily alter the design and functionalities of their websites thanks to thousands of themes and plugins. You may entirely change the design of your website without changing any code by using a suitable free or commercial theme.
Strong and supportive community: WordPress offers an enormously big and strong user base, with over 42% of the worldwide website market share. Almost any problem may be handled with the help of the community. WordPress Vietnam forums and specialized Facebook groups with tens of thousands of people are always ready to provide assistance and exchange experiences with developing WordPress websites.
Device compatibility: WordPress’s responsive design capabilities is a notable feature, providing compatibility with all devices. The website interface automatically changes to accommodate tablets and phones, giving consumers the greatest experience possible across all platforms.
Search engine optimization: SEO optimization provides a substantial competitive advantage by allowing websites to appear high in Google search results. WordPress themes and plugins make it easier to optimize content, titles, URLs, and page load speed. To improve search ranks, administrators may quickly modify meta descriptions and title tags.
However, before selecting to use WordPress to create your website, it’s important to understand some of the disadvantages of it:
- Installation of templates and plugins: Installing templates and plugins is not an easy procedure, and erroneous installs might result in problems during use.
- Suitability for small organizations: WordPress struggles with huge database sizes, making it less ideal for organizations with high server capacity.
- Security issues: Because of the variety of plugins, Word Press is vulnerable to security breaches. This may be prevented by regularly upgrading these plugins.
- User management roles: WordPress’s user management roles are currently rather restricted. Installing Word.Press multisite plugins and splitting administration responsibilities might help to overcome this issue.
- Data processing speed: When loading sites with big amounts of material, many users find Word.Press to be sluggish. However, this may be solved by using tactics such as caching, removing unneeded plugins, optimizing picture sizes, and limiting the number of advertising on the website.
WordPress usage guide
Installation and setup
Choosing hosting and a domain: Before you begin building a Word.Press website, you must first choose hosting and a domain. The hosting service offers storage space for data, while the domain acts as the website’s access address. Choosing dependable, high-speed hosting has a huge impact on the user experience on the website.
Choosing a WordPress Theme: The architecture and look of a website are formed by a Word.Press theme, often known as a layout or skin. There are many of free and paid Word.Press themes available. Astra, GeneratePress, and OceanWP are some popular free themes.
Installing WordPress: Once you’ve decided on hosting and a domain name, you may install Word Press straight from the hosting control panel (such as cPanel). Word Press installation on hosting is often automated; you just need to give basic information, and the procedure may be done in a matter of minutes.
WordPress admin interface and basic features
After successfully installing Word.Press, you may use the admin interface to setup and add content for your website. The admin interface is commonly accessed via the URL “tenweb.com/wp-admin.”
Dashboard: The Dashboard gives you an overview of your website, including information like the amount of posts, users, and views. Important alerts are also available here.
Post administration: This is the most important component for generating articles and news for your website. The interface is user-friendly and simple to use, allowing for efficient content administration.
Page administration: Pages are used in Word.Press to construct static pages such as an About Us or Contact page. To make the website manageable, avoid creating too many pages.
Media library management: This is the area for managing media assets such as photographs and videos that have been posted to the website. The information may be embedded in posts or pages.
In addition to the functions mentioned above, the Word Press admin interface provides several choices for user role assignment, plugin installation, menu modification, and website display customization.
Creating posts, pages, and managing content
After being acquainted with the admin interface, the next step is to learn how to create posts and pages, which are among the most typical duties while running a Word Press website.
Writing posts in Word Press:
To add a new post, navigate to Posts > Add New.
Here, users fill in the information for the post:
- Post title
- Post content: supports text formatting, link insertion, images, tables, etc.
- Assign to a category (if it’s a blog post)
- Featured Image (optional)
- Choose to add to the menu (displayed on the website or not)
Finally, click Publish to make the post public, or Save Draft if you don’t want to publish it immediately.
Adding basic pages
To create basic content pages like About Us or Contact, go to Pages > Add New.
Similar to adding a post, users enter information about the page:
- Page Title
- Detailed Content
- Featured Image (if applicable)
- Choose to display in the menu
Managing content
It is critical to organize postings into distinct categories in order to efficiently manage material. Consider categorizing news websites by certain themes or businesses. For simpler maintenance, static pages such as Home and About should be placed as child pages. Searching and maintaining website material gets easier with logical categorization. You may speed up the process by using content search plugins.
Customizing website interface with Themes and Plugins
One of WordPress’s most notable features is the ability to quickly change the interface using themes and plugins. You may select from hundreds of free and paid themes and plugins.
Installing and customizing WordPress Themes:
Word.Press themes are the clothes that a website wears. You may completely transform the appearance of your website by just changing the theme.
Return to the admin panel and click Appearance > Themes. Users may do the following here:
- Search and install new themes
- Activate/Deactivate themes
- Install default themes
- Customize themes to change the interface
Installing and using WordPress plugins:
Plugins are extensions that allow you to add various features to Word Press, such as comment functionality, social media integration, speed optimization, SEO, and more.
To install a plugin, go to Plugins > Add New and enter the plugin name in the search box to install.
After installation, activate the plugin to start using it. Some popular plugins include:
- Contact Form 7: Allows customers to contact you through a form.
- Yoast SEO: Optimizes SEO on Word Press.
- W3 total cache: Optimizes web loading speed.
Effective WordPress assistance tools
AI Creatr
AI Creatr is an innovative web tool that harnesses the power of ChatGPT to effortlessly generate 100% completed and ready-to-monetize affiliate sites within minutes. This cutting-edge software streamlines the process, making it quick and easy to establish profit-ready platforms without the need for extensive manual input.
S3 Video Host
S3 Video Host is a state-of-the-art video hosting and marketing platform designed for seamless uploading of unlimited marketing and sales videos with professional flair. This revolutionary technology sets marketers apart by providing a swift, efficient solution to host, stream, and market videos without incurring any monthly fees. Elevate your video presence with S3 Video Host and experience a level of convenience and performance that’s unparalleled in the industry.
GenerateBlocks Pro
GenerateBlocks Pro is a versatile block-based Word Press plugin that enhances your website building experience. It seamlessly integrates with the Gutenberg editor, providing over 150 attractive blocks for easy customization. This lightweight tool ensures a streamlined design process without unnecessary bloat, making it a perfect companion for the GeneratePress theme. Elevate your content creation with GenerateBlocks Pro’s added features and flexibility.
Conclusion
So, you now understand what WordPress is, its benefits and drawbacks, and how to utilize WordPress to create a website. With millions of websites previously developed on it, it has progressed from a simple blogging platform to the ideal platform for building many sorts of online websites. Whether you’re new to the world of websites or an experienced user, we hope this article has offered a thorough understanding of WordPress and its features. Wishing you success!
