I talk about WordPress quite a lot on this blog. It’s an excellent blogging platform, and it’s a great addition to almost any site — as long as you have time to write on it.
However, some people get intimidated by the idea of installing it and end up using Blogger or something else instead. Long-term, having the software installed on your own server offers a lot of advantages, so here’s how it’s done.
Before we get started you’ll need to do a few things:
- Get hosting established. For this tutorial I’m using a cPanel-based host, though most hosts will be similar.
- Get your FTP software installed and configured. The FTP software I use is completely free and is called FileZilla. Your hosting company will provide your username and password, which you put into the software.
- Find the location of your hosting “control panel”. Again, this will be provided by your hosting provider.
During the install, I’ll be going out to wordpress.org to download the software. Note that wordpress.com is something different — be sure you’re going to the .org site.
Ready? Here we go.
After you’ve finished installing WordPress, check out “I’ve Installed WordPress — now what?” for some suggested next steps to take.
Update: This video is also now available over on A Brighter Web
