Worpdress is a system that allows anyone to create a website. Making the website a “professional” one is another thing, and the road to making your website truly yours and truly how you want it to be is just beginning.
You don’t need many skills but you do need to know your way around the computer and the internet, have basic understand of how files work and the different types of files. You’ll need to understand a few best practices for creating a modern website, and you’ll have to learn and understand the hierarchy and different options of WordPress.
Photo Editing
You don’t have to be a Photoshop master, but you’ll find Canva to be very handy. Canva Pro makes any web-creators life easier, you don’t need high-end hardware to create graphics and video, it’s all Browser and Cloud based and works like a charm in most cases. With the development of new tools and Ai, Canva can replace many functions of more professional software such as Photoshop, but it can’t replace them completely.
Using Canva for your WordPress website will give you the ability to create different designs that can be implimented into the structure of the website, and you’ll be able to edit and resize images which is crucial for website speed and optimization.
A little bit of HTML and CSS
Yes, I said NO CODE but HTML and CSS simple and you have to be familiar with them at some point in order to make small adjustments to your website. Don’t panic if you’re alergic to code like me, just try to keep an open mind about using it, small steps.
Web Hierarchy and Best Practices for SEO and Accessibility
If you’re not creating the website just for yourself, you’ll need to consider the best practices of a modern website, in order to make sure you’re not penalized by search engines. The hierarchy of a website is not difficult to understand, it begins with titles that are called H1, H2, H3 and so on. Followed by sections that are usually Paragraphs, images and buttons.
H1 is the main title of each page, it should sit somewhere at the beginning of the page, and it serves as a “Welcome, you’re here at…” for both visitors and search engines.
After the H1 title comes a hierarchy that begins with H2, and goes up to H6 if needed. The main sections of the page are seperated with H2 titles, and below the H2 titles are paragraphs and extended hierarchy of titles such as H3 to H6, when needed.
What are the base payments I’ll have for the website?
Two main ones, 1 is the domain name which you can purchase for a few bucks usually from GoDaddy or others. If you’ll purchase a special domain extension, keep in mind that future renewals of that domain may be more expensive than a “standard” domain such as .com or .net
The other thing you’ll be paying for while having a WordPress website is Web Hosting. The service that keeps your website files and serves them to your visitors. Choosing a good hosting is a good idea if you don’t want trouble in the long run, but if you’re just starting out and want to “play around” with Wordperss, it doesn’t really matter which Hosting provider you’ll choose, as long as it’s up-to-date with enough resources and technology that can work with modern systems such as Elementor pro and other plugins that require more resources that ever before. Many hosting providers are now updating their technology and the ones that won’t, won’t be able to run modern website, at all.
Transferring a website between hosting providers
You’ll be able to transfer your website to another hosting provider if you’ll want or need to upgrade. But make sure you do this before your website becomes really popular because the process can to some downtime. You can however try to eliminate downtime when transferring a WordPress website between providers (click to se more).
Understand SMTP – Email servers
The Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) is provided by your hosting provider (usually) or by a 3rd party mailing service, and sends emails from your website. You can use a 3rd party mailing service such as Google Workspace or Outlook 360 in order to send emails from your website – and for that you’ll need to know a bit about DNS addresses.
One of the most common issues with new WordPress website is the mail functionality and deliverability, you should always use a plugin that save and tracks your email delivery even if it’s working correctly most of the time – for example Check and Log Email for WordPress is a free plugin you can use. And you can use an SMTP plugin to set this up – for example WP Mail SMTP.
You can also use a third party mailing service with a Mailing List and automations such as Brevo.