Explaining WordPress for beginners – a comprehensive and detailed guide

If you want to build your new site, you will make sure to launch it at the perfect time with its excellent performance and affordable cost, and these three features are available in WordPress. So, in this guide, I will provide you with a comprehensive and detailed explanation of WordPress from the time we get to know WordPress until you customize your site in the way you love.

I prepared this short video for you to understand what WordPress is

In addition, you can continue reading the article to get more information in explaining WordPress.

 

What is wordpressWordPress is an open source content management system that was created in 2003 by an automatic company based on (PHP & MySQL) and it is one of the easiest ways to develop your website based on a control panel and customizable tools for your site until WordPress became the most popular among website owners.

Why is WordPress the most popular?

WordPress is the most popular among website owners ( about 37% of websites are based on WordPress), and you always find site creation explanations recommending you to use WordPress, and you ask what is the secret of this popularity?

In fact, there are many factors that make WordPress the top of the list of content management systems ( CMS ) as it is an open source system that allows anyone to modify the code and produce thousands of templates, plugins and other tools from various programmers around the world.

This combination of tools allows you to create any type of website (blog creation, personal website, business gallery, online store, discount sites, social platforms .. and other sites), and WordPress is not just a blogging tool just like Blogger.

In addition, most hosting companies support WordPress, and the system is constantly updated by the supporting company, and the same is true for companies that produce templates and tools as they update their products in order to provide a safe environment and better performance for site owners.

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WordPress.com or WordPress.org

If you want to learn more about WordPress and go to its official site, you will find two WordPress sites, one is WordPress.com and the other is WordPress.org, what is the difference between them?

Basically .org stands for acronym = organization and .com stands for acronym = commercial.

Depending on WordPress.org, you can download the WordPress script for free and upload it to your hosting ( for example, Bluehost ) and you can use it for your site.

As for WordPress.com, it allows you to provide free hosting and use it to launch your site with limited capabilities, such as including the name of WordPress in your site domain (example.wordpress.com) with no possibility to put custom templates and plugins or modify the PHP code, and therefore I do not advise you this good, but I advise you to rely On your paid hosting, that’s what I explain in the rest of the article.

Note : You may ask if the WordPress system is 100% free, so what does the company that developed it benefit from? Answer: The company does not benefit from selling the WordPress system itself, but rather from selling the tools and templates inside it.

 

Now let’s move on to the steps of explaining WordPress in more detail.

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Step 1: Install WordPress

You can rely on WordPress to launch your site by installing it in one of two ways: the manual method, or the automated method.

Manual method: You download the latest version of WordPress from WordPress.org, upload the script to your hosting using FTP Manager, to Public_Html file, create a new database in MySQL Data bases, and install WordPress.

In fact, it is a complicated method, and there is no need to explain it, especially since most hosts nowadays provide you with a one-click installation of WordPress, depending on the automated installer.

The automated method: You go to the hosting control panel, then choose the domain required to install WordPress, then choose to click on the “Install WordPress” button.. That’s how easy it is!

The method differs from one hosting to another, but the method is the same in choosing to install WordPress from the website builder tools.

 

For example, if you purchased hosting from Bluehost and then went to the control panel, you will find the ability to install WordPress with one click in the control panel in the (Websites) field.

The following video also explains how to buy hosting from Bluehost and install WordPress.

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Step 2: Use the WordPress Dashboard

After installing WordPress, you will find the integrated control panel that WordPress provides you with, through which you can fully control your site.

You can go to the control panel by adding (/wp-admin) after the domain name, so the link will be like this:

 

example.com/wp-admin

 

 

This link will take you directly to the control panel and ask you to type the username and password that you relied on during the installation of WordPress (I explained this in the previous video)

After logging in, you will see the appearance of the WordPress dashboard like this

Once you go to the main dashboard, you will find an overview of the latest news on the site, as well as all the available updates that you need.

You will find the board is easy and simple, and it is mainly divided into three sections

1. At the top of the control panel, you will find the toolbar, and it contains the most used tools in the control panel such as going to the site, adding a new page or article, and recent comments.
2. On the left side, you will find the navigation menu, which includes all the tools of the control panel, and through each tab you can navigate to a special part of the site management, such as (managing articles, managing pages, managing the appearance of the site, main settings .. and so on).
3. The large area in which you use the control panel.

 

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Step 3: Customize the look of the site

After installing WordPress, you need to customize the appearance of the site, what will the home page look like? Site pages and articles, color customization, article layout, sidebar, and all these details you customize based on a ready-made template.

Go to Appearance >> themes

Then, click on Add new

Then choose the Feature filter, and choose the desired properties for the template: do you want a template for a blog, an online store, a business gallery, and other properties, then after selecting the properties, you click on apply filters

You will find many templates available in front of you, choose the one that suits you, then press install, Activate

And you will find your site appears with the beautiful template you chose

Another option is to buy a paid theme from Theme Forest (the largest store for WordPress themes) and then after purchase you will get the template in the form of a .zip file that you will download to your computer.

Then you can upload the template through appearnce >> themes then Add new then Upload Theme and then upload the template file from your compute

 

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Step 4: Publish the content

After you customize the look of the site to your liking, we will publish the different types of content, whether that content in the form of pages or articles. You may ask what is the difference between articles and pages?

Articles are placed and published within the blog within the group of articles and are divided into categories and tags (such as the article you are reading now in the blog) and users can build an interaction environment through comments,
and pages are for unchanging content in static pages (such as the communication page, about us, our services …etc.).

Now let me tell you how to publish articles and pages

4.1 Publish a new article

You can post a new article by going to Posts >> add new

You will be taken to the WordPress visual editor to add new content

3. You will write in this rectangle the title of the article
4. In this large white part you will write the entire content of the article
5. After you have finished writing the article, you will select its category (if you created categories before that)
6. You will click on Add new category (if you are going to publish the article In a new category that has not yet been created)
7. You will add tags to the article for easy access (optionally)
8. After the article is properly configured, you will click on (Publish)

This will be your first post on your blog🙂

4.2 Publish a new page

In the same way, you can post a new article, by going to Pages >> add new

You will go to the WordPress visual editor, through which you can add the contents of the page in the same way by typing the title of the page and the contents of the page, and then clicking on Publish.

 

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Step 5: Install WordPress Plugins

You have installed WordPress, created the content of your site and published it to users, but there are still some features that you want to increase the site, what is the solution? You will search for plugins that implement these features and activate them on a site to get the desired feature.

There are thousands of free add-ons for various purposes: from setting social sharing buttons to activating security and security features.

You will easily search for and install the required plugins by going to
Plugins >> add new

3. In the search box, you will type the name of the extension you are looking for, then you will find different results from the extensions
4. You will install the required extension by pressing install now and then activate

You can also upload the extension from your computer, by uploading the compressed file (.zip) in the same way we used to upload the template.

By going to Plugins >> add new
to go to this page

3. You will choose the Upload plugin
4. You will click on Browse and upload the .zip file from your computer
5. After uploading the file from your computer, you will click on install now, then do it after that

Thus, the extension is downloaded from your computer and installed on your site

Some recommended add-ons

There are some necessary plugins that I advise you to install regardless of your site type, as they will add some great and useful features to your new site. I advise you to type the name of the extension in the search box and then install it in the previous way, which is as follows:

Google XML Sitemaps: This plugin creates an XML map to make your site easier to read for search engines.

Rank math SEO: This plugin helps you make SEO settings for your site’s pages and articles, to improve their visibility in search results correctly. This optimization includes keyword positioning, meta, page SEO settings, etc.

Wordfence Security: Helps you set up a firewall for your site, to prevent hackers and malicious files from accessing your site’s database or files.

Contact Form 7: A simple extension that helps you place a contact form on your site, so that users can contact you through this form.

Note : I do not advise you to install too many plugins unless you need each add-on that you will rely on (such as the ones I mentioned to you), but installing too many plugins unnecessarily will have a negative impact on the overall performance of your site.

 

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 Step 6: Optimize Website Performance

In the previous steps of this tutorial, I introduced you to the basic things that you can do to create your WordPress site in a professional manner, starting with the installation of WordPress, through customizing the appearance of the site, publishing the content, and installing the necessary plugins.

Now I will explain to you a further part in making some general improvements to your site’s performance, and these improvements you will need sooner or later especially after you have published many articles, pages, images .. many visitors, and so on.

These improvements will generally affect site speed to ensure a good user experience and a good search engine impression (site speed is an important SEO factor).

We will make all these improvements through a few simple steps

6.1 Installing cache plugins

Cache plugins generally help you to improve site speed by caching data and then displaying it to the user so that it will be displayed the second time faster.

For example, if you visit the WPar.net site frequently, the cache plugin will save a static copy of the site to be shown to the user on the second and third visit instead of loading PHP and Javascript scripts each time, and this definitely increases the speed of the site.

Most popular cache plugins:

• WP Super Cache
• W3 Total Cache
• WP Fastest Cache

Note : You can choose to add one of the three, and do not install them together.

6.2 Configure your site images

Creating images is a necessary task for any website owner, because often many images are displayed on one page (like this article you are reading, or like e-store owners). Most website owners display several images on a single page, imagine each 1 or 2 MB image, the page will load in a very short time.

You will format the images in several steps:

• Use optimal image sizes: For example, if you are viewing an image on your site on a user’s phone screen, why does the image need to be 6000×4000 for example? The result is that the user’s browser will load the large size and then resize the image to appear in the small size on the mobile screen. So my advice to you is to use ideal image sizes in general.
• Compress Image Size: By default, images are produced at the maximum size through graphic programs, or through popular image download sites. It is better to compress the image size without losing image quality through graphic programs, or you can compress images using one of the ready-made tools
• Using Image Compress Plugin: If you already have a website and upload many images and you don’t have time to load images and then upload them again, then it is better for you in this case to use WP Smuch plugin , it is a WordPress plugin that enables you to professionally compress all your site images.

6.3 Compress your website files

You can compress the site files (HTML, CSS, PHP, & JavaScript) so that the user can interact with the compressed files instead of the original files of large size.

This process will help you increase the speed of your site without any negative impact on your site. You can accomplish this task with a WordPress plugin

Most popular file compression add-ons:

• WP-Optimize
• Hummingbird

After installing the plugins, you will activate the GZIP feature.

 6.4 JavaScript loading delay

Most of the templates and plugins basically contain many code written in JavaScript in order to do some tasks on your site.

The recommended solution by Google’s programmers is to first load the contents of the site (pages and articles) and then delay the loading of these codes from the JavaScript.

You can accomplish this task through one of the following add-ons

•  WP Deferred JavaScripts
• Speed Booster Pack

Note: You do not do this task once you create a new WordPress site, but when the size of the site increases and the number of features available in the templates and plugins installed, then you will need to do this task.

 6.5 Use of a CDN

Using a Content Delivery Network (or CDN ) helps you speed up your site by saving a temporary copy of your site in several data centers around the world, then when a user browses your site they browse to the stored copy from the nearest data storage center nearby.
Thus, this factor works effectively in increasing the speed of the site.

You can use the free version of CloudFare and get CDN and DDoS protection.

6.6 Activate the LazyLoad feature

If your site contains a lot of content on one page, for example a sales page with a lot of paragraphs and images or published articles with an abundance of information and images, it will be appropriate for you to activate the LazyLoad feature.

This feature loads the content that the user is browsing, and then when he scrolls the rest of the page, the rest of the content (such as images, etc.) is loaded.

There are some templates and plugins that have this feature by default, but if you do not have this feature in the template you are using, you can rely on the Lazy Load or Rocket Lazy Load add-on .

Note : If your website pages are small, there is no need to use this feature.

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Step 7: Securing Your WordPress Site

In the last and important step, we will talk about some things related to securing your WordPress site from any malicious files or hackers accessing it. This does not mean that WordPress is insecure, but that it must be secured like any other software in the information world.

Here’s some quick info to secure your site

7.1 Get the latest updates from WordPress

The WordPress system is always updated by the company responsible for its development (Automatic) by providing newer versions to provide a more secure information environment. The same goes for themes and plugins that you use.

To browse it go to Dashboard >> updates

You will find the updates page divided into 3 sections

• 1. WordPress updates: Ensure that you are using the latest version, and while there is a newer version it will offer you to download the latest version automatically (by pressing the Update now button) if it is available
• 2. Plugins: It displays the available updates for some of the plugins you use. In this example, you will find two plugins that have a newer version available to download by selecting the two plugins and then clicking on Update plugins
• 3. Themes: There are also updates available with themes that depend on it

7.2 Change your username and password

It is important that you use a secure username and password for your account on the WordPress dashboard, as they are not easily expected by hackers.

As for the username, try to make it unique other than some versions of WordPress that use Admin by default. As for the password, it is important that it be more than 8 characters and contain small & capital letters, symbols and numbers (ExAmPel!2#4)

7.3 Get a backup

When your site expands, and its data is updated periodically, it is important to get a backup copy (back up) on a daily or weekly basis. This step is very important to keep your site files safe and you can recover them in case they are lost for any reason, God forbid.

If you rely on a hosting service that provides you with the feature of taking backup copies for an additional cost, I advise you to get them, as they are the best solutions. Otherwise, you can take a backup manually by downloading Database + site files to your computer, or relying on some add-ons to save backup copies such as UpdraftPlus   or BackUpWordPress .

Note: You can choose to save data on a daily basis if your site is getting big changes quickly, otherwise you can just make a weekly or monthly backup at first.

With this, we have finished this tutorial in providing a comprehensive explanation of WordPress and covering the most important basics and information you need to know how WordPress is run.

If you want another practical explanation of creating your site dynamically based on WordPress + Elementor, you can view this video

Then what?

The next step is for you to choose, to begin with the practical implementation of building and customizing your WordPress site in a way that enhances your presence on digital platforms. Days go by and we make sure that we have a strong presence in the digital world.

Share with us in the comments your new site after its creation.