Just What IS SEO?

So, lets start with the basics: what is SEO? SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. It means that you do everything you possibly can to help the search engines find you, and once they do find you, they can tell quickly what your site is about and which keywords you are targeting. If that left you scratching your head, let me break it down a little more. A keyword is a word or a phrase that describes your business. If you sell jewelry, your keyword is jewelry: that is what you want to be known for. If you sell only handcrafted jewelry, then your keyword is “handcrafted jewelry”. When someone types “handcrafted jewelry” in the search box in Google, you want your web site to be the one at the top of the list on the results page. If you sell pearl necklaces on one page, and Swarovski bracelets on another, you have two keywords, or phrases, that you want to rank for. Most people will have anywhere from 6 to 30 keywords they want to rank for.

What Is Ranking?

Google “ranks” pages by their content and by the number of links pointing back to them. This is how they decide who gets the number one spot, which website is listed second, third, fourth, and so on. Your Google ranking determines where your website shows up, and the higher your ranking, the more visitors you get. I know you’ve searched for something, and it comes back with a million hits. You might work your way through the sites on the first page, and if you still didn’t find exactly what you were looking for, you might click on the second page of results, but most people don’t. Most people won’t look beyond that first page of results, so that is where you want to be. By default, Google lists 10 sites on the first page. That means that you want to be ranked in the top 10 for your keyword to get the most search traffic.

How Do You Get “Ranking”

So, exactly how does Google determine ranking? Well, if you can figure that one out, you can write a book, sell millions of copies, and hire someone else to sell your jewelry for you. The truth is, Google guards that information very closely. Nobody knows for sure, but lots of people have figured out a variety of things that help you move up in ranking. Another thing to be aware of is the fact that the algorithm changes. They are constantly refining the criteria they use to determine who has the best website for a given keyword. If you are thinking that it is like trying to hit a moving target, you are right.

How To Tell Google Who You Are And What You Do

But lets start with the basics: we need to tell Google, and other search engines, the name of our website, a brief description of it, and the keywords we want to be known for. Sounds like a lot of work, but with WordPress, we can install one simple plugin that handles all of this for us. One of the first plugins we installed was named “All In One SEO”. When we activated it, we got this big red banner across the top of the page telling us that it needed to be configured.

To do that, scroll down to the Settings menu on the left and click on All In One SEO.

Don’t get overwhelmed by all of the options that this plugin offers. We are only going to start with the basics and leave the rest of them on the default settings.

Basic Settings

The first thing that you want to do is to click the button beside the word Enabled. Then move down in the Home Title box and put the title of your website there. Next, write a short description. This is what searchers will see when your website shows up in the search engine results. Make yourself sound good. “Handcrafted chains created using the ancient art of chainmaille” sounds so much better than “I make chains”. Think of your most enthusiastic supporter and how they would describe your website. This is the type of description you want here. This is not the time to be modest. You only have a few seconds to catch someone’s attention and entice them to click on your website. Don’t gush, and don’t lie, but this is no time to hide your light under a barrel – let the whole world know what you do.

The third box is for your keywords. Put in everything you can think of that someone might use to search for a business like yours. Don’t go overboard and put things that have nothing to do with your site just because you think it will get you traffic. Periodically, the engineers at Google will do a visual inspection of random websites. If they do one and find that the site lists iPods in its keywords, but doesn’t actually have anything to do with iPods, they will penalize you for it by dropping your ranking so far down no one will ever find you. So don’t try to cheat the system, but do put in everything that relates to your site.

That’s It

I change these settings and nothing else. Fill in the blanks and click Update Options down at the bottom of the page.  The defaults work fine in most cases. After you become an SEO expert, you may want to experiment with different settings, but the basics will do just fine for starting out.

Links  = Authority

Another thing that helps with your ranking is the number of links pointing back to your site. I’m not talking about exchanging links with another website. Google caught on to that practice long ago and doesn’t give as much weight to those types of links as they used to. When you link to me and I link to you, that is called a two-way link, and in Google’s eyes, it is less valuable than if I link to your site because I found something on there that I thought was worth sharing. For instance, if I’m looking at your jewelry and I find a ring that is gorgeous, I might put a link to it on my website or my Twitter or Facebook pages. These are one-way links (as long as you don’t see it and link back to me), and they tell Google that someone else, me in this case, thought something on your site was important enough to share. If you have a lot of links like this, they think you must be HOT STUFF and you move up in the rankings.

Another way of getting links is to write articles yourself, or hire someone to write them for you, and post them on article directories, like EzineArticles.com or Hubpages.com. These types of pages are almost always well ranked with Google, so having an article published there will give you a boost.

Keep It Fresh

And last, but certainly not least, give people a reason to come back. In other words, keep adding new stuff. A website that is consistently updated is better in Google’s opinion than one that has been stagnant for two years. This doesn’t mean that you have to post something every day, but do try to add something at least every week to 10 days. If you don’t have new jewelry to show, then write a short blurb about a favorite technique. Or write about how much you admire someone else’s jewelry and link to their website. You’ll both get a boost out of it. If you teach, list upcoming classes. If you do shows, announce them ahead of time.

Final Thoughts

There you have it – SEO in a nutshell. And it didn’t cost you thousands of dollars up front, or $500 per month. Just some simple things that you can do yourself to give the search engines all of the information they need to get your website listed on the first results page.
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If you have questions about this post, something I’ve covered previously, or even something I haven’t covered yet, send me an email or leave a comment – I’ll be happy to help.

Talk to you soon,

goldie

The rest of the series:
1 – Announcing Jewelers Website Assistant

2 – Pointing Your New Domain To Your Hosting Account

3 – Two Methods To Install WordPress

4 – How To Select And Install A Theme

5 – Basic Plugins You’ll Need And How To Install Them

6 – Setting Up Static Contact, Privacy, and About Pages

7 – How To Write Posts & Add Captions To Pictures

Adding A New Post In WordPress

Now, exactly as you did when you set up your Pages, type in a title, then start typing your new Post in the box:

Adding A Title And Words To Your New Post

Don’t forget to periodically click Save Draft so that you don’t accidentally lose your Post. When you have it ready to go, click Publish to make it visible on your web site.

Use The Save Draft Button Frequently While You Are Writing

Before you finalize your Post and Publish it, you should pick a category for it. Categories are a way of keeping posts of a similar nature grouped together. If you are selling several types of jewelry on your web site, you might have Categories like Necklaces, Bracelets, Earrings and Rings. This way, if a customer is looking only for Earrings, they can click that category and see everything you have in the Earring Category without having to wade through Necklaces, Bracelets and Rings that they aren’t interested in. Or you might have categories for different types of stones, or even color groups. Categories are an easy way to organize your site so customers can find what they are looking for quickly, much like departments in a regular store.

Categories Help Organize Your Web Site

What if you have reached this point, but realize that this Post doesn’t fit any of your Categories? Easy fix: add a new one on the fly. Click the +Add A New Category link at the bottom of the Category box. This will open up a spot where you can type in your new category and click the Add New Category button to add it to your list. By default, the new category will be selected, but so will the Default Category, so watch for that and uncheck the Default.

You Can Add Categories On The Fly

One thing that I’ve done different with the pictures on this Post is to add Captions. You can put anything from a short description of the item to its name, if you “name” your items. This is very easy to do – you do it in the same dialog box where you upload your picture. It adds a bit of professionalism, plus studies have shown that online shoppers automatically look for a caption under a photo. So take a few extra seconds while you are uploading your picture and fill in the Caption box. While you are at it, copy and paste your Caption in the Alternate Text box before you Insert the picture into the Post. The Alternate Text box is used by Search Engines to help determine how to classify your web site. Major Search Engines like Google, love Alternate Text boxes. This step is part of what is called Search Engine Optimization, something we’ll talk more about in the next post.

Adding Captions and Alternate Text To Photos

If you have questions about this post, something I’ve covered previously, or even something I haven’t covered yet, send me an email or leave a comment – I’ll be happy to help.

Talk to you soon,

goldie

The rest of the series:
1 – Announcing Jewelers Website Assistant

2 – Pointing Your New Domain To Your Hosting Account

3 – Two Methods To Install WordPress

4 – How To Select And Install A Theme

5 – Basic Plugins You’ll Need And How To Install Them

6 – Setting Up Static Contact, Privacy, and About Pages

8 – SEO Helps Search Engines Like Google Find You

First, a little background information to help you understand the difference between Pages and Posts. You put your basic information on a Page (upper case P). For instance your About Page would be similar to your Artists Statement, maybe not as detailed, but it can be, if you wish. Pages are considered “Static” because they stay readily accessible and rarely change, unlike Posts, which move down the page (lower case p) as you add newer Posts and they eventually move off of the front page and into your Archives.

Create an About page

The first Page I’ll need is an About page so that everyone can get to know me. Click on Pages and you’ll see that it already exists. WordPress installs a generic About page along with the basic software.

Rather than delete this one and make a new one with the same name, I’ll just edit the existing Page. I am going to replace the type with a bit of my history and add a picture. When you move your pointer underneath the title About, you’ll see a second line appear.

I’m going to click on Edit so I can make changes to the existing Page.

Adding an Image

This is an important step to learn because it is the same for both Pages and Posts. Since you will be showing off your beautiful jewelry, you’ll want lots of pictures. In the previous screenshot, notice the two tabs that say Visual and HTML. For most of your posting, you’ll want to use Visual. On the Upload/Insert line, the first icon is for adding an image. Clicking on it brings up another screen.

Click Select Files, find the image you want to use on your hard drive and click Upload. When the file has uploaded, you’ll get this screen where you can specify a Title, Caption, and Description if you wish, then click Insert Into Post.

When I click Insert Into Page, this is the result:

The picture is too big, plus it is sitting there in the middle of everything, by itself. To make it smaller, I click on the picture and two small icons appear in the upper left corner. Click on the one that looks like a landscape.

Formatting the Text around a photo

I changed the size to 80% and it looks better. Next, click “Left” and watch the type flow around the picture. When you leave it on the default, None, your type will start at the bottom of the picture. You can also put the picture in the Middle or Right by clicking those buttons. Click the Update button to see how it looks on your Page.

See how the type is right up against the picture? I don’t like that and I want to move it out some. (Did I mention that I spent 14 years in the printing industry? I have a “thing” about how my pages look.) So I go back to edit the setting again by first clicking the picture, then the little landscape button. This time, I’ll click Advanced Settings. It opens up lots more options, but the only one I’m concerned about right now is the space around the picture. Scroll down until you see Image Properties and put 15 in both Vertical Space and Horizontal Space. You can play around with these numbers and decide how wide or narrow you want that space, but you do need something so the type isn’t right up against the picture. Go down to the bottom and click Update when you get it the way you want it.

I’m happy with the size of my picture and the way the type flows around it, so I’ll click Publish to let the whole world see. Actually, because this Page has already been Published, the blue button says Update, but normally, when you create a Page or a Post, it will say Publish.

I’m going to open my website in another tab so I can see how the new About Page looks.

Setting up your Contact page

I also want to add a Contact page so people can get in touch with me. There are a couple of things you need to think about before you post your contact information on the Internet: Security and Spam. Security first: My original web site had my home address and phone number. More than enough information for someone to track me down if they really wanted to. Whether someone wants to rob you, or just sit and talk, don’t get too cozy with people you meet online. Don’t give them more information than necessary until you’ve had a chance to check them out, too. And even after a few conversations online, do not invite strangers to your house – meet at a coffeehouse, gallery or library. Always think of safety first. On my web site now, I use a post office box and a cell phone number, along with email. Plenty of options for people to contact me without knowing exactly where I live.

Spam – everybody hates it. Don’t voluntarily post your email address for all the nasty little internet spiders to grab and re-sell. There are several Contact-type plugins available that will mask your email list, plus make people prove that they are humans before they can send a message. Earlier, we installed the Contact Form 7 and Really Simple CAPTCHA plugins just for this purpose so lets go to the Plugins page and activate both of these by clicking the word Activate under each one.

You’ll notice that you now have a new tab on the left that says Contact. When you click on it, it opens up the screen where you can change the defaults on your email address or the subject line, if you wish, but I’ve always just left them alone.

The only thing that I change here is to add the CAPTCHA code just before the Submit button. You’ve seen the web sites where they give you some words or letters and numbers and you have to type them in the box – that is a CAPTCHA code. Officially, CATPCHA stands for “Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Human Apart”. Unofficially, it is how you keep the spammers from sending automated emails using your web site.
To add the code, click Generate Tag and select CAPTCHA from the dropdown list.

You’ll get this screen:

Highlight and copy the type in the first brown box and paste it in above the line that says

[submit “Send”]

then copy and paste the code from the second brown box below that.

Add a line of instructions telling people what to do, then click the Save button.

Near the top of the page you’ll see this line: [contact-form-7] This is the code that actually makes this plugin work.

Highlight and copy it, click Pages and Add New. Give this page the title Contact and paste the text you just copied into the text box. Click the Publish button.

Now let’s look at the page we’ve just created. Very plain, but it gives people a way to contact you by email.

Polishing up the Contact form

I’m going to add some words before the form, then list my cell phone number and post office box as additional methods of contact. I click Update Page when I’m finished and go check it out.

Much better.

Adding a Privacy Policy

When you are doing business online, you need to have a privacy policy to reassure visitors to your website that you aren’t going to steal their information and sell it. When we were installing plugins earlier, we installed one called Easy Privacy Policy. I’ll go back to the plugin page to activate it now.

Now, the button underneath says Settings, instead of Activate. Click Settings and we’ll set up our privacy policy with just a couple of clicks. You’ll want to check to make sure that your @blogname and email address are correct, but I have never changed any of the other settings on this page. Click the Create Privacy Page button and the plugin does the work for you.

Here’s how the finished page looks:

Now you’ve completed the main Static Pages you’ll need. As your site grows, you may find that you need others. A couple of Pages you may consider adding later are ones explaining the different types of materials you use in your jewelry or maybe one about how to care for handmade jewelry. If you sell a lot of birthstone jewelry, you may want a special page listing the different birthstones. In our next session, we’ll talk more about creating Posts and the different options for pictures, including adding captions.
If you’ve already set up a website, but have questions, send me an email or leave a comment – I’ll be happy to help.

Talk to you soon,

goldie

The rest of the series:
1 – Announcing Jewelers Website Assistant

2 – Pointing Your New Domain To Your Hosting Account

3 – Two Methods To Install WordPress

4 – How To Select And Install A Theme

5 – Basic Plugins You’ll Need And How To Install Them

7 – How To Write Posts & Add Captions To Pictures

8 – SEO Helps Search Engines Like Google Find You

Plugins are little extras that do one specific function. There are hundreds of thousands of blogs, but every one has different needs. The basic program would be terribly bloated if it tried to do every single thing that every single person wants for their own blog. Think of WordPress as the base software and plugins as accessories. You can pick and choose from thousands, depending on your specific needs. The latest version of WordPress has made it extremely easy to find and install new plugins. Start by clicking on Plugins on the left side of your Dashboard, then Add New.

The first plugin I want you to find & install is All In One SEO. This will help the search engines find you, index your pages and be ready to offer your website in their results when someone searches for one of your keywords. We’ll talk more about Search Engine Optimization later, but for now, let’s find the plugin and install it. When you click Add New, it opens a new window with, among other things, a search box. In that search box, type “All In One SEO” and click Search Plugins.

When the results come up, it should be the first one on the list. If it isn’t scroll down till you find the right one and click Install Now. A popup window will ask you if you are sure you want to install this plugin and you click OK.

On the next screen, click Activate Plugin. The plugin will be installed and you’ll end up back on the main Plugin page.

While we are here, let’s take care of some other plugin business before we move on. First, we want to activate Akismet to stop the spam before it ends up on our blog for the whole world to see. Click Activate under Akismet.

When it is activated, you’ll see a message telling you that you have to enter your Akismet API key for it to work. Click that link to go to page where you enter your API key.

If you don’t have one yet, Click the Get your key link to sign up & get your API Key, otherwise, enter your API key in the blank, click the box to Automatically discard old spam comments, and click Update Options.

From here, you’ll have to click Plugins to get back to the main plugin page. The next thing I want you to do is to delete Hello Dolly. It serves no real purpose and I don’t like to have a bunch of unused plugins hanging around taking up space. To get rid of it, click the word Delete underneath it.

The next screen will ask you if you are sure you want to delete these files and you’ll click Yes, Delete these files.

After your files are deleted, you’ll be returned to the main Plugin screen again. Once you’ve reached this stage, you should be able to find the plugin you want and install it. The options for each individual plugin vary, but the installation procedure is pretty much standard. Occasionally, you may find a plugin that you’ll need to download from a website to your desktop, then upload into WordPress. You do this by going to the Add New screen and clicking Upload.

I have a standard list of plugins that I always install. There are others that I use occasionally for specific purposes, but this is a list of the ones I put on every blog I set up.

All In One SEO Pack
Akismet
Google Analytics For WordPress
Google XML Sitemap
Contact Form 7
Really Simple Captcha
Easy Privacy Policy
WP-DB-Backup
Advertising Manager
Simple Tags

Anytime you find yourself thinking “I wish I could do _______ on my website, check to see if there’s a plugin already available – chances are, you are not the first person to think that. Go to http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/ and look around to see what’s available.

Now you understand how to find and install plugins. We’ll put some of them to good use in our next session. We’ll use the plugins we just installed to create a Privacy Policy, plus Contact and About pages.

If you’ve already set up a website, but have questions, send me an email or leave a comment – I’ll be happy to help.

Talk to you soon,

goldie

The rest of the series:
1 – Announcing Jewelers Website Assistant

2 – Pointing Your New Domain To Your Hosting Account

3 – Two Methods To Install WordPress

4 – How To Select And Install A Theme

6 – Setting Up Static Contact, Privacy, and About Pages

7 – How To Write Posts & Add Captions To Pictures

8 – SEO Helps Search Engines Like Google Find You

Free Theme Websites

http://www.freewpthemes.net/
http://www.templatesbrowser.com/wordpress-themes/
http://wordpresstemplates.name/
http://wpthemeland.com/
http://bestwebsitetemplates.org/freetemplates-wordpress.html
http://wpweaver.info/themes/twenty-ten-weaver/
http://www.wpthemes360.com/

Choosing A Theme From WordPress.org

WordPress.org also offers hundreds of options. To see them, click on Appearance, then Themes, then Install Themes. Select a couple of options and click Find Themes. I usually only select a color so I get hundreds to look at. If you choose the color Blue, you’ll get 17 pages worth of themes to look at.

When you find one you like, you’ll see Install and Preview links underneath the name of the theme. If you click the Preview link, it will open another window and give you a close up look at a demo site using that particular theme. You can scroll around, click the links, just sorta “try it on”.

When you find one you want to use, click the Install link. I am going to use Magazine Basic because I am very familiar with it and it is highly customizable.

When the theme is installed, you’ll come to the following screen, where you’ll want to click Activate.

Once the theme is activated, you’ll see a message telling you that this theme supports Widgets and that you should go configure them. But before we configure our Widgets, lets talk about other theme options.

If you found a theme that you liked on one of the free theme websites listed above, you would have downloaded a zip file to your desktop. To use that zip file, go to the Install Themes tab, but this time you want to click Upload.

First, you’ll want to click the Browse button and locate the zip file on your desktop, then click the Install Now button. When the installation is finished, it will bring you back to the window where you can Activate it.

It is possible to install several themes and switch among them to decide which you like the best but you shouldn’t do much customization before you make your decision, because it doesn’t carry over from one theme to another; you have to re-do it on each theme.

Premium Themes

While we are still on the subject of themes, let me give you a few premium theme sites to look at, in case you haven’t found one that is just right for you yet. Prices for these themes range anywhere from 9.99 to $50+, but sometimes it it worth it to get just the right look.
www.wpremix.com
www.templatic.com
www.woothemes.com
www.elegantthemes.com
www.markettheme.com
www.weborithm.com

In our next session, I’ll show you which basic plugins you need, how to install and configure them.

If you’ve already set up a website, but have questions, send me an email or leave a comment – I’ll be happy to help.

Talk to you soon,

goldie

The rest of the series:
1 – Announcing Jewelers Website Assistant

2 – Pointing Your New Domain To Your Hosting Account

3 – Two Methods To Install WordPress

5 – Basic Plugins You’ll Need And How To Install Them

6 – Setting Up Static Contact, Privacy, and About Pages

7 – How To Write Posts & Add Captions To Pictures

8 – SEO Helps Search Engines Like Google Find You

A note before we get started: If you have trouble seeing the screenshots clearly, clicking on them with give you a larger version.

Now that you have your nameservers pointing to your Bluehost account, you are ready to install the WordPress software. You’ll start by signing in to your account. Scroll down to the section named Software/Services and click on the big round W for  WordPress.

This will redirect you to the Simple Scripts website where you’ll click Install.

On the next screen, you’ll see some options. Where it asks “Which version of WordPress to install”, the default will always be the latest stable version and you won’t need to change that. If this is your only website, you won’t have any other options under “Where would you like WordPress installed?”. The name of your new website should be selected. In Step 2, give your website a title. Mine, of course, is Jewelers Website Assistant. I prefer to pick my own username and password, so I fill in those boxes, too. If you want to be known as ADMIN, you can leave it on the default. Next, you want to click the box next to “Automatically create a new database”. This is called Simple Scripts for a reason, no sense in complicating it. Check the box stating that you’ve read the license agreement – it really is a good thing to actually read these things before you agree to them. Finally, click Complete.

The next screen will give you links to your new website and to the WordPress login page. I strongly suggest that you bookmark both of these, or add them to your favorites, right now. Also on this screen is a reminder of your username and password. Unless you have so few of these that you can remember them all, make a note of these, too. This would be a good time to tell you how I handle the hundreds of usernames and passwords I’ve collected over the years. I use an Excel file with a generic sounding name like “packing lists” so that if the bad guys ever get their hands on my computer, they probably wouldn’t open that particular file. But even if they tried, it is double password protected, so the chances of them finding it are small and the chances of them actually getting it open are even smaller.

Clicking the link for the Login URL brings you to this screen – bookmark it because you’ll be going back to it frequently.

With Fantastico on Hostgator

Now, while I love Bluehost, I have also used Hostgator with great success. They use a different installer script called Fantastico Deluxe. Again, you scroll down to the Software/Services box and click Fantastico Deluxe.

On the second screen, click WordPress, then New Installation.

Because I am doing this installation for someone else, I have blurred the details in my screenshots to protect their privacy.  If this is your only website, the domain will be correct, if you have several domain names on your account, you’ll want to choose the right one. On the next line “Install in Directory”, you’ll leave this blank unless you have more than one website and need to separate their files. Fill in the username and password boxes. Under Base Configuration, fill in those boxes. The Admin Nickname is the name you’ll be using on your site – this will be used as the name of the Author on your posts. It is up to you if you want to use your real name or a screen name here. For the email address, it will automatically fill in the one you used when you signed up with Hostgator. Later in the series, we’ll set up a new email account to match our new website and I’ll show you how & where to change this, but for now, go with the default. The Site Name is already filled in for you and you need to add a description – I just use the website name again. Click the Install WordPress button.

The second screen gives you the details of the database that it creates for you. You will rarely need this information unless you have major problems or need to move your website from one host to another. Click Finish Installation.

The final screen gives you a link to your new admin page (and reminds you to Bookmark it), plus your username and password. Again, you need to have some secure method of keeping up with all of this information. If you don’t have a copy of Excel, Open Office is FREE alternative that works much like Excel. If you would like to have these details emailed to you, put your address in the box and send the email. I have a gmail account that I use for storage of stuff like this. It is free, offsite storage that is accessible from anywhere.

You have officially installed WordPress  – In our next session, we’ll take a look at all of the themes that are available. I’ll give you a list of both Free and Premium Theme sites to take a look at.

If you’ve already set up a website, but have questions, send me an email or leave a comment – I’ll be happy to help.

Talk to you soon,

goldie

The rest of the series:
1 – Announcing Jewelers Website Assistant

2 – Pointing Your New Domain To Your Hosting Account>

4 – How To Select And Install A Theme

5 – Basic Plugins You’ll Need And How To Install Them

6 – Setting Up Static Contact, Privacy, and About Pages

7 – How To Write Posts & Add Captions To Pictures

8 – SEO Helps Search Engines Like Google Find You

I personally like to buy my domain names from one source and my hosting from another. The reason for this is that in this day and age, anyone can go out of business at any time, usually without warning. If your hosting company goes out of business, but your domain name is registered with someone else, you can easily point your domain to a new host and be back up and running within hours. If your domain name is registered with your host, and they go under, it can take days or weeks to get control of your own domain name again. Does that sound like the voice of experience? That’s because it is. It happened many years ago, but it was one of those lessons that stick with you forever. Don’t put all of your eggs in one basket.

So I buy my domain names through GoDaddy.com because I think they are going to be around a very long time. After I purchase a domain name, I point it to my main hosting company: Bluehost. Another hosting company that I use and recommend is HostGator. If you are looking for the cheapest possible solution, they offer a “Hatchling” account with a single domain name for as little as 4.95 per month, depending on your payment plan. If you are 100% sure you’ll never want to add another website, this could be the best choice for you.

It is a simple procedure to point the nameservers to your web host and I’ll walk you through it. After you have paid for your new domain name, go to the domain manager and click the domain name, then Manage Domain. On the next page you’ll see all of the information about your new domain.

The section we are interested in here is Nameservers. Start by clicking on the Set Nameservers link. A new window opens up and you want to select “I have specific nameservers for my domains”, then fill in the nameservers from your new host and click OK.

Right about now you are thinking “OK, where did she get the nameserver information in the first place”? That should be the easiest part for you to find. Every hosting company WANTS you to point your domain at them, so they make this information easy to find. If you don’t see it displayed prominately, then search their help section for the word “nameservers” and it should pop up. If you are having trouble finding yours, send me a message and I’ll find it for you.

After you have made the change on GoDaddy.com, it takes a few hours to take effect. If you are like me and want to get started right away, do this step right before you go to bed at night. By the time you get up in the morning, it should be ready for the next step and you will have saved yourself the aggravation of checking every 5 minutes to see if it is ready (there goes that voice of experience again…).

I use Bluehost for my website hosting for many reasons, the main one being reliability. Someone asked me once if they had good customer service and I had to say I didn’t know. And I still don’t. I’ve never had to use their customer service. Maybe I’m just lucky, but I haven’t run into any problems. Another reason that I love Bluehost is that they use SimpleScripts, which automatically installs WordPress, among many other things. A few clicks and you have the latest version of WordPress installed – super easy.

So now we’ve pointed our domain towards Bluehost, but we still need to add it to our hosting account. If this is your first, or only, domain name, you’ll add the name while you are signing up for the hosting account. The first screen you see after you click the Sign Up Now button asks if you NEED a domain name or you HAVE a domain name. You’ll put your new domain name in the second box & go from there.

If you already have a hosting account and just want to add the new domain name to it, you log in and go to the Domain Manager. Once there, you click Assign A Domain Name To Your cPanel Account. Select “use a domain that is not already associated with your account” and put the domain name in box. In the Step 2 section, you’ll notice that it already shows that the nameservers are pointing to Bluehost. If you’ve been impatient, it will give you some ways to verify that you actually own this domain. It is far easier to wait for the nameserver change to take place. For Step 3, you’ll want to choose Addon Domain and Step 4 will have filled itself in automatically. All that’s left for you to do is to click Add Domain.

In our next session, I’ll show you how to install the WordPress software using Simple Scripts on Bluehost and Fantastico on Hostgator. Then we’ll get started setting it up properly so that the whole world can find us & admire our creations.

If you’ve already set up a website, but have questions, send me an email or leave a comment – I’ll be happy to help.

Talk to you soon,

goldie

The rest of the series:
1 – Announcing Jewelers Website Assistant

3 – Two Methods To Install WordPress

4 – How To Select And Install A Theme

5 – Basic Plugins You’ll Need And How To Install Them

6 – Setting Up Static Contact, Privacy, and About Pages

7 – How To Write Posts & Add Captions To Pictures

8 – SEO Helps Search Engines Like Google Find You

I discovered WordPress in 2004 when I added the first News section to my website. Since then, I have installed it dozens of times for myself and for family and friends who wanted to start blogs. As more and more jewelry makers are discovering every day, the internet is a great place to show off, and sell, your jewelry, and wordpress is the easiest way to build a website for that.

I am often asked how the Golden Maille site was built, who do I recommend for a web host, how did I do this or that. I don’t mind answering these questions, I have helped several people get their sites up & running. Since the questions are getting more frequent, I feel like there’s a real desire for more information, so I’ve decided to start a new series of posts designed to help everyone create a website with WordPress and get it set up properly so Google, and the rest of the world, can find you. And once they find you, they can click a button and buy your jewelry right then. To do this, I’ve set up a new website named JewelersWebsiteAssistant.com.  There is actually nothing on it right now, but I’ll be using it as a demo site to show you how to do things as I go along.

The first few lessons will be basic: how to register a domain and change the nameservers to point to your hosting account. How to install WordPress with a couple of clicks. Then I’ll talk about selecting a theme and which plugins you need and how to install them. Later on, I’ll get more in depth about Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and why you need it. And how to customize your theme, how to add advertising to your site if you want to go that route.

If you’ve already set up a website, but have questions, send me an email or leave a comment – I’ll be happy to help.

Talk to you soon,

goldie

The rest of the series:
1 – Announcing Jewelers Website Assistant
2 – Pointing Your New Domain To Your Hosting Account

3 – Two Methods To Install WordPress

4 – How To Select And Install A Theme

5 – Basic Plugins You’ll Need And How To Install Them

6 – Setting Up Static Contact, Privacy, and About Pages

7 – How To Write Posts & Add Captions To Pictures

8 – SEO Helps Search Engines Like Google Find You