With this setup you’ll have a site using your own choice of domain name.

It can be in the form of “mysite.com” instead of having something like “mysite.wordpress.com”. Most people prefer the former as they believe it looks more professional. Do you think so too?

However there’s a price to pay for this advantage. One is the domain name registration which typically cost you around $9 per year depending on which TLD (top level domain - .com, .net etc) and which registrar you get the domain from.

Second is the hosting server fee as your domain name needs a place to stay in the web sphere. The basic service is called shared server hosting where many sites will be sharing a common server. This is not ideal but very cost effective especially when you’re just started out. You can also get a dedicated server if you’re willing to pay for it.

In most cases, you can keep many sites(domain and sub-domain names) under a single account on the shared hosting which makes it even more cost effective. So look out for the features before signing up with the hosting provider. Yearly basis hosting plan typically costs you around $80.

Installing WordPress Codes

It’s basically a 3 components thing. You need to have a domain name, WordPress codes or scripts and a database.

You have 2 choices of installation method:

1. If your hosting uses cPanel, there usually a feature called Fantastico that lets you install application like WordPress just by clicking a few buttons. So go check your cPanel if you want to do it this way.
2. Another way is to manually download WordPress installation codes from WordPress.org.

If you chose the second method, you’ll have to follow these steps to complete the installation and setup:

1. Make sure the domain has been setup properly in your web hosting.
2. Go to WordPress and download the installation file.
3. Unzip it.
4. Upload all files to your web host server via FTP program. Choose the folder name as per step no.1 above.
5. Create a mySQL database in cPanel. Assign a user to it.
6. Run setup process by entering “http://mysite.com”. Replace mysite.com with your actual domain name.
7. Just follow the steps shown on-screen.

I recommend you immediately change the password to your preference.

Yes, your new basic WordPress site has been up and running. You just need to do some more setting up to improve its look and functionality.