If you’re a creator you need to make sure you’re sharing your work with your audience.
This will help you improve your work, or art, learn more about what your audience likes, and it can even help you monetize your work.
Having a website up and running will help you achieve the goals above. If you rely on any kind of marketing to make your money you need to have a website. If you would like to start using your hobbies or interests to make money you need a website.
Below, we will go through how to select and set up your website hosting and we will also go over how to set up your WordPress site.
I will show you how to do this in 4 easy steps.
Bonus: there are some tips at the end of this article which give you some ideas on more ways you can use your website and how it can make you some money.
1. Select a Hosting Service
To create a website you will need to select a Webhosting service provider. A great hosting service will help you select your domain name. This is what will appear as your website’s URL (what you type into the Google search bar to navigate to a specific website). You will likely have to pay for a domain name and hosting unless you’re making use of a free website platform like WordPress.Com (Please don’t confuse WordPress.Com with WordPress.Org).
The most important function of your hosting provider is to provide you with space on their server on which your website will be hosted. In South Africa, there are a number of good service providers available.
Here is a shortlist of popular hosting services and platforms available in South Africa:
- Shopify – this platform has a focus on e-commerce but it can be used for non-commercial blogs as well
For this quick tutorial, we’ll go through how to set up a WordPress.Org website with Xneelo. I’ve selected this hosting service specifically because of its one-button WordPress installer.
2. Select a Hosting Package
Below you will see the various hosting packages available with Xneelo. If you’re starting out pick the basic package for now. This will allow you to buy your domain name, get your database and your custom email address.
Once you’ve gone through the account creation flow you should land on the page below:
Congratulations! You have successfully set up your hosting service account.
3. Select and confirm your Domain name, Hosting Package, and payment
You’ll receive an email from Xneelo confirming your account has been created. You will also be prompted to log in to KonsoleH. This is Xneelo’s administrative control panel for your account. This is where you will complete the rest of your order. You’ll land on the page below:
Once you’ve set up your login details you’ll gain access to your account control panel. If you struggle with finding and setting your login credentials you can reach out to the Xneelo support team for assistance. Upon logging in you will land on the page below:
Click on the green ‘New Order’ button to start the domain name selection, hosting package, and payment confirmation flow.
Pick the basic package:
Select ‘Register a new domain name’, search for and select any domain name you’d like, and check what domain name extensions (TLDs – Top-Level Domains) are available for your desired domain name.
(Examples of TLDs: .com, .info, .co.za, .org, .net, .co.uk).
Complete the order and provide all of your details through the rest of this order confirmation flow. Once you’re on the last page, click the green ‘Place Order’ button.
Congratulations! You now have everything you need to create your website.
Xneelo will send a mail to confirm the activation.
4. One button WordPress Installation and website setup
It’s time to setup your WordPress website.
Now you’ll need go back to your KonsoleH Control Panel and Install WordPress on your Domain.
Once on KonsoleH click on your Domain Name and then click on the ‘Software’ tab in the menu on the left hand side.
Click on ‘WordPress Installer’ and then click on the green ‘Start Install’ button.
You’ll now be quickly taken through the installation process.
You’re nearly done! The WordPress setup will begin after you click the green ‘Finalise Installation’ button.
Just a few more details left:
Click the ‘Install WordPress’ button and…..
CONGRATULATIONS, YOU’VE GOT YOUR WEBSITE!! In 4 simple steps you’ve managed to create a whole website.
Now you get to do all the fun customizing and content building on your website. You should probably start by adding a theme and you should also Google some useful plugins you can add to improve your website’s functionality. I usually start by adding the EWWW image optimizer and the UpdraftPlus plugins.
What now? How can I use my new WordPress website to make money?
You can use a website for a number of purposes but for a Creator, this is the Home of your Content.
- Your social media accounts should send your social traffic to your website and vice-versa. There are a lot more features you can use on a website to engage your audience. It would be wasteful to rely solely on your social media platforms for engagement.
- Use your website for marketing your content.
- Install analytics tools (like Google Analytics) to conduct market research and learn more about your audience.
- Sell your merchandise on your website through e-commerce.
- Use your website to help build your online community by sharing relevant and helpful content.
- Generate a passive income for yourself on your website through platforms like AdSense.
You should be creative with how you can use your website and explore all your ideas.
Any hobby, personal interest, professional goal, business, side hustle, charitable cause, or event could make good use of a website. A website is a digital asset and assets should always return some kind of value on the investment you’ve put in them.
Thanks for reading! Complete the form below if you want me to help you plan and setup your WordPress website.