Once you’ve chosen a domain name for your
Posted: Tue Dec 24, 2024 5:08 am
Once you’ve chosen a domain name for your lifestyle blog, it’s time to get it online. If you want your lifestyle blog to have full potential to grow, you’ll need to pay for web hosting.
Tip: There are some free blogging platforms out there – but you’ll likely find it hard to develop a professional website that can grow with you, using these. I always recommend using self-hosted WordPress (which is free) and paying for your own good-quality WordPress hosting.
The good news is that there are plenty of budget web hosting options available. My favorites for beginners are Bluehost and Dreamhost (you can check out my comparison of them here). They’re both great value, especially for your first year, and both of them offer a free domain name when you pay upfront for at least a year of hosting.
Bluehost Web Hosting for Lifestyle Blogs to Get Online
Whatever web host you choose, they’ll walk you through the step-by-step process of setting up your web hosting account, and it should only take a few minutes at most to sign up.
Both Bluehost and Dreamhost offer a very simple installation process for WordPress, too, with nothing technical to worry about.
You’ll get an email from your web hosting provider once everything is set up, letting you know what you need to do to log into your WordPress admin area.
It should only take a minute for your web hosting account to be active after you send payment, but it can take a little longer for your domain name to be fully working.
Your WordPress admin area will normally be your domain name plus /wp-admin – like this: www.ryrob.com/wp-admin
Once you’ve logged in, you’ll see lots of different options for adding to your lifestyle blog:
Bluehost WordPress Dashboard Once Logged In
It can look a little overwhelming at first, so we’re going to focus on the most important areas to start off with:
Your blog’s theme (template) and plugins (add-ons)
Tip: There are some free blogging platforms out there – but you’ll likely find it hard to develop a professional website that can grow with you, using these. I always recommend using self-hosted WordPress (which is free) and paying for your own good-quality WordPress hosting.
The good news is that there are plenty of budget web hosting options available. My favorites for beginners are Bluehost and Dreamhost (you can check out my comparison of them here). They’re both great value, especially for your first year, and both of them offer a free domain name when you pay upfront for at least a year of hosting.
Bluehost Web Hosting for Lifestyle Blogs to Get Online
Whatever web host you choose, they’ll walk you through the step-by-step process of setting up your web hosting account, and it should only take a few minutes at most to sign up.
Both Bluehost and Dreamhost offer a very simple installation process for WordPress, too, with nothing technical to worry about.
You’ll get an email from your web hosting provider once everything is set up, letting you know what you need to do to log into your WordPress admin area.
It should only take a minute for your web hosting account to be active after you send payment, but it can take a little longer for your domain name to be fully working.
Your WordPress admin area will normally be your domain name plus /wp-admin – like this: www.ryrob.com/wp-admin
Once you’ve logged in, you’ll see lots of different options for adding to your lifestyle blog:
Bluehost WordPress Dashboard Once Logged In
It can look a little overwhelming at first, so we’re going to focus on the most important areas to start off with:
Your blog’s theme (template) and plugins (add-ons)