Boostrapper’s Guide to Launching WordPress for Under $25 bucks. Really!

You’ve got a lot of experience to share.

Some of your colleagues and friends have said you should start a blog.

“Tell people about how you ended up waiting 47 hours for a flight to chiang mai and ended up having drinks with the prince of neverland!”

You’ve got tons of stories, from travels, from business.

So what’s stopping you? There are usually four things that stop you from starting a blog.

1. No time
2. It’s too expensive
3. Not sure what to write about.
4. No technical skills

I will tackle the time issue in another post. Today, I want to show you that you can setup your own, self-hosted blog for less than $25. Don’t believe me? Look below.

Quick & Dirty Version – Get the full checklist and guide here

Define your Strategy and Plan $0

This only costs you time. So if time is one of your excuses then you’ll have to read the one I do on that issue. The important thing to note is that knowing the strategy and plan for your website will save you time in the long run.

Get your domain, hosting and email setup $21

I’ll keep it simple and just tell you what I recommend.

• Domain – Namecheap – <$11/year
• Hosting – Namecheap hosting – $10 for first year

• Email – Mailchimp – free for first 2,000 subscribers. No autoresponder.

Build the site – $0

Building the site is the fun part. It doesn’t cost anything if you are writing your own content. Get used to using the wordpress environment and everything else will be a piece of cake.

• install wordpress
• add Make theme
• Setup your plugins

• Install google analytics [need VPN if in China]
• Register on google webmaster [need VPN if in China]

Make it pretty – $0

Take a step to really look at your site and refine the look and feel of it. Play around with the customizer to choose your options wisely. This can take some time so block it out and get focused. Use the one song technique to help with your focus if you need to.

• Create your starter graphics using powerpoint.
• Logo
• Header image

Launch the site – $0

By this time you are pretty much there. All you have to do is tell people about it and start sharing those wonderful stories of failure and triumph.

 

Rookie Mistake: Thinking “If I build it, they will come”

Tell your friends, family and colleagues about your blog. This will help get some buzz going for it.

Done.

There you go. A quick and dirty breakdown of how to build your own blog for less than $25.

Cost is not an issue to get started. Time can be a challenge and we’ll be tackling that soon.

 

Enjoy

P.S. I am building a new site dedicated to making the most of wordpress. Go check it out