Are you thinking about starting a blog? Well, there’s no better time than now! WordPress is the perfect platform to build your blog, and with the Zero WordPress theme, you can make it look like a million bucks without spending a fortune. In fact, the premium Zero WordPress theme is now available for free! So, let’s get started on creating your dream blog.
Step 1: Choose Your Hosting Package
Before you can start creating content, you’ll need to choose a hosting plan. There are many options available, but we recommend a few of our favorites to help you narrow down your choices.
If you’re on a budget, Bluehost offers an affordable shared hosting plan starting at just $2.95 per month. This plan comes with a free domain name and $50 in promotional marketing offers to help launch your new blog.
For those with a little more to spend, Flywheel offers a superb managed hosting plan for WordPress blogs. For $14 per month, you’ll receive fully managed WordPress hosting, free demo sites, built-in caching for faster page loading time, automatic website backups, and more.
WPEngine is another great option that we use and love here at WPExplorer. Although it starts at $29 per month, the support and hosting are both super fast and efficient. Plus, since WPEngine manages your WordPress installation, you can rest easy knowing your website is up to date.
Step 2: Install WordPress
If you’ve chosen a managed WordPress hosting plan, WordPress will already be installed for you. If you’ve opted for a shared hosting plan, you’ll need to log in and use the 1-click WordPress installation that most shared hosts offer. Simply follow the onscreen instructions from your host, wait a couple of minutes while the server sets itself up, and then you’re ready to go!
Step 3: Download The Free Zero WordPress Theme
While you could use any free or premium theme, we recommend the Zero WordPress theme. It’s a powerful blogging theme with custom widgets, a lovely left-sidebar navigation, tons of custom post formats, unlimited color options via the theme customizer, RTL support, translation files, and more – all for free!
To download the Zero theme, visit its theme page and download the zip file. Then, log into your WordPress dashboard and navigate to Appearance > Themes > Add New. Select the Zero zip file and activate it. Voila! Your website now looks awesome and it didn’t cost you a dime.
If you hit a stumbling block while getting set up, don’t worry. Zero has easy-to-follow online documentation that you can reference any time you need help along the way.
Step 4: Styling, Plugins & Content
Customizing Zero is easy since it uses the WordPress Customizer for all of its options. Just open the Customizer (which is located under the Appearance section in your WordPress dashboard) and use the options in the Styling tab to create a custom-looking site. After that, don’t forget to set your menus, add some widgets, and start creating your content!
Before you officially launch your blog, you might want to consider some plugins as well. Of course, you’ll probably want the famous “everything but the kitchen sink” Jetpack plugin, which can do tons of fun stuff like related posts, social sharing, website statistics, limit login attempts, image carousels, extra widgets, and tons more. But in addition to that, there are literally thousands of plugins to choose from (free and premium).
Congratulations! You should now have a beautiful blog up and running. And aren’t you glad you finally took the plunge? Make sure to spread the word about your freemium WordPress theme and click one (or all) of those share buttons. Don’t you want your friends to have awesome blogs too?
Over To You – Show Us Your Blogs!
If you’ve followed along and are using the Zero theme, share a link to your blog below! We’d love to see what you’ve created and show other new bloggers what’s possible with WordPress and the zero cost Zero theme.
