Internet Marketing For Small Business

Non-techies listen up – now you too can have a WordPress blog set up and running at your own domain.

The how-to instructions on how to do a manual install of WordPress can be rather intimidating. This is because you need to set up a database on your web hosting server to run WordPress, and in order to do so, you need to get into the “tech guts” of your server. Spooky.

That’s why One-click installs are great – all you have to do is follow the instructions set up by your web hosting company, which usually amount to clicking a few check boxes. The trickiest part in the operation will be naming the database, but that’s basically all you have to do: name it. The rest is done for you.

Another thing that is great about One-Click Installs is that they make handling updates to the WordPress software easy. The kind WordPress developers keep making their software better and safer, and so it is a good idea to keep updating to the latest version of WordPress. With one-click installs, the web hosts will upload the latest software for you, and when you are ready to install it, it’s just another click away.

Here are a few reputable companies that offer one-click installs. Sign up with either one and you could be blogging in about 10 minutes.

Hostgator

We are happy to say we have started using Hostgator as a web site hosting company and are delighted with the servers and with service. With packages starting at $7.95 USD per month, Hostgator is a sweet deal. It is also the host of choice for many pro Internet Marketers who use the Reseller Package to host all their web sites. It boasts Cpanel and WHM control panels.

• Click here to check out the Hostgator web site or to sign up for an account.

Dreamhost

Is probably the most popular one-click install company, probably because of their very popular affiliate program. There are as many Dreamhost evangelists as there are detractors, but the one thing you can be sure of is that Dreamhost’s newsletter will make you laugh, as it boasts the wittiest corporate writing out there.

A big plus – the company is very honest about what’s going on with their service and have a blog and wiki set up so that you can stay up-to-date with what is going on with your server’s status.

Dreamhost’s Crazy Domain Insane! package costs $7.95 a month if you sign up and pay for 2 years up front. This will get you 150 GB of web host space, which increases weekly by 1 GB. Yes, this incentive is quite unique, but it seems to be working.

Your allowed bandwidth or transfer amount increases weekly too, starting at 1.5 TB and increasing weekly by 16 GB.

With Dreamhost, you can host as many domain names as you like on this package and have unlimited MySql databases running – enough to set up a blogging empire. You also get 1 year of free domain name registration.

I am currently hosting this site and a few other blogs with Dreamhost and I have had very little problems with them and found their support service quite speedy.

• This way to review the Dreamhost package in more detail.

Midphase

Is growing quite a strong fan base. Their packages tend to be a bit more costly, but advocates swear the service is worth it.

Midphase’s basic package is $7.95 and will get you 200 Gigabytes of space, a domain name for life, and 3oo GB of bandwidth. You have to bump up to the $11.95 pro-phase package to get unlimited domains.

• More about Midphase

AN Hosting

An Hosting is offering a lot of great deals recently. Their usual package is 250GB of disk space, 2,500GB of bandwidth, 20 fully hosted domains and a free domain for life, all for $6.95 a month. But if you wait for sale time, you can get some pretty good deals – like this $4.95 a month special that is available until Nov, 22, 2007.

• More about AN Hosting

As usual, do your research to choose the right company for you. A quick Google search of any company name above and you will find tons of fan mail, heated debates, as well as a few horror stories. But I think you will be safe with any of the companies above unless you plan on getting millions of hits a day, which in that case you should be able to afford a dedicated server (one that you do not share with anyone else.) And that is a good problem to have

This post is part of my “Blogging with WordPress Made Super Easy – Well, Almost” series. More coming soon.

Tags: wordpress, blogging made easy, one-click installs, web hosting, blogging for beginners