1. Thousands of 3rd party plugins – majority of which are free
   See the official plugin directory
2. Thousands of 3rd party themes – mainly free, but for a small cost you can by some amazing premium designs
   See the official theme directory
   
3. WordPress is written in php with MySQL database back end meaning you can host your blog on 99% of the webservers in the world.
   php is a dynamic web language
   MySQL is a fast full featured database
4. Easy to use well thought out admin interface
   WP-admin dashboard screen shot
5. Constant development cycle
   Download the latest build from wordpress.org

1. Set the time to your local time zone

You do this by clicking on:

–> Settings

http://www.<your-domain-here>/wp-admin/options-general.php

On the General Tab scroll down to the Time Zone section. Alter the pop up to correspond with how far out your time is with the server time

2. Alter your tagline to a good keyword rich slogan

While on the same page as above, in the Tagline section alter ‘Just another WordPress Blog’ to a meaningful keyword rich (but brief) slogan.

3. Alter your permalinks structure

You do this by clicking on:

–> Settings -> Permalinks

http://www.<your-domain-here>/wp-admin/options-permalink.php

Click on the radio button next to ‘Custom Structure’ and type /%postname%/ into the field, this will set up good SEO links based on your blog title.

4. Update your Ping List

You do this by clicking on:

–> Settings -> Writing

http://www.<your-domain-here>/wp-admin/options-writing.php

Your ping list is the list of services that your blog announces itself to when you make a new post, by default you have just one service specified (http://rpc.pingomatic.com/) however I suggest adding these also:

http://audiorpc.weblogs.com/

http://www.imblogs.net/ping/

http://pingoat.com/goat/RPC2/

http://pingqueue.com/rpc/

http://ping.feedburner.com

http://www.bloglines.com/ping

http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2

5. Set your comment options

You do this by clicking on:

–> Settings -> Discussion

http://www.<your-domain-here>/wp-admin/options-discussion.php

Choose your options carefully because these choices configure how you want comments to appear on your blog. These options will also give you email notifications of when a new comment is made.

6. Alter your admin username

You do this by clicking on:

–> Users -> Admin (in the Username column of the Manage Users list)

http://www.<your-domain-here>/wp-admin/users.php

The Admin username can not be altered, and if you blog under that login, your posts are credited as being authored by ‘Admin’. This isn’t ideal, so on this page you have the opportunity of entering your First Name, Last Name and Nick Name, then (once you have saved) you have the options in the pop up menu of being publicly displayed as a variation of your name or nickname. Alter this pop up menu depending on how you want to brand yourself.

7. Activate Akismet plugin

You do this by clicking on:

–> Pugins -> Akismet (click activate then follow the prompts)

http://www.<your-domain-here>/wp-admin/plugins.php

Akismet helps you fight comment spam, it is the default spam fighter plugin but a quick search will find others. Akismet requires an API key from WordPress.com the online version of WordPress. You will need to visit the link that activating Akismet prompts you to and sign up for a free account, make sure you opt for the username only option otherwise you will end up creating an online blog. You will be sent an email with your API key this is a string of numbers and letters approx 12 characters long. Copy and paste this into the Akismet configuration.

You have now completed all the initial steps to setting up a WordPress blog, no doubt you will need to adjust settings in the future but now you can get on and choose your theme and start blogging!

2. Regsiter a really good catchy domain name

3. Set up hosting with a reputable ISP

4. Get the Blogging Rocket ebook “All the Things You Should Now About Installing WordPress… …But Don’t”

5. Log all your usernames and passwords

6. Alter the AUTH_KEY, SECURE_AUTH_KEY and LOGGED_IN_KEY in your wp-config.php file

7. Download a backup plugin like WordPress Database Backup and use it before you start playing with the settings

Here is the install window for WordPress:

As you can see from the above screen grab, all you do is choose your domain, tell it your admin UN and PW, your site name, your email address and then you hit the install button. Within seconds you have WordPress installed and up and running. This has got to be the easiest way to get a blog set up ever. There is one thing I don’t like and that is it doesn’t report to you the UN and PW that it uses when it sets up the database, these however can be found in wp-config.php file in the root of your directory.

wp-config.php file:

So if you want to use Fantastico you need to look for an ISP that supports it, generally the ones that allow you cPanel access. I use Hostgator but there are others, I’d welcome suggestions for other hosting providers, but please no affiliate links. (I reserve the right to remove any comments posted that contain affiliate links)