How to Start an Online Business Using WordPress

Are you tired of doing your day-to-day job and thinking about being your boss by launching your own business? No worries. It has become easier than you think. No coding is required, no need for a Computer Science degree. With the world’s most popular CMS WordPress, your online business is waiting for the grand launch.

In this article, you will learn the fundamental elements of a WordPress website and how to use them to start an online business using WordPress. So let’s get started.

Identify Your Niche 

Before jumping into the website building, you need to identify your niche. But what actually is a niche? Think of it as a category of the market for a particular kind of product or service that you intend to offer. 

Let’s assume you have a thing for houseplants. You know every ins and outs of houseplants. You are skilled in nurturing them and solving common problems. 

Since there is a good market for houseplants, you thought about sprouting some of the plants and selling them to the greenkeepers. You can also provide online consultancy and personalized advice or courses about how to maintain a house garden. 

There you have it! You have discovered your passion and skill as well as the market for them. Nothing hard, you just need to take a seat and focus. 

Think about what you are good at and how you can sell it. Remember, your niche can shift as you learn more about your customers and the market. 

And you are done with the first step. 

Things You Need to Start an Online Business Using WordPress

If you are done with identifying your niche, it is time to move forward. Now you need an online store for your business where you will showcase, promote, and sell your products/services. What are they? 

Domain 

Domain is a unique address to your website. Think of it as the location of your online store. You should think wisely before choosing your domain name because it will serve as a brand name on the internet. The domain name should be relevant to your niche, memorable, and easy to spell. A domain would cost you around $10-20 per year, depending on the extension (.com, .net, etc.) and chosen domain provider.

From where do you buy these domain names? Some of the popular domain providers are Namecheap, Squarespace, Bluehost, etc. 

Hosting 

Hosting is a service that provides servers to store your website files and make them accessible from all over the world. You need a reliable host to ensure your website is always accessible and running smoothly. 

Shared hosting plans start around $3-10 per month, but can vary depending on the storage requirements and features. Select a plan that fits in with your expected monthly traffic, storage, and any special features you need within your budget. 

Bluehost, Hostinger and Godaddy are popular choices for beginners. 

SSL Certificate 

This is like an invisible security guard that encrypts data transfer between your website and visitors. It is essential for secure transactions and logins. 

Often, the SSL certificate is included in the hosting plan. So choosing your trusted hosting provider is again important. 

WordPress Installation 

Now comes the crucial part, installing WordPress on your site. Depending on the hosting provider, the process may vary. However, some hosting providers offer one-click WordPress installation. 

If your hosting provider doesn’t offer a one-click WordPress installation and you need assistance with the manual installation process, there are many guides available online. 

Design Your Online Store 

First impression matters. In fact, according to a study by Stanford University, 94% of first impressions are design-related. This means that a badly designed website can drive away potential clients before they even get a chance to look at your offerings.

The good thing is that WordPress offers a huge collection of themes, both free and premium. Most of the themes have live previews, so don’t be afraid to experiment. 

Choose a theme that aligns with your brand identity and check the user reviews before you proceed to buy the theme. 

Power-up Your Website with Plugins 

Now that your website theme is selected, it’s time to increase the functionalities of your website. WordPress is a highly customizable CMS. However, the true power of WordPress can be achieved with the use of various plugins. 

But what do plugins do? Plugins can do virtually anything. You need to sell something. Or maybe you need a contact form to connect with your potential customers. Or perhaps you want to optimize your website for search engines. Chances are that there is a plugin for each one of these tasks. 

So let’s take a look at some essential plugins to consider as a beginner in WordPress. 

WooCommerce 

An e-commerce website is nothing like other websites. So there has to be a dedicated and powerful plugin that will transform your website into a fully functional online store. For that, WooCommerce is currently the best plugin in the market. 

WooCommerce provides almost all the features you might think your online store needs. From product management, store customization, and marketing, to analytics, payments, and flexibility. WooCommerce provides it all. 

Key features of WooCommerce: 

• Sell physical/digital products, and subscriptions with flexibility 
• Access 800+ extensions 
• User-friendly interface; effective product organization 
• Set the currency, language, and measurement units 
• Let customers sort products by popularity, ratings, newness, price, or other attributes 
• Add as many images as you want to showcase your products 
• Built-in payment processing 
• Inventory and order management 

Price: Free 

Yoast SEO

You certainly want your products to appear on top of the SERP (search engine results page). That’s why you need an SEO plugin. 

Yoast SEO is an SEO plugin that helps you improve your visibility on search engines. It helps you write SEO-friendly content. 

First, it analyzes your content for readability and suggests improvements like title tags, keyword, sentence length, and internal links to optimize for search engines. It is very user-friendly and efficient. 

Key features of Yoast SEO are: 

• Front-end SEO inspector for enhanced visibility 
• Integration with WordProof and REST API support 
• Keyword insights via SEMRush for strategic optimization 
• Schema controls and internal linking blocks for structured content 
• Inclusive features like FAQ block, function words check, and image alt attribute analysis 
• Readability analysis, mobile previews, and keyphrase density evaluation for comprehensive SEO management 

Price: Freemium (Pro version starts at $99 per year) 

Fluent Forms 

Fluent Forms is the most lightweight form-builder plugin in WordPress. Creating effective and visually pleasing online forms is just a piece of cake with Fluent Forms, thanks to its user-friendly interface and the variety of powerful features packed into it. 

From contact forms to lead generation forms, product order forms, registration forms, conversational forms, quiz forms, and beyond, Fluent Forms lets you design and implement a wide range of forms to suit every need of your business. 

Key Features of Fluent Forms: 

• 50+ ready-to-use input fields 
• Conversational forms for giving the best form-filling experience
• 45+ native integrations for additional functionality
• Numeric calculation for measuring numbers based on inputs
• Payment feature for accepting payments from your clients in a seamless way

Price: Freemium (Pro plan starts at $63/year) 

MemberPress 

If you’re planning to offer subscription-based services, MemberPress is an excellent choice. Memberpress allows you to have full control over to whom and how much of your content is seen. 

Key Features of MemberPress: 

• Provide exclusive content for members 
• Design and manage membership levels based on subscriptions 
• Sell online courses 
• Content analytics 
• Customizable membership options 
• Community forums 

Price: Pricing starts at $179.50 per year. 

FluentCRM 

Email marketing is a fantastic way to grow and keep your audience. However, maintaining customers and sending emails can take a lot of time and energy.

FluentCRM stands out as a self-hosted CRM plugin with robust marketing automation capabilities, serving as the preferred solution for over 30,000 businesses. This plugin offers a ton of features designed to efficiently manage your customers. 

Key Features of FluentCRM: 

• Run and manage unlimited email marketing campaigns 
• One-click integration with popular plugins like WooCommerce, LearnDash, Easy Digital Downloads, LifterLMS, MemberPress, etc. 
• Detailed user overview and customer tracking 
• Advanced segmentation and automation features 
• Create lists, give your contacts tags, and create dynamic or behavioral segments 
• Send repetitive emails to a large number of people with email sequencing 
• Perform A/B tests for the subject lines 

Price: The annual license for a single domain starts at $77. 

WP Social Ninja 

WP Social Ninja is an amazing social media plugin that fetches social media feeds, and reviews from different kinds of social media and embeds them into your website.

A key advantage of using this tool is its compatibility with over 29 social media platforms. 

Key Features of WP Social Ninja: 

• Add social reviews, proofs and recommendations on your website 
• Ask for more reviews 
• Display social reviews with stylish layout types: Grid, Slider or Masonry 
• Show off your social reviews from a variety of templates 
• Control the visibility of your reviewers’ identity 
• Update social feeds in real-time on your website 
• Customize social chat box to suit your brand perfectly 

Price: Freemium (The single domain annual plan starts at $89) 

How to Install Plugins? 

Installing plugins on your WordPress website is a straightforward process. Go to Plugins from the left sidebar of your WordPress dashboard. Click on Add New Plugin to access the plugin repository.

Here, you can either search for a specific plugin or upload one directly. Once you’ve found the desired plugin, click Install Now. 

After installation, activate the plugin to enable its features. 

Some plugins may require additional configuration. Once activated and configured, your new plugin is ready to use. 

And there you have it! From an idea to starting a new journey in simple steps. 

Wrap Up

Starting an online business using WordPress is easy. Find your niche, get a domain and hosting, and use themes and plugins to build your online store.