There are a lot of hosting companies out there. Anything from $2 – $200 month. So how do you choose?  My guesss is that you are looking for quality hosting, lots of value for the buck and have one or more basic to medium sites you are looking to host/create. If you are are a pro then you probably already know so this is for the rest of us.   My personal recommendation is Dreamhost.  I’ve been wirth them for 8 years now and I have been really happy. They have a good uptime (~99.98%), are very affordable ($6-$10 a month depending onw how long you prepay for), give you a free domain name, offer unilimited domain hosting and email, ridiculously large disk space and bandwith and best of all have 1-click installs for things like Wordpress!

affordable web hosting

So if you want to launch your website today sign up for Dreamhost and let me walk you through each of the steps necessary so that you can have a professional looking site within a few hours.

It’s time to install Wordpress! Because of Dreamhost’s 1-click install, the process is made pretty easy. Again, just carefully follow the instructions below.

The first thing to do is to login your Dreamhost Panel. This is your control center for your sites. Head over to https://panel.dreamhost.com. Use your email and the password that you selected when you initially signed up for hosting.

Once you’re in the panel, select  ”Goodies” on the left menu, then “One-Click Installs”.

Welcome to the One-Click Installs page. This is where we can easily add software such as Wordpress and others. For now, we’ll just focus on Wordpress. You’ll notice that there are 2 options – easy and advanced. I recommend that you use the advanced as it will allow you total control over your Wordpress install – the easy one is, well a bit easier but also limited. So select the advanced option.

By default, Wordpress will be selected as the option of choice. But just make sure.

The next step is to specify the domain to install it to. If you only have one so far then that will be the one selected. Leave the second box blank.

The next step will ask you to create the database for Wordpress. Don’t worry if you don’t know what that is. Just ented the info exactly as shown in the image (replacing mydomain with yours of course).

Click the “Install it for me now” button. Check your email for instructions from Dreamhost. It usually takes about 10-15 min. Follow the instructions provided and you should end up staring at your Wordpress admin panel!  Good job!

If you’ve selected a domain name, it’s time to sign up for hosting (where your sites will reside). You’ll be able to register your domain name in the process (that means that it will be your domain name for the length of the registration which is a year by year thing.

So head over to Dreamhost. I’ve put together detailed instructions below, just follow them accurately and you’ll be good to go.

Once the page loads, click on the “Sign up NOW!” button to start the signup process.

Next click on the “Host a Domain” button.

Select the desired pre-pay period in Step 2. Any of them are fine, but I recommend a year minimum to avoid the setup fees.

Skip Step 3.

Step 4 offers a choice of extras. By default the Google Apps is selected and it’s not big deal to leave it on though you will have to perform some extra steps with Google afterwards. I recommend turning this off unless you have a need for it. You can change this later.

In Step 5, leave the first choice selected, enter your new domain name (don’t include the “wwww” and don’t forget the extension – i.e. “.com”)

You’ll need a unique username for the next field in lowercase letters with no spaces. The first part of your domain name is fine (i.e. mynewdomain) without the “.com” part.

Enter your personal information in Step 6.

In Step 7, check the indicating that you have read Dreamhost’s Terms of Service and Anti-Spam Policy after you’ve read them and click on the “Proceed to Payment” button to go to the payment screen which will allow you to complete the signup process using a choice of payment options.

Congratulations! Check your mailbox for emails from Dreamhost. Keep them archived but you don’t really need to follow any instructions in them.