Publishing Your Website in Three Steps

Whether you want to make money online, publicize your business, or simply set up a website for fun, knowing where to start is half the battle. This brief, easy-to-follow guide will tell you how to publish a website, and what comes next.

publish a website

It is easier than ever to create and manage a website, even if you have limited technical knowledge. The process of publishing a website can be broken down into three simple steps: finding a Web Hosting provider and registering your domain, setting up your website and publishing content.

Step 1: Finding a Web Hosting Plan

The kind of Web Hosting your site will need depends on certain considerations, such as its functionality, the amount of visitors you expect to receive, and how many pages it will comprise of.

Unless you expect your website to receive thousands of visitors each day or plan to create a website with high demands, you can most likely get by with a Web Hosting provider that offers either Shared Hosting, also known as Cheap Web Hosting. You can quickly compare some of our best value options displayed on the right side of this page, or hit the button below:

Compare and Buy Cheap Web Hosting

With Shared Hosting, your site will share server resources with other websites on the same server as you. Because modern servers are incredibly powerful, multiple websites can reside on one server without creating performance issues.

Hosting providers monitor Shared Servers extensively. If a website is using too much resource from the server, providers take the necessary steps to ensure the stability of service. All providers aim to offer as close to 100% uptime as possible.

Using WordPress (Recommended)

A WordPress hosting plan – allows you to easily install the WordPress Content Management System (CMS) with a single click. Depending on the complexity of your website idea, you may be able to simply select a theme defining the appearance of the website and start publishing content immediately. 

WordPress is, for good reason, the most popular CMS in the world - it is flexible, user-friendly, and responsible for running over half of active websites on the Internet today. If you haven't yet started building your website, try our step-by-step tutorial:

 

Often, the Web Hosting company will even take responsibility for keeping the CMS, plugins and themes up to date - ensuring constant stability and security for your website.

Domain Registration

The Domain Name defines the address that people use to find your website - for example, the Domain Name of this site is webhostingsearch.com. Most Web Hosting companies offer to register a domain on your behalf when you buy a hosting package with them. It is usually simplest to register a Domain with your hosting company, as they will then automatically link the Domain Name to your web server.

If you prefer however, you can also purchase a Domain Name from a 'Domain Registrar'. To register your Domain this way, you will need to log in to your account on the Domain Registrar’s website and link the Domain to your website's DNS address(es). These can usually be found in the email you get from your hosting company after you sign up.

Our Domain Search tool can help you to decide on the best Domain Name for your website, check its availability, and help you to register it. Simply specify a few keywords, and it will provide suggestions based on those and similar words, including synonyms and related expressions.

Register Your Domain Today

Automatic Application Install

After creating your Web Hosting account and registering your Domain Name, you can log in to your hosting account. Most Web Hosting providers utilize control panels with intuitive graphical front-ends such as cPanel or Plesk.

Here you will be able to customize your hosting plan and install software applications, including Content Management Systems such as WordPress, Joomla or Drupal. 

Step 2: Setting Up Your Website

Before you start, consider whether you want to create a dynamic website by using a Content Management System (CMS), or a static website by using a website builder or your own handwritten code.

In general, maintaining a large static website requires more effort than maintaining a dynamic website powered by a CMS. However, if you just want to create a small website with a few simple pages, a static website may be worth considering. Although they lack the functionality provided by CMS plugins, they are generally quick and cheap to develop.

Web Design Software: Creating a 'Static' Website

If you know how to write in HTML, CSS and JavaScript, you can design your website using a text editor such as Notepad++ and preview your pages by opening the files in your browser. When you create a website in this manner, you are creating a 'static' website; each page is a unique file on your web server and is displayed exactly as you create it when someone visits its URL.

If creating a website this way is not an option for you, there are numerous WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) Website Builders which enable you to create a website with all the necessary functions, even if you have no technical knowledge. 

Free Website Builders in Web Hosting plans

Content Management Systems (CMS)

Creating a website with a CMS frees you from designing each page from scratch. Content Management Systems store your website's information in a database and rely on a template to define its appearance and functionality. These templates use HTML and JavaScript with CSS, and usually every page keeps the same basic design and structure.

Installing a CMS onto your Web Hosting plan is usually a simple process, thanks to one-click installers built into modern hosting control panels. Once it is installed, you can easily add and modify the content, design and functionality of your website by logging into the CMS from any Internet browser.

If you want to change the appearance of your website, you can simply change to a new template or theme. Templates dictate the different types of pages available to you. These usually share some elements but differ in a crucial ways – for example the contact page, home page and article page will look different from each other due to their conflicting intentions. You can change templates and themes whenever you like without altering your website’s content or taking it offline.

Setting Up a Content Management System

Installing and configuring a CMS is a very simple process if your Web Hosting company offers automatic CMS installation. 

WordPress Hosting plans

After you install the CMS through your hosting company’s control panel, you will receive instructions via email explaining how to log in to the CMS. For example, with WordPress this is accomplished by adding “/wp-admin” to the end of your website’s URL.

After entering your password, you will see the main menu of your CMS. You will most likely want to install a template first, as the design and functionality of the site may dictate the content you place within it. On WordPress, you can choose a template by selecting the 'Themes' option under the 'Appearance' menu, and adapt it to your preferences by using the 'Customize' feature.

Not using WordPress?

Try these popular alternative Content Management Systems:

Joomla HostingDrupal Hosting

Once the theme is sorted, we recommend adding some useful plugins. All-in-one SEO for example, is very useful for analyzing your content and suggesting how to rank higher in search results. You can also find plugins which increase your website’s security. When installing plugins, be careful to not add too many at once – occasionally plugins do not work well together, or significantly slow down your site.

Step 3: Publishing Content

Now you've got the Web Hosting plan set up and the design and functionality of your website decided upon, it's time for arguably the most important part; adding content. Without quality content, your site will not be found by your target audience, regardless of how good it looks.

Static Websites

If you opted to create your website using a WYSIWYG editor or your own handwritten code, your website will be available to the public as soon as you upload the files to the server. Although your Web Hosting provider likely has a file management solution for this purpose, these systems are often slow and unreliable, even sometimes disconnecting unexpectedly in the middle of large transfers.

Instead, we suggest using an open-source File Transfer Protocol (FTP) tool such as WinSCP or FileZilla, which connects directly to your server. If the connection is terminated, it will automatically try to resume it and continue your file transfer, saving you time and frustration.

Dynamic Websites

If you opted to create your website using a dynamic Content Management System such as WordPress, you can add new content by clicking the ‘Add New’ link under the ‘Posts’ or ‘Pages’ menu section on the Dashboard. Pages are for content that rarely changes, such as ‘About Us’ or ‘Company History’. New pages will usually appear in your website’s navigation bar, which can be further customized in the ‘Menus’ section.

If your website is a blog, most of your content will be Posts. Each Post that you create will be dated, and the front page of your website can be configured to display your most recent posts. Remember that blogs are not exclusively personal; many business websites have blog sections for news updates and other time-sensitive information, and for letting search engines know that the site is being actively maintained – which can contribute to improving your ranking.

What's Next?

Now you know how easy it is, get started by choosing your Web Hosting plan:

Compare and Buy Cheap Web Hosting

You may also be interested in:

Written 2016-09-26 (Updated 2016-12-21)
me2

Written by Alex Tester


Alex is a native English speaker with a BA (Hons) degree from Anglia Ruskin University in the UK. He is passionate about creating engaging content for Web Hosting Search, and does all he can to ensure that what you see on the page is helpful and gets you where you want to go.

Share your thoughts

Raafat Hamzeh,  2 April, 2015

This is the first time I publish a web application and I'm totally lost! I have developed my web application using Yii2 framework on my local server (xampp), and now it is ready to be published. I have to publish my application on packard server (packard.websitewelcome.com), but I have no idea how to do this. I uploaded my app folder to the CPanel file manager, but I don't know how to install my app and how to choose a domain or even how to start publishing it!! Could you please guide me through this?

Debra,  25 March, 2015

Have you looked at BlueHost? It is much more affordable and seems to have more features.

Uduak Daniel,  16 March, 2015

Thanks for this tutorial. Very useful. I however would want to where on the fireFTP control panel I can make the site inaccessible to the public while updating. Please help

Manuel Lopez,  16 March, 2015

If I have customized my wordpress on my localhost, then how can I publish it to my hosting provider (hostforlife.eu)? I have uploaded all my files, but I got an error 'establishing database error'? Is there anything I miss?

Thank you

Nigel,  14 August, 2014

I need to publish my website as soon as yesterday.

bharathi.b,  26 May, 2014

thanks for your valuable posting it was very informative.

fenser,  23 April, 2014

I am nearly done done with my research. I have chosen PHP as my platform to make a dynamic CMS website intended for uploading and downloading a university modules and etc.. Normally when doing a page in PHP + Wamp Server, we set the Host as Localhost and then later on test the website on a browser indicating the URL as Localhost/blabla... and not the website name if not yet assigned or purchased...So what are the possible or expected steps to do when I wanted to publish the website on the www....Your help is deeply appreciated...:)..Sorry I'm still new to PHP...

Gordon Johnson,  11 January, 2014

I am an amateur website designer. I designed and manage a few websites for organizations that I belong to. I started out many years ago creating a simple website, building on my previous programming experience by also taking a course in HTML/JAVA at the local community college.

I use a text editor to write the code, and Cute FTP to publish, either to GoDaddy or iPage. I enjoy the challenge and control of writing in HTML, but feel somewhat limited in what I can produce due to my lack of knowledge of how to do certain things (drop down menus, requiring password protection, etc).

Is there any web design software designed for someone with a little experience such as myself, so that I could do these things, but also, for example, go in and alter the source code? Also, do any of the software packages include publishing capability or should I stick with Cute FTP?

Olumide,  13 November, 2013

Really helpful!

vani,  8 November, 2013

Hi !

I have webpages created inside the localhost. Now I need t make it available to all. Therefore I downloaded the FileZilla server into my laptop. Now my concern is, how do I upload the files into the dedicated web server hosted by 3rd party. Also need some clarification on purchasing domain name .

Thank you in advance.

Matt Dierlam,  22 May, 2013

Dave,

Can you help me with some Word Press Launch questions and considerations?

YFSIndia,  26 March, 2013

Fantastic steps but any site wants practical for publishing and after I read the given steps, I am confused now. Any ideas?

priya,  16 February, 2013

i have a dynamic website designed on .net.how can i publish that ....please tell me

Asad,  8 February, 2013

Hey David, thanks for your plug-and-play post! I am using the combination of HostGator and Wordpress and sometimes Joomla. Joomla is fully customisable and Wordpress is easy to share an article or page!

Georgean Sharp,  18 November, 2012

Hi David,

I happened on your website through Google Images and was wondering if the photo you have with your article Publishing Your Website in Three Steps is copyrighted. If so, can you give me that information? I'd love to use it on my website at some point.

Thanks,

Georgean Sharp

Tulasi,  25 September, 2012

It is really effective article. Thank you very much.

Jose Castro,  19 June, 2012

I wolud like publishing my website in yahoo

whaimz,  16 June, 2012

Hello sir!
I would like to ask a question for you there is any way or most convenient step by step regarding about on web publishing?

angelb,  22 April, 2012

what is the difference of dreamweaver and wordpress?

Edness,  15 April, 2012

I was just wondering, how can I publish a website with Web Page Maker.

Roxanne,  2 April, 2012

How can i publish my website at free of cost?????

April,  2 April, 2012

Thanks David,
Im a college student getting my degree for Web Developement, but as an entrepreuer this little bit of info really guided me in the right direction for my business and my clients.

Joanne,  9 March, 2012

Hi David,
I need to re-create my company's website to offer password protected access to various services and scheduling. In order to register, clients will need a password (which will identify their employer) then after they register we need clients to be able to access employer customized service offerings (now using their own ID and password) and then schedule for appointment time slots.

What do I need/how do I find the right person to set this up. I suspect our current host/server may not be able to do all this. I assume we can move our domain name -- yes?

Tx.
JJ

kaaba,  15 January, 2012

when my web site connected to MySQL DB... how can I publish the site ?

rajesh,  25 November, 2011

i creat a website in dreamweaver and i want know how to published website in easy steps.

Website Development Company,  24 November, 2011

Hi.

Good information on website designing structure and its hosting.

thanks

Pras,  25 October, 2011

how shouid i enhance and publish my website? Please mention steps to connect the my webpage into geogle or yahoo?

Jarnail singh,  20 October, 2011

I have developing the web site project in Asp.Net , plesse let me know how to publish the website.

Dj playa,  20 September, 2011

I think publishing a web site iz prety cool,but nw plz,xplan how do i gain 4rm it if i want to earn a lil somethng....!

Brian Shively,  9 June, 2011

so i have a question. I have written a website in dreamweaver and am currently very pleased with its turnout. my plan is to get into affiliate marketing(like everyone else). now....i would like to produce multiple websites promoting different goods and services. Now...here is where my question begins. Can i go to godaddy.com and get a hosting package...and run multiple sites? Am i going to be able to upload multiple sites? I am looking at the "medium" priced one...i believe its 7.99/month. I would presume that i am correct, but i am new to this. any help that you can offer would be much appreciated.

SoogUnpamma,  17 January, 2011

I love www.webhostingsearch.com! Here I always find a lot of helpful information for myself. Thanks you for your work.

Best regards

Deen aDhayalan. U,  18 December, 2010

I want Publish My Mobile Service Business..How can do it.,
url http://dhaya-freedomsolutions.blogspot.com/

Alemu Shiferaw Tolla ,  15 December, 2010

How I publish an article? Please help me!

SHARIFbos,  7 December, 2010

SHARIFbos

Lisa,  5 December, 2010

how to puplish products sold on ebay store?

sahl ahmed shaikh,  2 December, 2010

do i have to publish my blogger blog also?
pls tel soon

Check out my cool blog of best humor and technology tips and tricks
do comment if u like i will comment back!!=)

http://www.humortechblog.co.cc

easypag.es,  30 November, 2010

hey guys, if you don't need a full website, but just a web page (quick and free) for an event or just to share some content, try this out http://easypag.es

ROMEO,  26 November, 2010

hi everybody,i have creted my web site free at webs.com.now i want to publish my website but unfortunately i dont know how it will?
can someone help me?
is it free?

ROMEO,  26 November, 2010

hi everybody,i have creted my web site free at webs.com.now i want to publish my website.can someone help me.is it free?

Sukumar Roy,  25 November, 2010

i am new to this field please help me out........!!

i am done with my website and want to published. but i need to know what are the rules i should follow so that i am not in any trouble. actually mt website is about music videos songs, movie trailor, mobile sms, and movie poster. can u please help me......!!

Azam,  24 November, 2010

I have completed my website. But ggchrome showing that it is down. Plz show me the way to make it On

mayur ,  15 November, 2010

sir,
i want to publish my website on internet...pls give me some information.......

Alina's List,  14 November, 2010

i really like it. i hope so many people will take more knowledge from this information. thanks for sharing.

beelza,  10 November, 2010

please help me!! i know html,javasript. and lil php i want to create a social network site.. my ques is - is it secure to host a social network website through anonymous companies or to purchase my own server. my project is small .

Stephan,  6 November, 2010

Thanks for the tip. It was very useful. I myself used these basic steps to create my website www.multimediaboom.com

Best Hosting:,  1 November, 2010


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Hope this helps.

sakshi shukla,  31 October, 2010

please tell me can i own a domain free of cost

praful shrivastava,  18 October, 2010

sir, i want to publish my static pages web site on Internet, with out any cost...

jason,  4 October, 2010

i have make my free website but i don;t know how to publish it to the web?

can u teach me how?

manish shrestha,  16 September, 2010

sir,
i hve struct while creatg my own webste but i need sme hlp from u in publishg my ws.......................

dilip,  10 September, 2010

please define me how to changes in my application after publishing my web & please tell me where .cs file of my Asp.net application stored after publishing web.I have only seen aspx file .

rakesh goel,  4 September, 2010

please define very simple process to publi8sh a web site .
my knowledge is about html, and frontpg is limited

tom.prestage,  5 August, 2010

oooooohhhh yeh i am the best and everyone kinows it!

Inregistrare domenii,  12 July, 2010

Good information!

hazief lukman,  9 July, 2010

that is great

orainecampbell,  25 June, 2010

now

juls,  23 June, 2010

please give me the step by step procedure on how to upload my website

vijay ( Todays ),  17 June, 2010

pls help me. how to publish our website.

vijay,  17 June, 2010

pls help me. how to publish our website

mylita,  16 June, 2010

please help me how should i publish our website to the internet give me some tips to easy publish our website
our website:www.friendgolf.com

golf clubs,  16 June, 2010

very good!

sunil kumar,  14 June, 2010

i have create a website on asp.net
& i have buy web space but i don"t know how to publics our website plz help me

Silvester zafar,  10 June, 2010

we are builde the new wap site.I am computer mastee but i have to face the some problems.I love my friends and i miss you Good Bless You.

Rohit Soni,  18 May, 2010

We have our own website but not able to access the Main Page....pls help me to start our own website

mzw01,  11 May, 2010

is it apslotlee free

Chris,  8 May, 2010

It's real easy, but first you need a domain, here you can get a fully working free domain
http://www.000webhost.com/304438.html
Enjoy
Just Sign Up and create

Manish Kumar,  31 March, 2010

i had made the site free of cost but it is not opening with the web address which i have assigned. so, please someone tell me how to open the website with my own url, which is (www.knowledgefactor.org)

rythnace,  24 March, 2010

how to publish a php website, is it the same way to follow html website or else...? please help me...!!!!!!!!!!

900amir abdul,  23 March, 2010

if you like sport so look my blog and tell me how is it?
www.supperspots4u.blogspot.com/

crystal,  17 March, 2010

I'm new to the cpanel. I started off using the sitebuilder& templates. So, I installed a template, but rather use one of my own. To get rid of the template, I didn't see a delete option. I had to go through file manager, and delete most of the content through public html. When I type my url, a white page pops up and it says, invalid template! How can I can publish my website and override the existing template?

Moktar,  10 March, 2010

I've got a nice suggestion.
Thanks a lot.

Nikhil,  21 February, 2010

it is free or not

bhavesh,  12 February, 2010

how to recommend a ftp client

stephen,  5 February, 2010

i love the web site and i wise to publish a web site

PROMISE SMART JAMES,  1 February, 2010

Thanks alot, i could get some jek out of it but, i still need to tuitorial for enhancment in Development...for me.

jojo compas,  29 January, 2010

It's very Helpful

Nathanial Patric,  4 January, 2010

You have mentioned a very good points on this post, I really like it. Your post is very good, thanks for sharing!

eshal,  20 December, 2009

plz tell me te procedure to publish the website in the internet easy steps tell

Monika Rana,  18 December, 2009

Hi It Is Very Helpful for Me NoBody Can say Me About Uploaded Website but i can understand throught this site...

jhenn,  4 December, 2009

its hard for me to published

dHostings,  9 November, 2009

Hello everyone,
@Mangesh Yes.! for sure you can make your website online for that first you have to book your Domain Name Eg: www.abc.com and after that you need hosting for the same. It depends you need Linux or Windows. Rest you can check with our support team support@dhostings.com

Promotion:
Book you online identity now Eg: www.yourname.com at just Rs275/- @dHostings

www.dhostings.com

safina anand,  8 November, 2009

i tried this website...very helpful...thank you..................

shah,  5 November, 2009

creat a website

Mangesh s.,  11 October, 2009

I have a website in html. Can i make it live

Amazigh,  28 September, 2009

I have a website; I published it to Google yahoo.....
I have created a site-map too
But I need a lot of links of other web search engine
someone help me plz

kHALIL,  26 September, 2009

Naser, i think it depends on you webserver( free, dedicated, virtual, allocated). then if you own a server and your business is big you can use dedicated webser and make some agreement with the ISP for internet connectivity. thanks

siciidf,  17 June, 2009

please help me

shadgul,  3 June, 2009

is it free to publish your won site on the inernet

Ravi,  2 June, 2009

I have PHP project..now i can publish my PHP project on net...anyone tell how to publish using PHP and MySQL

brenen,  8 April, 2009

waaazzzzzz uuupppp!!!

naser,  7 March, 2009

please help me how should i publish our website to the internet give me some tips to easy publish our website

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