WordPress FAQ

Self-help Topics For WordPress Users

Find Answers To The Most Frequently Asked Questions In WordPress

WordPress is easy to use and on this page, I’m going to show you how you can manage your own site by providing a few simple lessons and some handy tips to get you started using WordPress and Divi.

FAQ & Solutions

How Do I Log Into My New WordPress Site?

Log onto the WordPress Dashboard on a Desktop PC or laptop, by typing your web address on your web browsers address bar and then add /wp-admin without any spaces, and hit enter on your keyboard. E.g.: www.yourdomain.com/wp-admin.

You should see a page that looks something like the image below. Use your login credentials to sign in to the Dashboard.

How to log into your self-hosted wordpress site

How Do I Edit Text Visually With The Divi Theme?

Log onto the WordPress Dashboard. See instructions in the previous FAQ.

Go to Pages>All Pages> Hover your mouse over the title of the page you wish to edit and click on ‘Edit with Divi.’ Wait for your page to fully load. Note: You are now editing in the Divi Visual Builder.

Watch the video below for a short tutorial.

How do I add or change an image on a page?

Watch this video to learn how to change an image in the Divi Image Module.

Where Do I Edit Blog Posts?

Log onto your WordPress Dashboard.

Go to Posts >All posts > Hover your mouse over the title of the page you wish to edit and click on ‘Edit.’

Most of my clients will have the classic builder installed. However you may have the Gutenberg editor.

( Note: As a beginner it is best that you DO NOT edit in the Divi Visual Builder which I reserve for page editing only.)

What WordPress updates are required?

Basic tasks that need to be carried out at least once a month for static sites that don’t regularly change. Keep in mind that all updates are critical as they are security based.

These are:

Plugin updates
Theme updates
WordPress Core Updates (when they become available)

Back up your site prior to carrying out the updates to create a restore point, in case you need to roll back your site to the previous version should anything go wrong during an update.

I also recommend server updates for the following:

PHP updates (on the server as they become available)

How To Update Plugins?

Before updating plugins I suggest first conducting a backup of your site. Conducting backups allow WordPress sites to be rolled back and restored to a previous version should something go wrong.

Manual Updates – Log onto the Dashboard.

Go to Plugins > Installed Plugins and Click on the check boxes of the plugins you’d like to install. You can select all of them it doesn’t really matter. Then at the top of the page in ‘bulk actions’ select update and hit the apply button.

Learn How To Conduct Bulk Plugin Updates.

Safe Plugin Updates

For sites running Woocommerce, Membership sites and Online course websites, I highly recommend testing on a staging site rather than on your live site. Conducting safe updates of those larger sites will ensure the sites will remain up and running after a ‘major’ release/update.

How To Update To A New WordPress Version ? (WordPress Core File)

Log Into Your Dashboard> Updates

To Update WordPress Safely, first conduct a complete backup your site. The backup will create a copy of your site and provide you with a restore point.

After a successful backup,you may safely update WordPress to the newer version.

My Website Is Not Displaying The Most Recent Changes

When this happens you clear your website cache. However, you might also need to clear your browser cache. Below are instructions on how to clear your Chrome Browser Cache.

HOW TO CLEAR CHROME BROWSER CACHE USING THE LIFETIME OPTION.

Lifetime deletion prevents you from conducting frequent cache cleanups. The action is is critical as these JUNK files accumulate regularly in browser folders and when cluttered, they effectively stop websites from displaying their most recent changes.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Before you do this, ensure you have a record of your passwords as clearing the cache in your browser may delete the saved passwords you have stored in your browser. To retrieve forgotten passwords you may be required to reset them.
Visit the website you’re trying to access, then underneath the sign in form, click the forgotten passwords linked text.

RETRIEVE LOST PASSWORDS: Then check your email to reset your password. Check spam and junk folders.

GETTING STARTED: SELECT THE THREE DOTS ON TOP RIGHT OF YOUR CHROME BROWSER

THEN GO TO MORE TOOLS> CLEAR BROWSING DATA:

IN THE DROP DOWN MENU, SELECT ALL TIME. Then clear data using the button below.

What is WordPress?

WordPress is a powerful content management system (CMS), that is typically used in combination with a registered domain name and a paid web hosting plan to create websites. This type of WordPress site is known as a ‘self-hosted” site. At least 30% of the world’s business websites are powered by WordPress.

WordPress is easy to learn and support is readily available. No coding experience is required for content management. WordPress is scalable enough to grow as your business grows. WordPress allows the user to add pages, features, and functionality as required. Design options are endless with the use of WordPress themes to style the appearance of a website. WordPress can be used to create a landing page, blog, online stores, classifieds, music websites, gaming sites, online learning sites, business websites and the list goes on. If you can think of it, WordPress makes it possible. Self-hosted WordPress sites are also portable, as they can be migrated from one web hosting provider to another.

The differences between WordPress.org and WordPress.com

WORDPRESS THEMES

WordPress uses themes and builders to govern the design aspect of a website. I personally love to work with the Divi theme for its visual editing capabilities. Divi allows me to express my creativity to create stunning websites, but it also makes affordable in-house content management possible. Great for those with no coding experience. The theme is really well supported, with the a plethora of videos and documentation available online.

What does WordPress cost?

WordPress is an open-source software that is free to download from WordPress.org. However for you to create a live site visible on the internet, you will need to purchase a web hosting plan and to register domain name. You may opt to create your own WordPress site, or to hire a professional to do the work for you. Request your no-obligation quote.

How Do I add A Page or Post?

WordPress makes it easy to add your own pages or ‘blog’ posts for adding content.

Pages: Log into the WordPress Dashboard, choose Pages>add new, Name your page, add your content and save your page in draft mode until it’s ready to be published.

Posts: Add a new ‘blog‘ post using your dasbhoard>posts>add new. Write your post, name your post, and save it in draft mode until your post is ready to be published.

On your pages and posts, the addition of other information will be required before going live. Depending if you’ve created page or post, adding more information other than your content is required. Such as: an excerpt, a featured image, meta description, categories and tags. Depending on the SEO plugin used, options to add more information will vary, such as the use of keywords etc. to make pages and posts search engine and social media friendly.

Can I Import My Blog Posts From Other Sites?

Content can be imported from one WordPress blog to another, or from various platforms to WordPress. Here are the instructions on how to do it.

Why do I need to conduct a backup before conducting updates?

Conducting a backup before any WordPress update is critical to the health of your website. Backups create a restore point to make your website recoverable should anything go wrong.

It’s even more crucial to those whose web hosting provider doesn’t include ‘acronis (hourly) backups’ in their web hosting plan. Acronis backups give you peace of mind, by enabling you to simply open a ticket with your web host to request a website restoration from their backup, to a time when your site was working. Even if you have Acronis backups, having more than one backup and restore point as an added safety measure is ideal. I also use the Updraft Plugin.

Play it safe. Its’ the internet after all. Files can become corrupted, carry malware, connections can drop, or just fail during installation as they get transferred in packets from one computer (or server) to the next.

How Do I Change My Theme?

A WordPress theme changes the style of your WordPress website. The theme itself can be changed by logging onto the WordPress Dashboard>Appearance>Themes>Add New. There you will be able to upload your own theme file in *.zip format, or to choose from free WordPress themes available on the WordPress.org list.

The next step is to activate the theme you have chosen. Not recommended doing this on a live site. Two simple methods you can use are:

Create a staging site
Place your site on maintenance mode while you work on it. You can do this by using a coming soon/maintenance plugin.

Be sure to check every page on various browsers such as Google Chrome, Bing and Mozilla. Also check layouts on desktop pc, laptop and smartphone.

How Do I Install A Plugin?

‘Installing a plugin is easy. From the WordPress dashboard go to plugins> add new.

From there you will be able to conduct a search for a plugin, or you’ll be able to upload a previously downloaded plugin.

For your website security, be careful to select reputable and compatible plugins with your version of WordPress that have had loads of previous downloads and are also highly rated. Also note the plugin creator which may come in handy for researching your plugin.

Once you have selected your plugin, install and activate it.

Plugin configuration is required. If the plugin settings are not easy to configure, you may wish to conduct an internet search to locate the plugin documentation from the vendors website. Search for “how to set up (plugin name by vendor’s name) on WordPress.”

How Do I Add or Edit A Menu?

Your WordPress navigation menu has links to various pages. To add a new menu or to edit an existing menu log into your WordPress Dashboard>Appearance>Menus.

To create a new menu: Click the ‘create a new menu’ link at the top of the page and name it.
Add/remove menu items: Add pages, posts, categories and tags that you’ve already published, or use the custom links option (which is great to link to other websites) using the options on the left side of the screen. Click the “remove” link on the menu item to remove it.
More from WordPress.org on Navigation Menus.

How Do I Change My Password or User Name?

Passwords can be changed by logging into the WordPress dashboard> users> all users.

There you will find your existing user name with a linked option underneath for editing your password. Be careful to take note of your new password.

While user names in WordPress cannot be changed, creating a new user name and password can be done. You may decide to use this method to replace your old login details.

WARNING – When creating your new user it is CRUCIAL that you give yourself an admin access level as the website administrator. Any other access level has restrictions that will disable your ability to perform certain tasks on your site. So be extra careful.

Once your new login credentials have been created with an administrator access level, you may wish to delete the old user by going into in the dashboard, using the same method as above for access.

More information about resetting your password on WordPress.org.

What Version Of WordPress Am I Using?

Log onto the WordPress dasbhoard.

Scroll to the bottom of the screen.

The WordPress version can located on the very bottom right of your screen.

How Can I Change My Theme Fonts?

Go to Appearance>Customize>General Settings>Typography

Select your font type and sizes, customise your colour, line height and more.

Can't Find What you're looking for?

Ask Sandra