Chances are, if you're watching this video, you've already heard about WordPress. But what exactly is WordPress? Simply put, WordPress is web software you can use to create your own website or blog. Since it was first released in 2003, WordPress has become one of the most popular web-publishing platforms, and today, it powers more than 70 million websites. But what many people
don't realize is that WordPress is not just a blogging tool. It's also a highly flexible content management system, or CMS, that enables you to build and manage your own full-featured website, using just your web browser. Best of all, it's completely free. That's because WordPress is an open source project, which means that hundreds of volunteers from all around the world are constantly creating and improving the code for the WordPress software. And there are thousands of plug-ins, widgets, and themes, that enable you to build a completely custom website for just about anything you can imagine.
So how does it work? Well since the early days of the Internet, websites have been created in HTML, a programming language that utilizes complex instructions, called tags, to format text, page layouts,
images, and so on.
Your web browser then reads this HTML code, interpreting those tags to render and display the content of a particular page. These days, you can install the WordPress software script on your own web server in about five minutes, and once installed, it enables you to use a simple, web-based editor
to create web pages without having to learn HTML. There's even a hosted version at wordpress.com
that allows you create a new WordPress-powered website in just a few seconds. And because it's built
on industry standard PHP and MySQL, WordPress can run on just about any modern web server. There are several reasons WordPress is a great choice for building your blog or business website.
First of all, it's open source, which also means that it's free. And with hundreds of people
all over the world working on it, WordPress is constantly evolving and improving. Second, it's user-friendly. Rather than having to hire a web designer or contact a webmaster every time you want to make a small change to your website, you can easily manage and update your own content, all without having to learn HTML.
In fact, if you know how to use the basic formatting tools in a program like Microsoft Word, you can edit your site. Third, it's flexible and extensible. There are literally thousands of plug-ins and themes, both commercial and free, that enable you to easily change the entire look of your website
or even add new features, like polls or contact forms with just a few clicks. Next, if you run into problems, or if you want to add some highly customized features, it's easy to find support or hire someone to help you. In addition to the tutorials on this site, there are also thousands of WordPress developers and designers who could help you. The official WordPress forum is a great place to get answers to your questions. And there are other sites, like the WordPress Stack Exchange or wpquestions.com, where you can also find answers to all your WordPress questions.
Right out of the box, WordPress is standards compliant and includes everything you need to ensure that your content is optimized for search engines, which is critical to your site's visibility and online success. In short, WordPress is made to do SEO well. And last, you'll be in control of your own content. Some other publishing platforms limit what you can and can't do on your own website, and you're locked into that service. If it should ever shut down, your content could simply disappear. With WordPress, you can import your data from other systems, like Blogger or Tumbler, and you can also easily export your data to move away from WordPress,should you choose. You're in control of your site and your content. So if you're looking for an easy tool that will help you to build your own blog or website without having to learn complicated HTML, no other system makes it this easy. And you'll find that WordPress is incredibly flexible, with thousands of themes, plug-ins, and support options, to ensure that your site will continue to grow with you in the future. We trust this video's been helpful, and we look forward to seeing what you're able to build with WordPress.