Here’s the biggest secret to developing websites, or working with computers generally:
It’s OK to make mistakes. In fact, it’s essential.
Many people have learned to fear mistakes. They’re afraid to mess with things because they think they’ll break them. But professional website developers and other computer folk make mistakes all the time. They try something; it doesn’t work. No problem; they just try something else.
WordPress is nice because if you do something wrong, it’s easy to undo it and try something different. Your mistake matters not at all. If you’re not sure whether a theme will work for you, try it. If you don’t like it, a button click switches you back to the previous theme.
That said, here are some guidelines for efficient mistake making, so you don’t waste too much time chasing down blind alleys.
Perfection is Expensive
Be prepared to accept compromises. Do you need the best plugin? No. Find one that’s adequate, set it up, and go on to the next thing.
I’ve put thought and research into coming up with recommendations that are best for people without much (or perhaps any) experience creating websites, who nonetheless want a fully functional site.
So here’s the approach I suggest. Do it the way I say. Accept the default settings. Get your site up and running. Fiddle with it later if you must. Remember these guidelines for efficient web development:
- Am I being a perfectionist? Cut it out.
- Will anyone but me be bothered by this? Ignore it.
- Let’s wait a week and see whether I still care then.
- Am I wasting time fiddling with details when I could be writing?
Know Your Deal-Breakers
If there’s a function you want to add to your site, have a list of your non-negotiable requirements for how it should work. Arrange them in order of how long you think it’ll take to test whether the candidate theme or plugin meets that requirement, with the quickest first.
When evaluating a candidate, go down the list in that order to rule out unsuitable ones without spending a lot of time on them. Often the description or reviews can tell you whether a feature is available or if you have to pay to get it.
Oh, almost forgot: search this site to see whether I have a recommended plugin for what you’re needing. I try to mention the important features of whatever I recommend, so you might be able to tell whether something fits by reading my review.
Take Notes
If you tried a theme or plugin, write down the exact name and what you liked and disliked about it — even if you’ve already decided against using it. There are many plugins with similar names and appearances, so keep track of which ones you’ve already rejected and why, in case there are no good choices and you have to decide which is the least unacceptable of the previously rejected choices, or if a solution you’ve been using for a while becomes unusable for any reason.
“Remember kids, the only difference between Science and screwing around is writing it down.”
Adam Savage
Take a Snapshot
Before making big changes, back up your settings. One of the plugins I’ll have you install can take a “snapshot” of your entire site. When you try a risky change, where it’ll be hard to remember how to put things back in case of total fail, the backup will let you restore the earlier settings easily.
Test Before Investing Time
Some plugins need more setup than others. For an event calendar, you’ll want to enter your upcoming events. For an image slider or art gallery plugin, you must add pictures and construct slides. A Quote of the Day plugin will need a list of the quotes to select from.
WordPress is good about redisplaying normal content correctly when you switch to a new theme. The menus, blog posts, and page contents are all present, though they may be in different parts of the screen or in a different font. Images, video, and other uploads are also stored in a standard way.
But some themes and plugins may have special page types, tables, or file storage areas that aren’t usable without that theme or plugin. Alternate plugins for the same task often can’t read their data.
So, before you invest effort adding special content to your site — things other than regular pages, blog posts, images, menus, and file uploads — have a fair degree of confidence you’ve chosen the plugins and the theme you’ll be using for a while going forward. Test with a little sample data before you enter a lot of data.
Most plugins that manage records of data have import and export functions. Before you do manual data entry, check whether you can just save your existing spreadsheet or other database as a CSV file and import it (perhaps after rearranging the columns).
Ignore Stuff You Don’t Need Now
WordPress has options you’ll never need. The themes and plugins add more things to configure.
Don’t get hung up on trying to understand what every checkbox is for. Don’t try out every selection. That’s a time sink.
Scan the list of options so you’ll have an idea what’s possible, because serendipity happens, but by and large, wait until you need something, then go looking for the option to do it. If it’s not there, there’s usually a plugin to do it.
I’ll point out the things to pay attention to when getting started. If you see it on the screen but I don’t mention it, don’t worry about it.
Use Forums, Search for Articles
This site also has a lot of “how to” articles about things you probably want to do — just search.
WordPress.org has free forums to search for answers, theme and plugin recommendations, and advice on how to achieve specific goals. There are both general forums and ones about specific themes and plugins. Smart, helpful people answer questions there, usually fairly quickly. They’re a good first place to look when you have problems or questions.
For beginner-level “how to” articles, wpbeginner.com is a good place to search.
For general web searches, adding the word “wordpress” to a query will generally find good how-to articles for whatever you’re trying to do.