(Please note, if you purchase by going through the links in this post I will receive a commission)

I’ve not updated my progress for a while, so here’s an update of what I have achieved since my last post:

I’ve updated the blog theme, signed up with Aweber, added an opt-in form & gift to my blog, set up Google Analytics to track my traffic, submitted my site to some RSS feed directories, and set up a profit pulling platform. So as you can see although I’ve not updated my progress here for a while, I have been quite busy behind the scenes, most of the time sticking to my plan. Although my current earnings online to date are zero $0. Doe’s this bother me? No, I’ve only just got going & I’ve not even started to drive traffic to my site yet, I would also rather concentrate on building my list right now than make money anyway. I’m sure you’ve heard the saying “The money is in the list” right? Well I believe that to be very true, & I can understand why having a mailing list is so important, so that is what I’m putting all my effort into. And I would strongly advise you to do the very same.

Now I’m guessing that if you are following my progress you are either one of the students on Alex Jeffreys Coaching Program. Or you are not on the Coaching Program, but you are more than likely interested in making money online? Now some of you may have already taken some action & got a blog, hosting, domain name, & auto responder set up? If you have well done, you’ve taken the first steps to success online. But if you have yet to get started that’s not a problem, because I’m going to take you through the steps you need to take to get yourself up & running, or at least up & crawling. Because we don’t want to run before we have learnt to walk, always remember that.

So let’s start with what you need first:

Domain Name & Hosting

Before you can get your blog set up you are going to need your own domain name & hosting account. Now some people try & save money when they are starting out & go with a free wordpress blog from WordPress Direct or a free hosting account. But for what we are doing you are going to need to pay for your own hosting & a domain name, the reason for this is you are going to want to have full control over your site. With a free wordpress blog or free hosting account you are always at the mercy of the company who is providing your free access, there’s also a chance you won’t own the content that you write, on a free hosted blog. Also with blogs on WordPress Direct, you won’t be able to use a lot of plugins that you will need, & you most likely won’t be able to have an opt-in box to build your list either. So just trust me on this one & go with the paid hosting from the start, it will save you a lot of headaches.

So for your paid hosting account I would recommend using Hostgator.com, this is the hosting company I use, as do many other successful Internet Marketers. I haven’t noticed any downtime in the 5 months I have been with them, & they have plenty of tutorial videos in the members area, to walk you through everything you need to set yourself up.You also get a 45 day money back guarantee, though I’m sure very few people need to use it, it’s nice to know the option is there.

I’ve also found a 20% discount code that you can use, it’s only valid for July 2009, but I’ll try & replace this code with a new one when it expires, I will try & keep these discount codes up to date. If you are reading this post & I’ve not updated the codes lately, just leave me a comment & I’ll get right on to it.

The latest code is: BEACH

The process for purchasing your hosting from Hostgator is fairly simple:

1) Go to HostGator.com. Select ‘order now’ under the plan that you want. If you are just starting out, I would suggest choosing the Baby plan, which is the plan I am subscribed to. This allows you to host unlimited domains which is important, also unlimited bandwidth, & unlimited disk space.

2) Register your new domain, now you can do this with Hostgator for ease, but I would recommend registering your domain name with namecheap.com. It’s a very simple process but I can go into the details of it more if you have trouble, simply drop me a comment. However if you’d rather keep things more simple, you can register your domain name with Hostgator like I said. So if you went with Namecheap.com you already have a domain, so click “I will use My Existing Domain” and type it in the field, click “next” to continue. If you prefer to get your domain name with Hostgator, proceed to register it with them.

TIP (If you decide to use Namecheap.com you can find discount coupon codes by searching on Google for “namecheap July 2009 coupon” Replacing July 2009 with the date you are currently looking for. Namecheap also offer free WhoisGuard subscription for the first year, which I highly recommend to you. This will stop your name, home address & email & phone number being made publicly available to all kind of spammers.)
3) Back now on hostgator.com, Select the desired “billing cycle”, and type in the coupon code. Now click ‘calculate totals’.

4) You should see the discounted price.

5) Complete checkout.

Once you’ve done all that you will get an email from Hostgator with all the details of your account, you will want to keep this email for future reference, & you will need this for updating your DNS (Domain Name Servers) info in the steps below. If you purchased your domain name with Namecheap, then you will need to update the DNS (Domain Name Servers) with your hosts name servers info. So go to namecheap.com & login to your account, then:

1) Go to the section on the your account homepage where it says “QUICKLY MODIFY ONE OF YOUR DOMAIN” & enter the domain name you just purchased. Then click “Modify >>”

Add domain name & click modify

2) Then on the menu to the left, you will then need to click “Transfer DNS To Webhost”

3) Now go to the email that you received from Hostgator, which contained your account info. Now you need to find the part where it says-

EXAMPLE:

Nameserver 1: ns1.mydomain.com

Nameserver 2: ns2.mydomain.com

Then copy & paste the nameserver info into box 1 & 2 on Namecheap.com

4) Click save changes… (The changes are sometimes instant, but you may have to wait up to 24hrs for the changes to take effect. For instance don’t be alarmed if you can’t view your website straight away, just wait upto 24hrs & everything should be fine after that. If not just contact Hostgator & they will be happy to help you. I’ve emailed & phoned them a few times, they’ve always been very helpful, & replied in a timely manner.)

That’s basically all there is to it, but if you have any problems just leave a comment & I’ll do my very best to try & help you get it sorted. :)

The next thing you’ll want to do is set your wordpress blog up in Hostgator, you can very easily do this using the Fantasico script setup in your cPanel, you will find videos explaining everything in your Hostgator account, but again if you need help drop me a comment. I will reply to any question asked

Now at the beginning of this post I mentioned all those other things I’ve done in the last 2 weeks. I will talk about setting those up in the next few posts. I hope this post has been of some use to you?

I’m currently in the process of learning how to use Camtasia Studio, if I can master this I will be bringing out some tutorial videos to go with this post & future posts. For now I will try & at very least add some screen shots. Now I must admit I’m finding Camtasia a bit difficult at times, & I’m also having trouble projecting my voice to make the recordings sound lively & loud enough. Hopefully I will get the hang of this soon, so if anyone has any tips for me, I would be very grateful. I guess I’ll just keep practising for now, as they do say practice makes perfect.

Thank you for reading,

Paul.

(Please note, if you purchase by going through the links in this post I will receive a commission)

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