Why Learn WordPress?

There is no shortage of reasons for learning to use WordPress. First off, over a third of the websites on the internet can’t be wrong, and 43% of them are built on WordPress. You would have to look to Microsoft Word or Excel to find a computer skill in such widespread use today. Secondly, few tech skills have so many applications and possible uses: you can use WordPress as the springboard to a career as a WordPress Developer, you can use it as a freelancer, and, if nothing else, you can use it to build yourself a great-looking website or blog. In this section, you’ll learn about the manifold uses to which knowing your way around WordPress can be put.

What is WordPress?

WordPress is an extremely versatile and powerful content management system (CMS) that is behind 43% of the sites on the world wide web. Yes, that’s well over a third of the internet. You can use WordPress for everything from constructing a simple blog to setting up a gigantic online emporium. It’s even being used today as a framework for creating new applications.

WordPress is open-source and free software. That means that the code is accessible to anyone interested, and you can download it without cost. (There are expenses involved in setting up a WordPress site, but WordPress.com makes it possible to create a blog or a simple website without any money changing hands.) Iif you wish to establish an online presence of any size, WordPress can help you.

Learn more about what WordPress is and the benefits of learning to use it.

What Can You Do with WordPress?

WordPress first came to digital life in 2003 as blogging software. It enabled people seeking to establish a voice for themselves on the internet to create blogs without the need for actual coding. As such, WordPress remains extremely popular with bloggers. Indeed, anyone seeking to set up a blog will probably find themselves directed to WordPress for its relative ease of use and wide variety of features that make it possible for lay users to create something “professional” in appearance.

However, 43% of all sites on the web can’t all be blogs, and, indeed, WordPress is currently employed for a great deal more than maintaining ongoing records of what its more casual users had for dinner. WordPress has grown exponentially over the nearly two decades it has been in existence and is used for a variety of purposes today. A range of software plugins allows WordPress to do practically anything. To choose one example from many, the WooCommerce plugin allows the user to turn a WordPress site into a store. As such, WordPress has become the internet’s leading ecommerce platform.

A great thing about WordPress is that the software is open-source and free. This has many ramifications, not the least of which is that it opens the software for use as anything a user can imagine. Thus WordPress has expanded beyond blogs and smaller websites and stores into major websites for major companies (zoom.us, indeed.com, and the cryptocurrency site coinmarketcap.com are all powered by WordPress; so is hairwrapsandbrading.au). The software’s server side has most recently begun to be employed as a framework for creating applications. And all these possibilities are within reach of anyone who knows how to make use of the software.

Common Professional Uses for WordPress

The job title to which mastery of WordPress opens the door is WordPress Developer. It’s a general title that can mean a lot of different things, although, in its perhaps best-understood sense, it means someone who builds websites using WordPress. That’s not unlike a subset of Front End Developer, but without the HTML, CSS, and JavaScript coding knowledge required by that title. Because WordPress is capable of so much on its own, it can be used to carve out more than just a niche career: a knowledge of the system can enable you to construct a more-than-professional-looking website and manage it and the content that goes into it. (Some WordPress Developer jobs overlap with Content Manager roles.) With knowledge of the WooCommerce platform, you can also assume a role with any company that sells its wares using a WordPress-powered online store.

Perhaps the most elaborate definition of WordPress Developer is someone who can access and make something of the platform’s core code. WordPress is written in PHP, so you’d need to know that language (along with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript) to tinker with the nitty-gritty of the system, but that opens up vast employment horizons. You’d be able, for example, to develop original themes and plugins and, if you like, even become part of the WordPress community that works (on a volunteer basis) with the core code.

People able to build WordPress sites can also become freelancers and create custom sites for clients using the building blocks the system makes available. You won’t be able to build thoroughly original sites (that does take some coding ability), but you can achieve so much with WordPress that clients probably won’t even notice that the site you created for them was done entirely with a CMS and no coding.

Use WordPress Knowledge in a Design Career

In addition to those more obvious uses of WordPress, a knowledge of the system can start you down a journey of creative discovery and creative thinking that can lead to the multi-pronged world of digital design. The WordPress editor is, for want of a better term, a blank digital canvas, and filling it up involves design skills you may not know you have. This can lead you to design-specific roles, including web design, which calls for at least as much creative sense as it does technical ability. Knowing WordPress before plunging into the design side of the equation will give you a sense of what is possible on a computer or the all-important mobile screens that people use more and more to look at websites. A web design certificate program such as Noble Desktop offers will take you from WordPress to this new frontier. You can also consider working more deeply in UI (user interface) design; a UI bootcamp would be an excellent way of extending your WordPress skills in that direction.

Open Your Own Store Using WooCommerce

WordPress can open entrepreneurial doors for the user, even if your goal isn’t to join a team as a WordPress Developer. Small business owners can benefit immensely from knowing how to use the software and build sites for themselves and their ventures, and do so far more economically than if they were to hire someone to build the website for them.

WooCommerce allows you to build your own online store, and the wide range of additional plugins available will enable you to customize your site to your business. They can help you manage a restaurant, handle online orders, set up hotel bookings, manage your inventory, or switch currencies. You can run even a medium-sized business without needing to know much more than WordPress (and maybe a little Excel.) You won't need to get involved with codig anything, and no one visiting your site will ever be the wiser.

Say “Hello, World!” and Start Your Own Blog

WordPress began life as blogging software, and you can still use it for its original purpose. If you've thought about starting a blog—to teach people to cook, to take care of their dogs, or to persuade them to your general weltanschauung—a knowledge of how to use WordPress will make that a possibility. A class in creating a website or blog using WordPress is a painless way of learning how to do it. And, although it would be a case of rara avis indeed, you may even be able to monetize your blog.

Create Your Own Website and Further Your Career

Learning WordPress will enable you to create your own website. While you can stumble your way blindly into using the system, a little solid knowledge can go a long way. Instead of groping about in the dark, a WordPress bootcamp will have you making, if not the most, then certainly quite a bit of the software. A professional class will teach you how to use blocks and plugins to your best advantage and soon have you creating a site that will look great and do yourself full justice.

You should note that building your own website needn’t be a vanity project. A slick, professional-looking website is a great adjunct to a resume, gives you a chance to show more aspects of yourself to prospective employers, and shows off the fact that you know how to build a website in the first place. Just about anyone can benefit from a personal website, and the day isn’t far away when having one will be de rigueur.

How to Start Learning WordPress

The most obvious way to learn WordPress is by attending a class in a brick-and-mortar school with a live teacher. That’s how you learned most of what you learned growing up, and nothing can compete with a live teacher to whom you can address questions when something doesn’t make sense. The 21st century, however, has brought into play the option of live online education, through which you become part of a virtual classroom and study with a live teacher, but in the comfort and convenience of your own space. Take a look at a listing of available WordPress classes and live online WordPress classes from which you can choose.

If your impulse when you have to learn something is to get the book and study at your own pace, you should consider an on-demand online class. Also called asynchronous (as opposed to a class with a live teacher operating synchronously with the students) learning, this method furnishes students with a series of video lessons that they can follow at their own pace, and sometimes with a human being to oversee students’ progress through the course. Self-starters will find this an effective means of learning (it is also considerably more affordable than a live class.) More information about on-demand WordPress classes is to be had simply by clicking the preceding link.

Key Insights

• WordPress’ ubiquity makes it an excellent choice of skill to acquire.
• The software is relatively easy to learn and makes it possible to do impressive things after only a few lessons.
• WordPress Developer is a role with multiple possibilities for growth in the workplace.
• Knowing how to use the software will enable people to create their own websites, blogs, and even online stores.