How Personal Trainers Can Offer Online Workouts with WordPress

Are you a personal trainer looking to take your workouts online and offer your services to more people?

Putting your workouts online isn’t hard. You can learn how to use these simple, but powerful tools quickly in your spare time.

In this article, we’ll show you how personal trainers can offer online workouts with WordPress.

If you want to take your workouts online, you need a simple and effective website with a few tools to make your job quick and easy.

To make the process run smoothly, you need to:

• Gather important information about your client’s needs
• Take payment online
• Be able to meet with them virtually
• Deliver their workouts

First, you need a website to handle the processes above. WordPress is the best option because it’s easy to use. And the site you’re reading right now is built with WordPress.

Now, we’ll walk you through each step from start to finish. By the time you’re done with this article, you know exactly how to offer online workouts to your clients.

What is WordPress?

WordPress is a powerful website software that allows you to publish content quickly and easily. We have a simple guide to help you set it up: How to Make a WordPress Website.

With WordPress, you can publish educational articles, how-to guides, and you can even embed workout videos and demonstrations.

You can create a fully functional website with unique content, an about page, a contact form, and much more.

So how will you build your website and offer online workouts with WordPress?

For a little context, a website consists of 2 parts:

• A domain name
• Web hosting

The domain name is the unique address people type into the browser URL to visit your website.

Hosting is where your website lives on the internet. And it contains all of the workouts, articles, images, and other files you have on your website.

A simple analogy goes like this: your domain name is the address and hosting is your house. When someone enters your domain name into their web browser, it takes them straight to your virtual house.

For more in-depth advice, see our guide for how to choose the best domain name.

WordPress Hosting and Domain Name

Choosing WordPress hosting for your website is very important, but it can get complicated fast. To make things easy on you, we prefer Bluehost.

Bluehost is an official WordPress recommended hosting provider. And when you choose them to host your site, you get a free domain name with your account.

Note: At WPBeginner, we are fully transparent. If you choose Bluehost with our referral link, we earn a small commission. It’s at no cost to you and it will save you money in the long run because you’ll get the hosting and domain name all in one.

If you’d like to skip the process of setting up your domain and hosting yourself, you can have us do it for you. Check out our free WordPress blog setup service.

Now that you know how to set up your website, we’ll show you how to set up your first page, plus our favorite tools.

WordPress Themes, Pages, Plugins, and Tools

After you’ve set up your website, your login information is emailed to you.

When you first log in to your WordPress site, you’ll see a screen like this:

This is known as your dashboard. It’s where you’ll access everything you need to customize your site in the future. From here, you want to look for Appearance » Themes.

You’ll see this screen:

Here, we have the Twenty Twenty theme active. This theme comes stock with all WordPress sites. For our example, we’ll leave this theme as-is.

You can change your theme at any time to your liking. You can learn more about changing your theme with our guide: What Is A WordPress Theme?

Now, let’s set up your first page.

Step 1: Setting Up A Client Information Page

Since you want to gather important information about your customers, we will set up a client information page. You can create as many pages as you’d like. To make a page, you simply go to Pages » Add New in your dashboard:

Next, you’ll see this screen:

See where it reads “add title”? That’s where the name to your page goes. For this example, we’ll name it “Client Information.”

There’s nothing else you need to add to this page right now.

And we’ll use this page later in this tutorial to show you how to add a custom form.

For the next step, look in the upper right-hand corner. You’ll see the “Publish…” button. Click that and it publishes your page.

Now that your page is published, you can view it by clicking the “View Page” link at the top of your screen.

Congrats! You’ve created your first page. You can learn more about how to use pages in WordPress.

Right now you might be wondering… “Do I need any more pages?”

Since you’re a personal trainer offering workouts online, your potential customers will want to know more about your expertise.

While we’re only covering how to create ‘client information’ and ‘payment’ pages, you will want to consider adding an about page.

You’ll probably want to create a ‘products and services’ page to list what workouts you’re offering online.

For more information on the pages you might need, see our guide: 11 Important Pages that Every WordPress Blog Should Have.

Now, we’ll show you how to create a form using one of our plugins, WPForms.

Step 2: Create Your Client Inquiry Form

To gather information, you need a form your client can fill out. The easiest way to achieve this is by building a form using a plugin.

We recommend the WPForms plugin. It has many features, but we want to show you how easy it is to build a form you can send to your clients.

By the way, when you sign up for hosting with Bluehost, the WPForms Lite plugin will come installed automatically.

Let’s set up your first form.

First, go to WPForms » Add New. Here’s what you’ll see on your screen:

Next, you’ll see that it’s time to name your form and select a template.

With this plugin installed, you can choose from a handful of templates. But if you want access to hundreds of form templates, you’ll want to go with the premium version of WPForms.

And since you’ll be setting up a payment form, you’ll need to upgrade to PRO to unlock the payment integrations. We’ll cover payments in a later step.

After you’ve upgraded to Pro, you’ll have access to your license key in your WPForms account. You’ll want to go to WPForms » Settings and then to the ‘General’ tab.

Copy your license key into the are below:

Now, you’re ready to set up your first Addon.

From here, you will go to WPForms » Addons and scroll until you see the ‘Form Templates Pack Addon’ on the page. Click the ‘Install Addon’ button and it will read: Status: Active.

Once this is done, we can set up the perfect form for your personal training client to fill out.

Now, go to WPForms » Add New and you’ll see this page:

Make sure you enter a name for your form. We’ll use ‘Client Info’ but you can name it whatever you’d like.

Now, scroll down until you see this screen:

From here, type ‘Personal’ into the box, and you will see a template option for ‘Personal Trainer Sign-Up Form.’

Click that area to create the form.

Now, it’s time to customize your form, any way you want to.

Here’s what the next page will look like:

On the left side of your screen, you’ll see ‘Standard Fields’ on the top with a bunch of options you can choose from below in blue. On the right, you have a preview of the form you’re creating.

You can drag anything you want into this form and rearrange it to any area on the form you want.

This form comes stock with most of the information you would want. Things like your client’s name, email, phone number, address, how many days they want to work out, and more.

And if you want more fields to choose from, you can scroll down to see even more.

Note: When you’re done creating your form, make sure you click the big orange ‘Save’ button at the top.

Next we’ll show you how to configure the right settings to make sure the form response goes to your email inbox.

In the same area, click on ‘Settings’ and then the ‘Confirmations’ link. You’ll see this screen:

From there, you’ll see the ‘Confirmation Type’ is a message. You can now edit the message you want people to see as soon as they finish filling out your form.

We will leave it as “Thanks for contacting us! We will be in touch with you shortly” but you can change it to anything you want.

If you make any changes, be sure you hit the ‘Save’ button.

Next, you’ll select the ‘Notifications’ link right above ‘Confirmations.’

There are 2 places you want to pay attention to:

1. Make sure the notifications are turned on.
2. In the ‘Send To Email Address’ field, you will see ‘{admin_email}’

Having notifications turned on means you will receive an email notification every time this form is filled out.

The ‘{admin_email}’ is known as a ‘Smart Tag.’ You can edit this field and put any email address in it that you want to be notified with.

The ‘Smart Tag’ for ‘{admin_email}’ means you will get an email notification to the email associated with your WordPress profile.

To see your admin email, go to your dashboard and then select Users » Your Profile. It will look like this:

If you want to change your admin email, that’s where you can do so.

Note: Due to the way WordPress works with sending emails from your hosting account, sometimes they’re not delivered.

To ensure your email confirmations are sent to your inbox every time, we have a tutorial on how to fix WordPress not sending emails.

That’s it. Hit ‘Save’ at the top and your form is ready to place into a page.

Step 3: Embed your Client Information Form into a Page

This next part is really simple. First, go to Pages » All Pages. From there, you’ll see a list of your pages:

Hover your mouse over your page name and click on ‘Edit.’ This will take you to your page editor. Now you’ll see a page you can edit like this:

Notice the small circle with a plus sign inside in the screenshot above. Click that, and you’ll see the following dropdown:

Select the widgets link, and then you’ll see a list of options:

Click on the WPForms link. Then you can select your form in the next step:

After you select the form, it will automatically embed into your page.

Next, click the ‘Update’ button at the top of your screen and your form is now saved on your page.

Now you know how to install, customize, and embed a form into your WordPress page. Next, we will show you how to take payment with WPForms.

Step 4: How To Take Payment with WPForms

Taking payments with WPForms is easy. All your customers need is a credit/debit card or a PayPal account.

Since this is the final step you’ll take before working with your client, it’s important to make another page.

We cover this in step 5 to help you set up a payment page.

Here’s how to configure your form.

First, from your dashboard, you will go to WPForms » Add New to create a new form. Then you’ll see this screen again:

We’ll call this form ‘Order Form,’ but you can name it whatever you like. Make sure you choose the Billing / Order Form option.

Note: You will get a prompt reminding you to configure your payment provider:

Click on ‘Close’ and then go to the ‘Payments’ button on the far left. You’ll see that it’s time to install a payment integration. This is where you hook up your preferred payment processor.

Click on the link for the Addons page. For our example, we’ll use the Stripe Addon:

Click the ‘Install Addon’ button. You’ll see the ‘Status: Active’ message.

Now, you have to connect your Stripe account to WPForms.

On that same screen, go to ‘Settings’ and then ‘Payment’ at the top:

From there, select the currency you want to accept payment in using the dropdown menu.

Then click on the blue Connect With Stripe button.

The next screen you’ll see is as follows:

On this screen, you will need to sync up your existing Stripe account by signing in using the link in the top right. Or you’ll need to set up a new account using the form on this page.

Once you’ve logged into your Stripe account, you’ll see the next screen prompting you to connect your account to WPForms.

From there, click on the blue ‘Connect my Stripe account’ button. Now, you’re connected. Here’s what the next screen looks like:

You’ll now need to go to the ‘Payments’ link on the left. Then click on the Stripe link at the top:

There are 2 steps here:

1. Make sure you check the ‘Enable Stripe Payments’ box.
2. Select ‘email’ in Stripe Payment Receipt if you want an automated email receipt to be sent to your customer.

Click the big ‘Save’ button at the top of your screen.

Note: for Stripe payments to work, you need to enable AJAX form submission.

To do this, go to Settings » General and check Enable AJAX form submission.

Click the ‘Save’ button at the top of your screen.

At this point, you’re ready to start taking payments. Now we need to go back to your order form link to edit.

From this screen, click the big ‘X’ at the top to exit. Then, on the left, click ‘All Forms’ and then click the ‘Order Form’ to edit.

To be able to take payments, you have to add a credit card field to your form. Drag the blue ‘Stripe Credit Card’ link to your form. We put it right below the Phone field.

For the sake of this tutorial, we also removed some of the standard fields to keep the order form shorter.

Since a personal trainer wouldn’t be shipping anything, there is no need for extra information like the ‘address’ or ‘comment or message’ fields.

Now you will need to add items for purchase.

Below, we added 2 options, but you can add as many or as few as you’d like:

Hit ‘Save’ at the top and click the ‘X’ to head back to your WordPress dashboard.

Step 5: Embed Your Payment Form into Your Payment Page

Go to Pages » Add New and title this page ‘Payment.’ Then embed your brand new form into this page (just like you did the contact form earlier), like this:

Hit the ‘Publish’ button when you’re finished. Then open your new page and you’ll see you’re ready to take payment:

Now that you know how to use WPForms to take payment, how will you easily interact with your clients?

Video chat with Zoom.

Use Zoom to Work with Your Clients

Since you won’t be in the gym with your client, you need the next best thing: video chat.

We really like Zoom because it’s easy to use, and the free version is well suited for most people.

Once you sign up for the free version, you’ll have access to an account. From there, you’ll be given a unique link to share with your customers.

After your client has paid you through the payment form, you can send them a unique link and time to meet you on video.

Setting Zoom up is easy for you and for your client. They walk you through every step of the process when you sign up.

Finally, we wanted to show you one more way you can deliver workouts to your clients using WordPress.

Bonus: Deliver Content to Your Clients with MemberPress

If you want some more advanced features and ways to deliver workouts, we recommend the MemberPress plugin.

With MemberPress, you can:

• Sell subscriptions (monthly workouts, personal training packages)
• Deliver digital downloads (like workouts, or guides)
• Restrict access to certain content you only want your customers to see

We hope this article helped you learn How Personal Trainers Can Offer Online Workouts with WordPress. You may want to check out our Ultimate Guide to Creating a WordPress Membership Site.

Using MemberPress opens up the possibility of offering your training programs and workouts to clients who want to work out on their own without 1-on-1 video guidance.

As a result, you can serve more clients and make more money without having to work more hours during the day.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How Personal Trainers Can Offer Online Workouts with WordPress appeared first on WPBeginner.

April 02, 2020 at 02:56AM

How to Disable Fullscreen Editor in WordPress

Do you want to disable the fullscreen editor in WordPress?

After the update, WordPress 5.4 now opens the post and page editor in fullscreen mode by default. While this distraction-free mode offers a clean and easy to use experience, some users may want to go back to the regular compact view.

In this article, we’ll show you how to easily disable the fullscreen editor in WordPress.

Why WordPress Switched to Fullscreen Mode for The Editor?

WordPress introduced a new editor called The Block Editor (aka Gutenberg) in WordPress 5.0. This new editor allow users to use blocks for common elements and create beautiful content layouts.

It also mimics how your article or pages will look by using the same fonts and colors as your WordPress theme.

However, an admin menu on the left and one on top made it look a bit cluttered. There were just too many options on the screen, which you don’t need if you are focusing on writing content.

To deal with this, the WordPress core team decided to make the editor fullscreen by default, so users can have a distraction-free writing experience.

Now, it’s important to note that this fullscreen mode is nothing new. It was already there, and users were able to turn it on / off.

What’s changed now is that the fullscreen mode will now be the default view when writing posts in WordPress.

How to Disable The Fullscreen Mode for WordPress Editor (Easy Way)

It is super easy to turn off the fullscreen mode for block editor in WordPress.

Simply edit a post or page and click on the three-dot menu on the top-right corner of the screen. This will display the settings menu for the post editor.

From here, you simply need to click on the ‘Fullscreen Mode’ to turn it off.

Post editor will instantly exit the fullscreen mode, and it will start showing the admin sidebar and the top toolbar.

WordPress will store your fullscreen mode preference in your browser’s temporary storage.

However if you switched to a different browser, used incognito mode, or accessed the admin area from a different device, then you’ll again see the fullscreen editor.

If you use multiple devices, user accounts, or browsers to access your WordPress admin area, then this may be a little annoying to switch it back every time.

This next method helps you fix that, permanently.

Permanently Disable Fullscreen Mode in WordPress (Snippet)

This method requires you to manually add code to your WordPress site. If you have not done this before, then see our guide on how to easily add code snippets in WordPress.

You’ll need to simply enter the following code in your WordPress theme’s functions.php file, or in a site-specific plugin. You can also use the custom code snippets plugin to add this code to your site without conflicts.

if (is_admin()) { 
        function jba_disable_editor_fullscreen_by_default() {
        $script = "jQuery( window ).load(function() { const isFullscreenMode = wp.data.select( 'core/edit-post' ).isFeatureActive( 'fullscreenMode' ); if ( isFullscreenMode ) { wp.data.dispatch( 'core/edit-post' ).toggleFeature( 'fullscreenMode' ); } });";
        wp_add_inline_script( 'wp-blocks', $script );
}
add_action( 'enqueue_block_editor_assets', 'jba_disable_editor_fullscreen_by_default' );
}

This code first checks if a user is viewing an admin area page. If they are, then it checks the status of the fullscreen editor.

If the fullscreen editor is enabled, then it simply turns it off.

You can still manually turn-on the fullscreen mode from the post edit screen, and your post editor would work just fine.

However, if you return back, then it will automatically turn it off. This behavior applies to all users who can access the post editor on your website.

We hope this article helped you learn how to disable the fullscreen mode in WordPress post editor. For more productivity tips, see our tips for mastering the WordPress content editor.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post How to Disable Fullscreen Editor in WordPress appeared first on WPBeginner.

April 01, 2020 at 05:35PM

What’s New in WordPress 5.4 (Features and Screenshots)

WordPress 5.4 was released earlier today, and it is the first major release of 2020.

This new release is packed with a lot features, many of them are focused around the WordPress block editor. This release will massively improve the way you create content on your websites.

In this article, we’ll share what’s new in WordPress 5.4, and which features you should try after updating your websites.

WordPress 5.4 is a major release, and unless you are on a managed WordPress hosting service, you’ll have to manually initiate the update.

Important: Don’t forget to create a complete WordPress backup before starting the update.

New and Improved Block Editor in WordPress 5.4

WordPress 5.4 is focused on improving the content editor. This includes new features, enhancements, and new blocks.

Let’s start with the enhancements first.

Fullscreen Editor will be Default in WordPress 5.4

WordPress 5.4 displays the block editor in the fullscreen mode by default.

This change will be noticeable on new WordPress installations, or if you are accessing the WordPress admin area from a new device, browser, or in the incognito mode.

If you are upgrading from WordPress 5.3 using the same browser and device that you regularly use, then your editor will open with the last mode you had enabled.

You can exit the fullscreen mode by clicking on the Editor settings and unchecking the ‘Fullscreen mode’ option.

New Blocks in WordPress 5.4

WordPress 5.4 brings two new blocks for you to use while writing content.

1. The Social Icons Block

As the name suggests, the Social Icons block allows you to add social media icons in your posts and pages.

After that, you can click on the add button and select a social network that you would like to add. You can then click on the social network icon and provide the link to your profile.

Social Icons block only allows you to add social media icons with links to your profiles. It does not add social sharing buttons. For that, you’ll still need a social media plugin with sharing features.

2. The Buttons Block

WordPress 5.4 introduces the Buttons block which will replace the Button block. As you can guess from the name of the new block, it allows you to add multiple buttons side by side.

You can select the background or gradient colors for each button and choose from two different styles.

Improved Blocks Your Should Try in WordPress 5.4

Several blocks in WordPress 5.4 are improved with new enhancements. Here are the top changes that will make a big difference in your writing experience.

More Color Options for Blocks

WordPress 5.4 offers new color options for multiple blocks. This allows you to create more engaging layouts for your posts and pages.

Previously users were only able to change the color of all text in a paragraph. With WordPress 5.4, you can now change the color of any text inside a paragraph block.

You can also choose text and background colors with gradients for cover block, and you can even choose background and text colors for all the blocks inside a group block.

If you regularly use the Columns block, then you can also use colors for separating columns from regular paragraphs.

Block Selection Tool

A new button in the toolbar now allows you to easily select blocks. This is a really useful tool particularly when you have nested blocks inside a group block.

Simply click on the select tool and then take your mouse to the block you want to select.

Drag and Drop to Add Featured Image

Previously, you needed to manually select to upload and set the featured image. This didn’t match the drag and drop ability of the content editor.

Now with WordPress 5.4, you can simply drag and drop an image to the featured image section.

Better Mobile Toolbar for Block Editor

Previously, if you had to edit a blog post using a mobile device, then you may have noticed how the block settings toolbar moved around.

This made it quite difficult to use the editor on mobile devices. WordPress 5.4 has fixed this with a fixed toolbar on the top.

Select Image Sizes in the Gallery Block

Previously you were not able to select image sizes for images in the image gallery block. Now, you can select image size directly in the gallery block settings.

Improved Latest Posts Block

Previously, the Latest Posts block didn’t include the featured images. You can also choose the size and alignment for the featured image. This makes the Latest Posts block a lot more engaging and useful.

You Can Now Embed TikTok Videos in WordPress

WordPress 5.4 includes oEmbed support for TikTok videos. Basically, you can now add TikTok videos to your WordPress posts and pages just like you would embed YouTube videos.

Simply paste the video URL and WordPress will automatically embed it.

Updated Privacy Tools in WordPress 5.4

WordPress 5.4 brings improvements to the built-in privacy tools. Personal data exports now include session tokens, community events location, and custom user meta.

Personal data export now comes in two files in HTML and JSON. The HTML file includes a table of contents at the top for easier navigation.

Developer Changes in WordPress 5.4

WordPress 5.4 has several improvements for developers. These enhancements affect theme and plugin developers mostly.

New hooks in WordPress 5.4 allow developers to add custom fields to navigation menu items. (Details)

Developers can now add keyboard shortcuts to the block editor. (Details)

WordPress 5.4 changes the HTML output for the Calendar widget. It moves the navigation links to a <nav> HTML element right after the <table> element in order to produce valid HTML. (#39763)

A new apply_shortcodes() function is now available as an alias to the do_shortcode() function. (#37422)

Some unused customizer classes are now formally deprecated in WordPress 5.4. (#42364)

We hope this guide helped you learn about what’s new in WordPress 5.4. We are excited about the new features and enhancements in the block editor particularly color options and buttons block.

What’s your favorite feature in WordPress 5.4? Let us know in the comments below.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post What’s New in WordPress 5.4 (Features and Screenshots) appeared first on WPBeginner.

April 01, 2020 at 03:32AM

9 Best Church Website Builders of 2020 (Easy for Beginners)

Have you been tasked with creating a website for your church? If you’re not a professional web designer or developer, this can be a daunting task.

The good news is that there are plenty of ways to create a church website that looks great and does everything you need it to do.

In this guide, we’re going to compare the best church website builders that you can use to build a church website without writing any code.

How to Find the Best Church Website Builder for You

When you’re considering which church website builder to pick, you’ll want to look for features that help you accomplish key tasks.

Creating a calendar: You’ll need to list your regular services, and perhaps other activities, on your website.

Uploading sermons: If you plan to put sermon recordings on your website, then you’ll want an easy way to do this.

Different user accounts and permissions: You’d probably want to have certain church members (volunteers) be able to update the website when needed, without giving them access to everything.

Allowing members to register and login: You might want to have some content, like the minutes of church meetings, only available to registered church members.

Taking donations: If you plan to take donations through your website, then you need to make sure that your church website software will support this.

Design and Templates: You should pick a website builder that has a wide variety of church website templates. You also want it to have an easy design customizer that lets you customize the design, add images, update colors and more, so you can create a church website that matches your church’s brand.

With that said, let’s take a look at the pros and cons of the most popular church website builders, so you can choose the best software for your need.

1. WordPress

WordPress.org is the #1 software for building church websites. It’s the most popular website builder in the world and powers over 35% of all websites on the internet.

Note that WordPress.org, also called “self-hosted WordPress”, is different from WordPress.com (mentioned later in the article). If you’re keen to know how they’re different, take a look at our guide that compares WordPress.org vs. WordPress.com.

WordPress is a completely free website builder that gives you full control and all the features you’ll need to build a website. But since it’s self-hosted, you will need to have a domain name and web hosting to build a website with WordPress.

Pros:

• WordPress has hundreds of different church templates and layouts (themes) that you can use, both free and paid. Here’s our expert pick of the best church themes for WordPress.
• There are plugins available to cover any feature your church website is likely to need. For instance, you might want the Sermon Manager plugin and one of these donation and fundraising plugins for your church website.
• WordPress has over 55,000+ free WordPress plugins which are like apps for your website that lets you add additional functionality like contact forms, photo galleries, image sliders, and more.
• You can use popular WordPress page builder plugins like Divi, Elementor, or Beaver Builder to create completely custom church websites without writing any code.
• WordPress lets you create as many user accounts as you want. These can be set up with different roles and permissions, so you can limit full admin access to just one or two people.
• With WordPress, you fully own your website. You don’t have to worry about ads appearing on your site as they do with some other free or cheap website builders.
• There’s a huge supportive community around WordPress, making it easy to get help when you need it. We even run our own free Facebook group called WPBeginner Engage where you can find lots of encouragement and support.

Cons:

• You’ll need to handle updates, backups, and security yourself. There are lots of WordPress plugins that can help with this, though.
• WordPress can sometimes be a bit daunting when you’re just starting out. You may find there’s a bit of a learning curve.

Pricing:

WordPress itself is free, but you’ll need to pay for a domain name and web hosting. The cost of a domain name is normally around $9 – $15/year and web hosting normally starts around $7.99 / month.

Luckily, Bluehost, a popular web hosting company, has agreed to offer WPBeginner readers a free domain name and a generous 60% discount on hosting. Basically, you can start a church website for $2.75 per month.

→ Click Here to Claim This Exclusive Bluehost Offer ←

Once you have setup your domain and hosting, please see our guide on how to make a WordPress website (step by step).

Note: you can use WordPress with all major hosting providers. If for some reason, you want a different hosting provider, then we recommend SiteGround or any of these top WordPress hosting companies.

2. Constant Contact Website Builder

The Constant Contact Website Builder is one of our top choices for an all in one website solution. They provide web hosting, so you don’t need to buy that separately.

The Constant Contact website builder is powered by AI (artificial intelligence). This makes it very easy and quick for you to build a church website.

Pros

• You can get started with the Constant Contact website builder completely free. This is a great option for small churches or those on a very tight budget.
• It’s very quick to create your church website. Just type in “church” for the type of site and you’ll be shown appropriate stock images you can use. You can then click a few options to finish creating your site.
• There’s support available 24/7. You can contact their team by email or live chat even on the free plan. We found that the live chat team was helpful and quick to respond.
• Your site layout and design can be customized in almost any way you can imagine. Constant Contact has a huge library of images (over 550,000) to choose from. Of course, you can also upload your own images.
• Although there isn’t a specific donations feature, you can create and sell products even on the free website plan. You could create a product that’s called “Donation” or similar. Donors can’t set their own amount, however.
• All plans, including the free one, come with an SSL certificate. This allows your site to use the secure https protocol instead of http.
• You can connect Constant Contact websites with their powerful email marketing service to send regular newsletters.

Cons

• You can’t create multiple users for your site, even if you’re on one of the paid plans. If you want other people to be able to edit the site, you’ll need to give them your login. This could lead to security breaches or someone accidentally deleting pages from the site.
• If you want to use a custom domain name, rather than one ending in constantcontactsites.com, you’ll need to upgrade to a free plan. These start from $10/month. However, you do get your domain name for free on that plan.
• Your site will show ads on the free plan. You’ll need to upgrade to get rid of these.
• Constant Contact takes 3% commission on website sales on the Free and Starter plans, meaning it’s not an ideal platform for taking donations.

Pricing

The Constant Contact website builder has a free plan. If you want to remove ads and use your own domain name, you’ll need to pay $10/month for the Starter plan.

The Business Plus plan, at $20/month, could be useful if your church wants to sell products, event tickets, or anything else online.

3. Gator by HostGator

Gator is another all in one website builder, making it a great option if you want to keep things as simple as possible. You can choose from different website templates to create your site.

It’s fully hosted for you by HostGator, one of the biggest web hosting platforms in the world.

Pros

• You’ll have unlimited pages, space, and bandwidth for your site. This means you don’t need to worry about running out of space or getting charged if your site gets a lot of traffic.
• A domain name is included for free (for 12 months) regardless of which plan you’re on. Alternatively, if you’ve already bought a domain name from a different domain name registrar, you can simply connect it to your site.
• There’s support available 24/7 through live chat, phone, and email.
• There are over 200 different templates available. You can customize these, though you can’t later switch templates completely.

Cons

• Unlike Wix, WordPress, or Constant Contact, Gator does not have free plans, and there’s no free trial available either.
• There’s no easy way to accept donations through your website unless you pay for the eCommerce plan.
• The pricing isn’t very transparent. Your site might end up costing you quite a bit more than you’re expecting as time goes by.

Pricing

The cheapest Gator plan costs from $3.84/mo, which requires you to pay upfront for two years. If you want to pay monthly, it’s $4.99/month.

Note that all the listed prices are for your site’s “first term” only. So if you opt for the $4.99/month option, you’ll be paying $9.99 from your second month onward.

4. Sharefaith

Sharefaith is a popular website builder designed specifically for churches. It is a dedicated platform and comes with a support team to help you get started.

Pros

• There are plenty of different church website templates to pick from. All of these are specifically designed for churches, so you won’t find yourself skipping through lots of irrelevant ones.
• You can view and try out the website builder without paying anything. Just pick a template that you want to demo.
• Sharefaith will migrate your old site for free (so long as you pay for a yearly plan).
• There are loads of different images, like website banners, you can choose from. You can also upload your own images to use on your site.
• You can easily add the audio or video recording of sermons to your website. With these, you can select who preached the sermon and what series it was in.
• There’s a built-in calendar feature so you can list services and other events.
• With your website, you’ll also get Sharefaith Giving. This makes it easy for you to accept donations and tithes through your website.
• Membership includes access to the full Sharefaith media library, with over 90,000 graphics, images, videos and so on.
• You can add additional users to your Sharefaith website using the ‘Advanced’ tools.

Cons

• Sharefaith definitely isn’t the cheapest website builder out there and probably won’t suit churches on a very tight budget.
• You’re restricted to the functionality that Sharefaith has. Unlike WordPress, you don’t have access to the same level of plugins or extensions.

Pricing

Sharefaith costs $45/month if you pay annually or $50/month if you pay monthly for their “media + web” plan. That plan is the minimum you can purchase if you want to create a website.

This could well be worth it for you if you want to use lots of the specialist functionality, like the ability to upload sermons.

5. Ministry Designs

Ministry Designs is another website that specialises in providing sites just for churches.

Pros

• There are lots of gorgeous templates to choose from, all of which are fully responsive. That means they’ll look great on mobile devices as well as on computers.
• There’s unlimited training, and your assigned “Ministry Success Representative” will use screen-sharing technology to show you exactly how to build your website.
• You’ll get an hour-long initial phone call, plus as much support as you need after that to build your site.
• Ministry Designs is very geared up for churches, with features where you can upload sermons, create a calendar, and even create and manage an email list.
• You can have multiple user accounts for your site. You can have 3 users for free, or more if you pay extra.
• The support team was very responsive and friendly. You can contact them through the website’s live chat without signing up for anything.

Cons

• You’ll be paying a large upfront fee. The ongoing hosting isn’t super-cheap, either.
• The templates aren’t necessarily any better or more advanced than those that you could use on other (much cheaper) website builders.
• Ministry Designs doesn’t actually create or design your website for you. They just walk you through the process of using their templates.

Pricing

Ministry Designs charges $1,000 upfront for their software and support. You’ll then be paying $20/month for ongoing hosting.

It’s a lot to pay. You may find it’s worth it if your church needs a website but doesn’t have a volunteer with the technical skills to create one without a lot of hands-on support.

6. Nucleus

Nucleus is an all in one church website builder, with a bunch of useful features like the ability to upload sermons and create email lists.

Pros

• There’s a 30 day free trial, which doesn’t require any credit card details. If you find that you need longer to evaluate the website builder, just contact Nucleus and they can give you extra time.
• Nucleus offers “scholarships” for smaller churches and startups. It’s worth enquiring about these if your church would struggle to afford the regular Nucleus payment plans.
• There’s lots of helpful documentation, plus support available through live chat.
• Nucleus is designed to be a “central hub” for your church. There’s a particular focus on signup forms so that you have a single place you can point people to.
• There’s a Facebook group you can join to talk about church website building with other people who are using Nucleus too.
• When you sign up for Nucleus, you also get access to their library of video footage clips. Note that only a small number of these are available during your free trial.
• There are lots of pre-created social media posts that you could use on your social media channels. These are all images with text overlayed and come with suggested captions.

Cons

• The support team are only available from 9am to 5pm EST, which could mean waiting quite a while for a reply at some points.
• If you want to take donations, you need to pay a flat fee for this service from RebelGive. It could well be worth it if you get a lot of donations through your website, though.
• Currently, you can’t have multiple users for your website. When we asked the support team, they said this feature would be added in the future.

Pricing

Nucleus costs $125/month if you pay monthly or $99/month if you pay upfront for a year.

You don’t need to pay more if your website grows. It’s a single flat fee that gives you access to all their features.

7. WordPress.com

WordPress.com is an all in one hosted platform that’s based on the same underlying code as WordPress.org.

It’s easy to get confused about the difference between WordPress.org and WordPress.com. The key thing to know is that WordPress.com is a commercial offering whereas the WordPress.org software is free and open-source.

There are restrictions on what you can do with WordPress.com and the free plan is quite limited, which is why we normally recommend WordPress.org instead. However, WordPress.com can be the right choice in some situations.

Pros

• WordPress.com is hosted for you, so you don’t need to worry about backups, updates, or security. It’s all handled on your behalf.
• There are hundreds of different themes (designs) that you can choose from for your website. This includes many options, both free and premium, that are suitable for churches.
• The paid plans are fairly cheap if you’re on a tight budget.
• It’s quite straightforward to move from WordPress.com to WordPress.org in the future. This helps keep your options open.

Cons

• You can’t customize your site to the same degree as you can with many other website builders.
• WordPress doesn’t have a drag and drop interface like some other website builders, so it can be harder to get to grips with.
• The free plan is very limited and doesn’t provide any support.

Pricing

The paid plans are fairly cheap, starting at just $4/month (billed annually) for a custom domain name and 24/7 support.

If you want more features, the Premium plan is $8/month (billed annually).

8. Weebly

Weebly is another all in one website builder. Most people find it really easy to use, and it comes with lots of designs that you can use as a starting point for your website.

Pros

• All of Weebly’s designs are fully editable using the drag and drop interface. It’s very beginner-friendly and easy to use even if you’ve never created any sort of website before.
• There’s built-in eCommerce support, which you could use to take donations. However, Weebly charges a 3% transaction fee on sales through your website.
• There’s an App Center that you can use to add extra features to your site. There are a number of different audio players you could add, for instance, if you want to put sermons on your site.
• The support team are available 24/7 through email, and during extended business hours (6am to 6pm PST) by live chat. If you’re on the Pro plan or higher, you can also call them on the phone.
• If you’re on the Pro plan or higher, you can create a membership area for your site. This means you can protect information that you only want church members to be able to view.

Cons

• Unlike other website builders such as Constant Contact, Weebly doesn’t have an AI creation process. This means it may take you a bit longer to create your site.
• The apps you can install are limited and you won’t be able to get such relevant features as you could with other website builders. There isn’t a specific “sermon” app, for instance.

Pricing

Their paid plans start from $6/month (billed annually), but this won’t let you remove ads. You’ll need to pay for the $12/month Professional plan if you want to remove ads and have unlimited storage.

9. Squarespace

Squarespace is a very popular website builder that again offers an all in one platform.

It’s easy to use and allows for multiple users, which could be really handy if you want to have several people working on your church’s site.

Pros

• It’s simple to add images, videos, and audio files using Squarespace’s block editor. This could be particularly handy if you want to upload sermons to your site.
• There’s a good number of different templates available on Squarespace.
• You can take a free trial without needing to enter your credit card details.
• There are a huge number of fonts available with Squarespace, which could be helpful if you want to match your website fonts to specific ones you’re using in printed materials.
• You can add contributors (other users) to your website and you have some degree of control over what permissions they have. The Personal plan only lets you have 2 contributors, but the other plans are unlimited.
• Squarespace handles images well, making it easy for your images to look great on different devices. You can browse and pick free images from Unsplash within Squarespace itself.
• If you’re on the Business plan or higher you can take donations through your website, using the ‘Donations’ block on any of your pages.

Cons

• There aren’t any Squarespace templates specifically designed for churches. The “Community & Non-Profits” templates might make a good starting point but you’ll likely want to modify them a lot.
• There are some third-party extensions available for Squarespace, but not nearly as many as you could get with a different platform like WordPress.
• If you’re on the Business plan rather than an eCommerce plan, Squarespace charges a 3% fee on donations. This is in addition to the fee charged by the payment processor.

Pricing

The Personal website plan is $12/month (if you pay annually).

We’d recommend going for the Business plan, at $18/month (also billed annually). This gives you access to premium blocks and extensions, as well as the ability to take donations.

Expert Pick: Which is the Best Church Website Builder?

WordPress is hands down the best website builder for churches. There’s a reason why it’s the most popular website builder in the world powering over 35% of all websites on the internet.

It comes with dozens of church templates and design customizer options that you can use to build your church website without writing any code.

From a cost perspective, it’s the most affordable with the Bluehost web hosting offer that includes a free domain and free SSL.

You can also quickly add any feature like donations, sermons, contact form, photo galleries, membership, email marketing and so much more with popular WordPress plugins.

To create your church website, you can follow our step by step guide on how to make a website with WordPress (video included).

If you want a WordPress alternative, then we recommend using Constant Contact’s website builder. The free plan lets you create a full website for your church even if you’re on a very tight budget. It seamlessly integrates with their marketing automation platform, so you can send email newsletters to your community members.

We hope this article helped you learn about the best church website builders. You may also want to take a look at our list of the best WordPress plugins for non-profits.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post 9 Best Church Website Builders of 2020 (Easy for Beginners) appeared first on WPBeginner.

March 31, 2020 at 08:16PM

Beginner’s Guide: How to Find Your WordPress Login URL

“How do I login to WordPress?” is one of the most common WordPress questions that we get asked.

Beginners often have a hard time finding their WordPress login page URL, and this prevents them from working on their website.

In this article, we will show you how to find your WordPress login URL. We’ll also show you different ways to log into your WordPress admin area.

Why do you need the login URL?

The login page is the door between your website and the management dashboard of your site also known as the admin area. Once logged in, you can create new posts, add new pages, change your design, add plugins, etc.

Video Tutorial

If you prefer text instructions, then please continue reading.

How to Find the WordPress Login link?

On a typical WordPress install with a good WordPress hosting provider, all you need to do is add /login/ or /admin/ to the end of your site URL.

For example:

www.example.com/admin/
www.example.com/login/

Don’t forget to replace example.com with your own domain name.

Both of these URLs will redirect you to the WordPress login page.

If for some reason, your WordPress login URL is not working properly, then you can easily access the WordPress login page by going to this URL:

https://ift.tt/12fdRXe

Now if you installed WordPress in a subdirectory such as /wordpress/, then you would need to access your WordPress blog login page like this:

https://ift.tt/1us8E87
https://ift.tt/1us8E8a

If you installed WordPress on a sub-domain, then you can access the WordPress admin login page like so:

subdomain.example.com/login/
subdomain.example.com/wp-login.php

Once you are logged in, you will be redirected to the WordPress admin area of your site which is located in the wp-admin folder.

You can directly access your admin area by entering the website URL like this:

www.example.com/admin/
https://ift.tt/KOWx3o

This URL checks if you were previously logged in, and if your session is still active.

If both are true, then you will be redirected to the WordPress dashboard. If your session has expired, then you will be redirected back to the WordPress login page.

How to Remember the WordPress Login Page in WordPress

If you find it difficult to remember your WordPress login link, then we recommend you add a bookmark to your browser’s bookmark bar.

Alternatively, you can add your WordPress login link on your website footer, sidebar, or in the menu. There are two very easy ways to do this.

First option is adding your WordPress login link to your menus. Simply login to your WordPress admin area and go to Appearance » Menus.

Next click on the Link tab to expand it and add your WordPress login link and text. Once you are done, click on the Add to Menu button to add this link to your menu. Also don’t forget to click on the Save Menu button.

Second option is to use the default widget called Meta. This widget adds a link to the login page, links to your site’s RSS feeds, and a link to WordPress.org website.

Start by going to Appearance » Widgets and drag the meta widget to your website’s sidebar or widget-ready area. If you don’t want to use the Meta widget, then you can use the Menu widget here as well.

You can add the WordPress login link in the footer, sidebar, or basically any other widget-ready area in your theme.

Use Remember Me to Bypass Login Page in WordPress

On your WordPress login page, there is a checkbox labeled Remember me. When you check this box before you login, it will allow you to directly access the admin area without a login on your subsequent visits for 14 days or your browser’s cookie settings.

If you keep forgetting to check the ‘Remember me’ option during login, then you can install Always Remember Me plugin. It will automatically check the remember me checkbox every time you login to WordPress.

How to add A Custom WordPress Login Form in WordPress

If you have multiple users on your WordPress site, then it makes sense to add the WordPress login form in your sidebar or create a custom login page that matches your site’s design and theme.

There are multiple ways to do that, but we recommend using Theme My Login plugin.

It allows you to create custom login pages and also comes with a sidebar login widget. You can simply add the widget to your website’s sidebar and it will display a login form.

You can also use WPForms to create your own custom login forms. It is the best WordPress contact form plugin and allows you to easily create login forms and add them anywhere on your website.

For detailed instructions, see our article on how to add front-end login page and widgets in WordPress.

Log in WordPress from Your Web Hosting Dashboard

Many WordPress hosting companies provide easy shortcuts to directly access your WordPress admin area and skipping the WordPress login page altogether.

Here is how to log into WordPress via popular hosting dashboards.

1. WordPress Login Shortcut in Bluehost

Bluehost is one of the biggest hosting companies in the world. They offer a beginner-friendly dashboard with quick shortcuts to manage your WordPress site.

Simply login to your Bluehost dashboard and switch to the ‘My Sites’ tab. From here, you’ll see all the WordPress sites you have installed on your hosting account.

Take your mouse over to the site you want to log in and then click on the ‘Log into WordPress’ button.

2. WordPress Login Shortcut in SiteGround

SiteGround also has a quick shortcut to log into your WordPress site.

Simply log into your SiteGround hosting dashboard and then click on the ‘Websites’ tab on the top. From here, you’ll see a list of websites you have installed under your hosting account.

Click on the ‘WordPress Kit’ button next to the website you want to log in.

This will bring up a popup, where you’ll see a button to log in to the WordPress admin area.

3. WordPress Login Shortcut in WP Engine

WP Engine is the best managed WordPress hosting companies. They also have a WordPress login shortcut which sends you to the WordPress login URL but does not automatically log you in.

Visit your WP Engine dashboard and then select your website. On the site overview page, you’ll see the WordPress login page shortcut in the left column.

Further WordPress Login Customizations and Resources

We have written a great deal of articles about WordPress login customization and fixing common errors.

If you are looking to create a custom WordPress login page with your branding, then check out our guide on how to customize WordPress Login Page (no HTML/CSS required).

WordPress login forms can be abused by brute force attacks. If you are facing such attacks on your website, then you can add a CAPTCHA to WordPress login and registration form to protect your site.

Troubleshooting WordPress Login Errors

Sometimes, you may encounter weird errors related to the WordPress login page. We have covered several of them in details along with troubleshooting tips:

• How to Fix WordPress Login Page Refreshing and Redirecting Issue
• How to Fix WordPress Keeps Logging Out Problem
• How to Fix Error Too Many Redirects Issue in WordPress

We hope this article helped you learn how to find your WordPress login link. You may also want to see our step by step WordPress security guide and our ultimate guide on how to speed up WordPress.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post Beginner’s Guide: How to Find Your WordPress Login URL appeared first on WPBeginner.

March 31, 2020 at 11:00AM