Let’s change our theme.
You’ve got your blog in place, you’ve got some content written on it, and you’ve got all the good plugins that bring people to the site and keep them coming back. It’s time to tweak the look of your blog. Changing your theme can be extremely simple or it can be an insane pain in the butt if you are a perfectionist like me. I want every little detail to be exactly as I envisioned it. Because of this, I actually purchased expensive software to edit my blogs so I can get the layout and colors exactly how I want them. If you just want a blog that looks nice but you are not extremely picky about getting the exact color and the exact layout that you want, you are in for a real easy ride. If you are more of a perfectionist, the steps to create your own theme are beyond the scope of this article. Maybe another day. If you ask nicely, I may be willing to throw something together for you in my theme editor. But I’ll talk more about that at the end of all this.

Lets find and upload a new theme.
The first thing you are going to do is log in to your WordPress dashboard. Once inside, click on the button that says “Appearance”.

This will open a drop-down. You are going to click on “Add New Themes”.

You will then see a menu and you can start selecting the options you want for your theme. For this example, I selected that I wanted it to be green and I want it to have 3 columns. You can then click “Find Themes” to hunt down a free theme that matches your criteria.

Now you will see some screenshots of themes that match your criteria. Simply find a theme that looks good to you and click the install link.

You will get a pop-up with a preview of the theme and you are simply going to click “Install Now”.

You are almost done. Your theme is now installed on your server but it is not quite live yet on your blog. The next step is to click on the “Themes” link underneath your “Appearance menu”

You will see a preview of all of the themes currently installed on your server. Simple click on the picture of the new theme that you just installed. You will get a pop-up window with a preview once again. Just click the link in the top right corner that says “Activate”.

Your theme is now live! Your WordPress blog is now a little bit prettier. Type in the URL to your new blog and check it out. The theme you just installed should be all set up.

Want some help with a little more custom theme?
Basically, what I am willing to do is create custom themes for somewhere between 5 and 10 people. Follow my instructions to set up a host and a domain through PowWeb like I taught in my post, How To Set Up A WordPress Blog. Once your blog is live, make a comment or send me an e-mail and I will work with you to get a nice, custom theme set up for you. Why am I doing this for free you might ask… For the most part, I just want to help people get moving. I want to see people take action and get the ball rolling on making some extra income.

There is, however, an ulterior motive. Remember how I previously told you that I have affiliate links in this blog. When I refer someone to a company that I am an affiliate of, they give me a little kick back. So this is kind of a sneaky little marketing trick. You will sign up for PowWeb to get your blog rolling, I will get a kick back from PowWeb, and then I will set up a custom WordPress blog. It’s a win-win-win. I win because I make a little bit of money, you win because you now have a blog live and you are getting a nice custom WordPress theme, and PowWeb wins because they just got a new customer. This is the big trick with internet marketing. You have to think outside the box a little bit sometimes. Offer up a bonus to people for using your affiliate link for a service that they are going to need anyway.

I will get deeper in to how to monetize blogs in my next post. You should be well on your way now. You’ve got your own domain name, your own host, great content, a boat-load of plugins to get people to your blog and keep them there, and now you have a shiney new theme to make your blog look pretty.

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