Wordpress is complicated for me, may need to spend 3k.

Lord Nikon

So, I have an idea for an online business(it's not a unique business), and I really really wanted to build it myself. I'm not computer illiterate at all, but WordPress has me completely stumped. I literally have no idea what to do, and now I'm inches away from dropping 3k on it done professionally, which I need to spend on inventory.

Is it as easy as they say, for something with no experience?
Ive downloaded Elementor, and purchased the
Porto | Multipurpose & WooCommerce Theme, but website preview looks crap, no images/icons just text.

Please help

M.T.D

There are lots of WordPress training videos and courses online, mostly free, but you would have to invest the time in learning.
Even if you are familiar with WordPress and your design skills are low your site can still not look "good".
Elementor will give you an almost drag and drop design set up, but also needs to be learnt as well.
Woo also has to be learnt and getting layouts as you want them also takes time.

If you are totally starting from scratch and a bit lost, get someone to set the site up for you and give you a basic training, this will speed things up and get the initial site structure in place.

If you can't get your head around it all give me a call.

thomas 123

What do you want to actually do? Basic info would help - for example if you want to start an online store there are platforms that are easier to use imo.

frozenfrozen

Just use shopify if its an online shop

Trojan

You willl have to invest either time or money, at your preference. There's no getting around that.

WordPress is a fantastic system, but it definitely has gotten more complex (and powerful) over the years, and there's a learning curve.

Shopify is a good platform to use if you are looking to sell products (ecommerce). It too has its own learning curve - they all do.

If you have been trading for more than 6 months (and can prove that), you may quality for the Trading Online Voucher from your Local Enterprise Office, which is funding of 50% towards your website, up to €2500 (€5k total spend). Ask your LEO, and register a business name with the CRO (€15) to get that clock started if you are not trading 6 months yet).

Tippbhoy1

Lord Nikon wrote: »

So, I have an idea for an online business(it's not a unique business), and I really really wanted to build it myself. I'm not computer illiterate at all, but WordPress has me completely stumped. I literally have no idea what to do, and now I'm inches away from dropping 3k on it done professionally, which I need to spend on inventory.

Is it as easy as they say, for something with no experience?
Ive downloaded Elementor, and purchased the
Porto | Multipurpose & WooCommerce Theme, but website preview looks crap, no images/icons just text.

Please help

It’s easy as they say to build a site, to have something that doesn’t look complete crap is substantially more difficult. I could probably build a garden shed, but it would look crap and most people wouldn’t buy it off me.

If I was to guess I’d say you haven’t finished the additional Porto install steps and loaded in the sample website data. This should be outlined in the theme documentation.

Regardless, you reference woo so I’d imagine you’re looking for a basic e-commerce website. Assuming this is the case, if you are not willing to invest a substantial amount of time learning how to use Wordpress and Woo, then just use Shopify. Either way, be prepared to put effort into getting it right, it’s as much art as it is technical skill.

Lord Nikon

Thank you for all the support folks, honestly. I've done a full reset of my Wordpress, as I installed too many themes and plugins, my Wordpress sidebar got a little overwhelming. I've reinstalled the Porto theme again(as I purchased it), so need to update the homepage to look how I want it.

The site is going to be a raffle/competition site, so I guess I have a lot of work to do, however I would like it to be simple enough for user to navigate.

Axwell

You would probably benefit from stepping away from the laptop initially and taking out pen and paper and drawing out how you want the site to look.

What pages it will have, draw the navigation menu.
What functionality is required on each page - a form, some buttons or a call to action - draw them out.

Once you have it done out on paper and some structure to it you will find it a lot easier to actually build it out in WordPress or at least look up some tutorials for the specific issue you have.

thomas 123

Lord Nikon wrote: »

Thank you for all the support folks, honestly. I've done a full reset of my Wordpress, as I installed too many themes and plugins, my Wordpress sidebar got a little overwhelming. I've reinstalled the Porto theme again(as I purchased it), so need to update the homepage to look how I want it.

The site is going to be a raffle/competition site, so I guess I have a lot of work to do, however I would like it to be simple enough for user to navigate.

Use Shopify there are apps there for what you want to do along with order management , customers etc...

jjoncik

Build a website with WordPress is not very hard. You can buy a template, replace it. All templates come with tutorials, but when you build the website you can't forget SEO, speed optimization and etc.

Explosive_Cornflake

You could just do it with letsencypt for free