As soon as you get your puppy home don't take it straight inside your house. First put the puppy on the place where you want her to relieve herself and let her sniff around a bit to familiarise her/himself with your garden. Tell the puppy to 'go potty' or whatever phrase you intend to use and when it performs praise it and tell it what a good puppy it is. Then take the pup indoors and don't over excite it. Most probably it will have had a car journey and everything will be completely new so you must let it get used to your home gradually. Don't be surprised if it doesn't eat very much the first day. Don't worry, it will make up for it in the weeks to come.
I always tell my puppy buyers to put the puppy in its bed with a nice big cuddly toy and let it snuggle up to it and get some sleep because it will be very tired after all the upheaval and trauma of leaving its brothers and sisters in the litter. There will be plenty of time for it to play later.
Puppies are just like babies, they need to sleep. They tend to sleep for quite long periods when they are very young so try and let it and don't be tempted to keep waking it up or you'll end up with a very tired and irritable puppy.
As soon as the puppy wakes up take it back to the spot you took it to when you brought it home and repeat the procedure again. If you do this each time the puppy wakes up, after it has had its meals, after play and always last thing at night before it settles down for the night you will soon be rewarded with a clean puppy but do remember that puppies do not have proper control over their bodily functions until they are about 5/6 months old so you will have the odd acident. Never get cross because it usually happens if someone has forgotten to take the pup out or left it too long on its own.
You cannot expect a puppy to hold on for hours, it just doesn't happen. It is up to you to train it. You can't just put it outside on its own and expect it to know what it's out there for. You have to stay with it and give it lots of praise when it performs for you.
You can get a crate for the puppy to sleep in and this certainly does help with housetraining. The theory is that puppies never soil their own bed but, again, they can have accidents. If you get a large crate try and get one with a divider so you can let the puppy have a small area to sleep in initially and then as it grows you can make it bigger. Never ever use the crate as a punishment. It should be a safe place where your puppy will want to go when it needs to sleep and
not somewhere to dump it when you feel like it.
I always put newspaper on the floor just inside the back door and the puppy will more often than not use the newspaper if it is indoors. When you see it go towards the newspaper you will know that it needs to go outside and you must take it out immediately. Eventually the pup will be so used to 'going potty' outside it should start to ask to go by giving a little bark.
I hope these guidelines help you and I wish you well with your new puppy. I am sure it will bring you lots of joy.