Welcome to Part 3 of our Web Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to create an automated web traffic generating machine using WordPress.
In Part One of this article series, we explained why using an expertly configured WordPress website is the key to generating automated traffic …
(With an expertly configured WordPress web site, all you have to do to automatically start attracting traffic is add great content regularly!)
In Part Two, we looked at critical setup decisions. We helped you understand the best way to start if you don’t have a website yet, how to set everything up if you already have a site, and what to do if your existing website has been built with WordPress.
(In Part two we show you how to set up WordPress on your domain)
In this section of the series, we will look at the configuration phase of the traffic automation process. You will learn why an expertly configured site is different than a professionally configured website. You will also understand just what type of work needs to be done to make sure that when all is fully configured, you can automatically attract new visitors when you begin publishing content to your web site.
WordPress Traffic Automation Blueprint – Configuration
The ability to attract more visitors to one’s website is often cited by most business owners as their greatest challenge online. With business getting so much more competitive on a global scale, it’s worth learning about any and every advantage that can help you improve your own results online.
Being able to generate traffic on demand can be a huge advantage. For WordPress users, having an expertly configured website means having a significant advantage from the word “go”.
The Configuration Phase Is The Difference
There is a difference between an expertly configured WordPress site and a site that has been professionally set up by an expert website builder but not necessarily configured to its fullest advantage.
Here is a simple way to explain the difference:
With a WordPress website that has been expertly configured you get a professional web presence plus online business marketing automation!
(An expertly configured site gives you a web presence and an automated online business marketing process!)
Not only are more steps required to build and integrate an automated online business marketing system into your website, it also takes a special kind of expert knowledge.
Let’s illustrate this with an amusing anecdote.
Knowing Where To Tap
All is going well in the widget-making plant when everything suddenly stops working.
As no one can figure out what’s wrong, the floor manager decides to call in an expert.
The expert arrives shortly afterward and immediately goes towards the control box. After staring silently at the wires and circuitry for no more than 3 minutes or so, the expert then takes out a teensy-weensy hammer from his utility belt and makes a gentle tap about one inch from the right-hand corner of the box.
Immediately, every machine starts working again.
The manager is greatly relieved as he thanks the expert, who leaves just as quickly as he had arrived.
A few days later, the manager receives a bill for $5,000.
Confused and outraged, the factory manager picks up the phone and rings the expert. Why were they expected to pay such a ludicrous fee for less than five minutes work? He then requests an itemized invoice to be sent and hangs up.
The next day, an invoice statement arrives and is placed on the manager’s desk. Upon opening the envelope, this is what he sees:
The #1 challenge most businesses face online is being able to drive visitors to their sites.
How much money did the plant stand to lose when the machines stopped working and no one on the factory floor had the expertise required to fix it? Did the expert not have the right to be compensated fairly for years spent acquiring the knowledge, skills and expertise that enabled him to repair a costly problem?
Similarly, if you could have a WordPress website set up so all you ever had to do is publish new content and search engines, social media and dozens of other traffic-generating web properties would be immediately notified, how much time and money would this save you?
(How much better would your business be if you could automate the process of attracting new visitors to your website?)
While experts often make complicated things look simple, it rarely turns out to be that way.
Knowing how to expertly configure a WordPress site requires more than adding some pages with content and configuring a few internal settings. It also involves knowing where to tap! This includes knowing things like:
- Which plugins you need to install to get various functionalities on your site.
- Which 3rd-party accounts you need to set up to get certain results
- Which options you need to configure in order to ensure that processes will work as expected, etc.
(Driving new traffic automatically with WordPress is a process that requires expertise)
This stage of the WordPress traffic automation system is not technically difficult, but it’s quite complicated. The reason why is because it’s not just about installing a piece of software, configuring some options and settings in your admin area … it’s all this and so much more.
The configuration stage involves the integration of many components including your server, your web site, and various third-party sites and services …
(The configuration phase involves more than just configuring some settings in WordPress)
If we try to flowchart the activities involved in the configuration process, it would look something like this …
(A simplistic diagram showing the activities involved in the configuration process)
Let’s examine these steps.
Server Configuration
We’re not talking about the process of configuring your webhosting account for installation purposes (this should have been done during the Setup phase). What we are talking about, is fine-tuning settings in your web hosting account that affect how your site will handle all web traffic …
(During the configuration stage, your server settings need to be fine-tuned for handling both good and bad traffic)
Not all traffic is positive traffic. Some of the web traffic your business may attract will be unwanted traffic like spam, security threats, brute-force bot attacks, etc.
This area of the configuration process, therefore, is about planning for both bad and good traffic and adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This can include things like server-level spam protection and security threat prevention, to configuring your domain and email forwarding, etc …
(Have you configured your webhosting settings for handling things like email forwarding, page errors, etc?)
After checking your server settings and configuring these, the next step is to set up and configure a number of third-party sites.
External Web Properties And Solutions – Configuration
The idea behind choosing external sites is that all content will be posted to a central location (your WordPress site) and from there, it will syndicate automatically to other components of your web traffic generation system, or notify traffic-related web properties and services.
Once you add these external platforms to your traffic system, content linking back to your website will be automatically posted to your search, social and aggregator accounts. Your content and site will benefit from exposure online, helping your business tap into new audiences and new sources of traffic.
Some third-party sites will need to have accounts set up before configuring your WordPress site to speed up the process and some will need to be done later, during the automation phase.
For example, you will want to set up the following accounts before configuring your settings:
Google Webmasters
(Google Search Console)
Google Search Console lets you tell Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for faster page indexing, and provides you with essential information, tools and diagnostic reports about your website.
After setting up your Google Webmaster Tools account and entering site data, your information can be used with traffic settings and notifications in WordPress and other applications.
Google Analytics
(Google Analytics)
Google Analytics lets you improve your site’s performance, SEO, user engagement, marketing efforts, and more, by tracking all user behavior, pages visited, keywords searched for, search engine referrals, etc.
Once your Google Analytics account is set up, your account code can be added to all of your web pages in WordPress using a plugin and instantly fed to various other useful applications.
Bing Webmaster Tools
(Bing Webmaster Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Webmasters. After setting up your account and entering site data with Bing, you can use the details to automate web traffic settings and notifications in WordPress and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As explained in Part 2, WordPress provides users with the option of a hosted vs self-hosted website. We recommended choosing the self-hosted WordPress option if you are planning to grow a professional web presence.
WordPress.com (the hosted option), however, provides a number of useful tools, which can be accessed by a number of WordPress plugins. We recommend setting up an account at WordPress.com, therefore, and we’ll explain how to integrate these features into your automated traffic system in the next installment of this article series.
Social Media Sites
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media sites and drive new visitors to your site)
You will need your social media and social bookmarking accounts set up before you can integrate these with your traffic generation system.
Once you have set up and configured everything, you will be able to syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and bring new traffic to your site.
Set up accounts with all the well-known social networks – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Pinterest, etc.
There are loads of social bookmarking sites you can set up and post your content to. You don’t need to create accounts with all of them, just select the ones that will work with your setup and/or content syndication tools (we will look at some of these tools in greater detail in the Automation phase).
(There are many social sites you can syndicate your content to. Image source ShareThis.com)
Additional Sites, RSS Aggregators, Etc.
There are many emerging platforms and RSS aggregators that can serve as second-tier sources of traffic. Some are free or provide free plans, and some offer a range of pricing plans.
For example, here is a content aggregator site that lets you add an RSS feed from your WordPress blog …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse)
RebelMouse is an aggregator for your social profiles and RSS feeds. Your content displays in a Pinterest-like format and users can follow your page.
There are many different platforms that can be incorporated into your own traffic blueprint. Please contact us if you would like to explore this area further and discuss a strategy to suit your needs.
After you have configured your web server and set up third-party site accounts, it’s time to configure your site’s settings.
WordPress – Configuring Your Site For Traffic
The first step in configuring your WordPress site for traffic is to make sure that your global settings have been set up correctly.
Let’s go over some key areas.
WordPress – Global Settings
The WordPress administration area contains a Settings section that allows you to modify your site’s main settings …
(WordPress settings section)
General Settings
Sections like Site Title and Tagline can influence your site’s SEO, search indexing, etc …
(Global Settings – General Settings)
Writing
The Writing Settings section contains one of the most important and often overlooked automated traffic notification systems available to WordPress site owners …
(Global Settings – Writing Settings)
As described below the Update Services section,
When you publish a new post, WordPress automatically notifies the following site update services …
Unless you have purposely chosen to discourage search engines from indexing your site – see next section, then your site will automatically ping the update services entered into the Update Services field
By default, this section includes only one entry …
(Writing Settings – Update Services)
You can notify dozens of update services automatically – just add a list of update services to this section and WordPress takes care of the rest …
(You can notify dozens of update services automatically with WordPress!)
Download A Comprehensive List Of Ping Services For Your WordPress Site!
Click the link below to download a comprehensive list of reliable and authoritative ping services for your WordPress site or blog:
Download A List Of Ping Services For Your WordPress Site
***
Note: If you need help setting up the list of ping services on your site, we recommend using a professional web services provider. You can find professional WordPress service providers in our WordPress Services Directory.
Reading Settings
This section affects how visitors will see your content when they visit your home page and blog pages.
The syndication settings on this page can have an influence web traffic. For example, your choice to display the full text vs a summary of your post, affects how your content displays in RSS readers and RSS email campaigns, and could play a part in someone’s choice to explore your site further, and whether or not they will visit your site to read the rest of the content from excerpts, or read the content in full without the need to click through to your site.
The most important setting here as far as traffic is concerned is whether the Search Engine Visibility check box is enabled or not.
Generally, you want search engines to visit your site. Leaving the box unchecked allows your site to instantly ping the list of update services whenever a new post gets published (see Writing Settings above). Unless there is a specific reason to discourage search indexing spiders from visiting your site, do not check this box …
(Global Settings – Reading Settings Screen)
Discussion
Although the settings in this section are mostly concerned with how users engage with content on your site, you have the option to allow notifications to blogs linked to from your content, and to allow link notifications from other blogs (pingbacks and trackbacks). This can work for you, but it can also drive bad traffic in the form of SPAM comments …
(Global Settings – Discussion Settings Screen)
Permalink Settings
Your Permalink settings allow your site to display posts with SEO-friendly URLs …
(Global Settings – Permalinks)
The examples below show some of the ways SEO-friendly URLs can be configured …
(Configuring SEO-friendly URLs)
If you need help setting up WP permalinks, go here: How To Configure WordPress Permalinks
Configuring WordPress Traffic Generation Plugins
The WordPress developer community makes available thousands of plugins that help to add almost every type of functionality to your website, including plugins with features that help to improve traffic generation.
Here are examples of plugin categories and plugins that can help drive more visitors to your site
Security Plugins – Blog Defender
Once again, it’s important to configure your website for handling both good traffic and bad traffic. No website or blog is guaranteed immunity from being attacked by hackers.
(WordPress Security Plugins stop bad traffic from causing your website harm)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your WordPress site invisible to botnet and hacker attacks.
Go here for more info:
SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
SEO plugins help drive traffic by improving the search engine friendliness of your web pages …
(Yoast SEO – WordPress Plugins For SEO)
A plugin like Yoast SEO (previously called WordPress SEO by Yoast) can significantly improve your website’s search engine optimization. Properly configured, this plugin not only makes your site easier for search engines to find, classify and index, it also gives you control over how your content is presented to Google’s search results and social media pages, e.g. Facebook, Twitter, and GooglePlus.
Social Plugins
Allowing visitors to easily share your content with friends and members of their social networks can help drive significant traffic to your site, especially if you post content that adds value to readers.
(WordPress users can easily add social sharing to their website using WordPress plugins)
You can easily add social sharing features to your site using free or inexpensive WordPress plugins.
Many social plugins let you specify which social sites your content can be shared to, embed social buttons into your content, set up default update notifications, display/hide share counters (e.g. number of followers), etc. Some plugins even allow you to set up protected content sections on your site which visitors can unlock by sharing your page.
Configuring Settings – WordPress Themes
As well as configuring various plugins, many WordPress themes also include features that help grow your site’s traffic.
For example, as well as options and settings for configuring the design and layout of your website, some themes also provide built-in features that let you improve search optimization and site navigation structure for faster indexing, add analytics snippets, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many themes come with built-in traffic optimization features)
With a number of quality themes, adding social sharing buttons and features to your pages is as easy as selecting the option to enable this functions …
(Many WordPress themes include built-in social sharing features)
Other Areas To Configure
Last but not least in the web traffic configuration process, are the areas that need to be configured outside of the global settings.
These include:
Compliance Pages
Once again, when preparing your website for a growth in visitor numbers, it’s important to plan not only how to handle bad and good traffic but also for all the things that can go wrong as more and more people begin to visit your website.
If you engage in any form of commercial activity online, it’s important that your website complies with regulatory agencies.
(Does Your Website Or Blog Comply With All Legal Requirements?)
If you need help adding legal pages to WordPress, go here:
Tags And Post Categories
WordPress tags & post categories help search engines classify and index your website, which improves traffic.
(WordPress post categories help improve traffic by allowing search engines to better organize and index your website.)
As we recommend in this article, your site’s post tags and post categories should be discussed and set up during the Website Planning Process.
When configuring your web site to automate and improve traffic, you will want to review and make sure that the post tags and post categories that have been set up.
A Site Map Of Your Posts And Pages
A site map that lists all of your site’s pages and posts is not only a useful navigation tool for users, it can also help external sites discover your online content …
(A site map is not just great for visitors, but for web traffic too!)
It’s important to note that an HTML site map and an XML sitemap are two different things. Although search engines like Google will index your pages just using an XML sitemap (which a plugin like Yoast SEO will create for you – see earlier section), allowing visitors to find more pages on your site results in increased traffic.
404 Page – A Source Of Lost Traffic Opportunities!
When visitors type in the wrong URL or click on a dead link, they will typically be greeted with an error page …
(A WordPress 404 Page)
Configuring your 404 Error Page allows you to redirect traffic that may otherwise be lost. …
(Configuring your 404 page allows you to redirect web traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 Not Found error page can be set up in your server, there are several plugins for WordPress that allow you to easily configure your 404 page from your WordPress admin area.
WordPress Traffic System: Configuration Process – Summary
Once you have your site expertly configured and fully set up, all you have to do then to attract more web traffic is add great content on a regular basis.
The process of expertly configuring a WordPress site, however, is quite involved and requires the configuration and integration of various components and web properties …
(Traffic System – Configuration Checklist)
The expertise involved in expertly configuring a WordPress site typically takes many web professionals a long time to acquire.
Once you have configured your WordPress site, the next step is to automate the process. This step is explained in the next article in our series.
This is the end of Part Three
To keep reading this article, click on the link below:
This tutorial is part of a comprehensive series of tutorials designed to help you learn how to grow your business and drive traffic sustainably using a WordPress-driven website or blog and proven marketing methods that are easy and quick to implement.
Get Notified When New WordPress Tutorials Get Published – Subscribe Using The Form Below!
***
"This is an awesome training series. I have a pretty good understanding of WordPress already, but this is helping me to move somewhere from intermediate to advanced user!" - Kim Lednum
***