Welcome to Part Three of our WordPress Web Site Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to automate traffic to your website using WordPress.
In Part One of this series, we described the process, and explained why using an expertly configured WordPress site is the key to generating automated traffic …
(With an expertly configured WordPress website, all you have to do to bring traffic is add new content on a regular basis!)
In Part 2, we focused on critical setup decisions. We helped you understand the best way to start if you don’t have a web presence yet, how to set things up if you already have a site, and what to do if your site has been built using WordPress.
(In Part two we show you where to set up a WordPress site on your domain)
In this section of the series, we look at the configuration phase of the traffic automation process. We explain how a WordPress site should be configured in order to ensure that web traffic will automatically start flowing when you begin to add web content to your site.
WordPress Web Traffic Automation Blueprint – Configuration Phase
Being able to attract more visitors to one’s website is often cited by website owners as one of the greatest challenges they face online. Businesses are becoming ever more competitive worldwide and are exploring any advantage they can to increase their competitiveness online.
The ability to generate traffic on demand is a huge advantage over other competitors. For WordPress users, having an expertly configured website means having a significant advantage from the word “go”.
The Difference Is In The Configuration
There is a significant difference between an expertly configured WordPress site and a website that has been professionally installed and set up by a website-building expert but not necessarily configured to its fullest advantage.
Here’s a simple way to describe the differences:
With a WordPress site that has been expertly configured you get a professional web presence plus online business marketing automation!
(An expertly configured site gives you a professional web presence and an automated online business marketing tool!)
Not only are more steps required to build and integrate an automated online business marketing system into your website, it also takes a special type of expertise.
To illustrate this here’s a story.
Are Experts Worth The Money They Charge?
All is going fine in the widget workshop when suddenly, the machines stops.
As no one can figure out what’s wrong, the floor manager decides to call in an expert.
The expert arrives shortly after being summoned and immediately walks towards the control box. After staring at the wiring diagrams for about 2 minutes, the expert then takes out a tiny little hammer and makes a single tap about 1 inch from the top-right edge of the unit.
Immediately, every machine in the plant begins to work again.
The manager is grateful and relieved as he thanks the expert, who then leaves just as quickly as he had arrived.
A few days after resolving the incident, the factory manager receives a request for payment of $5,000.
With a sense of outrage, the factory manager picks up the phone and dials the expert. Demanding to know why they have been charged such a ludicrous fee for less than five minutes work, he then requests an itemized invoice and hangs up.
The next day, an invoice notice arrives on the manager’s desk. Upon opening it, this is what he sees:
The #1 challenge most businesses face online is driving traffic to their sites.
In the above story, how much money did the gizmo factory stand to lose when production ground to a halt and no one in the factory floor was able to fix it? Did the expert not have the right to demand fair compensation for investing years building up the knowledge, skills and expertise that allowed him to immediately fix a potentially costly problem?
Similarly, if you could have your WP site fully configured so all you had to do is publish new content and search engines, social networking sites and dozens of other web properties would be automatically notified, how much time and money would you save?
(How much better would your business be if you could automate the process of attracting new visitors to your website?)
Although the solution to many problems may seem quite simple once it’s been implemented, it rarely turns out to be that way.
Expertly configuring a WordPress site involves more than installing a website and configuring settings for clients. It also involves knowing where to tap! This includes knowing things like:
- Which plugins you need to install to add desired functionalities to your site.
- Which accounts you need to set up and activate to achieve desired outcomes
- Which settings need to be configured to ensure that things function as you have imagined, etc.
(Generating traffic automatically with WordPress is a process that requires knowledge and expertise)
Although this stage of the traffic automation system may not seem so technically difficult, it can be quite involved and complicated. This is because it’s not as simple as installing a solution, clicking on a button or two … it’s all this and so much more.
The configuration phase is a process that involves your web hosting server, your web site, and various third-party sites and/or online services …
(Expertly configuring your website involves more than just configuring a few WordPress settings)
If we try to flowchart all the steps involved in the configuration process, it would look something like this …
(A simplistic flowchart of all the steps involved in the configuration phase)
Let’s take a look at these areas in more detail.
Web Server Configuration
We’re not talking about the process of configuring your webhosting account for site installation purposes. We’re talking about tweaking settings in your server that affect how your site will handle web traffic …
(In the configuration phase, your web-hosting account settings need to be checked for handling both good and bad traffic)
Not all web traffic is welcome traffic. Some of the traffic your site will attract will be unwanted traffic like spam, malicious threats, bot-hacking attempts, etc.
This aspect of the configuration process, therefore, is all about planning for both bad and good traffic and then adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This could include things like integrating server-level spam protection and securing server files, to configuring domain and email redirections, etc …
(Have you configured your webhosting settings for handling things like emails, page error redirections, etc?)
Once your server settings have been fine-tuned and configured, the next step is to configure a number of external sites.
Configuring External Web Properties
The purpose of setting up external sites is that all of your content will get posted to one central location (your WordPress site) and from there, it will syndicate automatically to other parts of your traffic generation system, or notify traffic-related web properties and applications.
Once these external platforms have been added to your system, content with links pointing back to your website is automatically added to your search, social and aggregator accounts. Your content and business will receive exposure online, helping your business tap into a whole new audience and traffic source.
Some web properties and online platforms will need to have accounts set up before configuring your WordPress site to help save time 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 WordPress settings:
Google Webmaster Tools
(Google Webmasters – create a Google-friendly website)
Google Webmaster Tools lets you notify Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for faster page indexing, and provides site owners with essential information, SEO tools, and diagnostic reports about their website.
Once your account and site data have been set up, use your account information with web traffic settings and notifications in WordPress using plugins like Yoast SEO and other applications.
Google Analytics
(Google Analytics)
Google Analytics lets you improve your site’s results, SEO, marketing activities, and more, by tracking all user engagement, pages visited, keywords searched for, social media referrals, etc.
Once your Google Analytics account and site data have been set up, traffic monitoring information can be integrated with WordPress using a simple Google Analytics plugin used with other applications and reporting tools.
Bing Data And Tools
(Drive more traffic with Bing Webmaster Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Search Console. Once your account has been set up, this information can be used to integrate and automate traffic settings and notifications in WordPress (e.g. using plugins like Yoast SEO) and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As explained in Part 2, WordPress offers website owners a self-hosted and a hosted option. We recommended choosing the self-hosted WordPress platform if you are planning to build a professional business presence online.
WordPress.com (the hosted option), however, provides some great features, which can be accessed by a number of WordPress plugins. We recommend setting up an account with WordPress.com, therefore, and we’ll explain how to integrate these features into your web traffic generation system in Part Four of this article series.
Social Media Pages
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media sites and social bookmarking accounts and bring new visitors to your site)
You will need your social accounts set up in order to integrate these with your traffic generation system.
After setting up and configuring everything, you will be able to syndicate your content automatically to your social media accounts and attract new visitors to your site.
You should have accounts with all of the popular social networks – Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, Pinterest, etc.
There are loads of social sites you can You can syndicate your content to many social bookmarking sites. You don’t need to create accounts with all of them, just select the ones that will work well with your setup and/or content sharing tools.
(There are loads of social sites you can post your content to. Image source ShareThis.com)
Additional Platforms, RSS Aggregators, Etc.
There are many new online technology platforms and RSS aggregators that can serve as second-tier traffic generation sources. Some are free or provide free access levels, and some offer a range of pricing plans.
For example, here is a content aggregator site that allows you to add an RSS feed from your website …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse – Publishing platform for distributed content)
RebelMouse is a news aggregator for your social profiles and RSS feeds. Your content is displayed in a Pinterest-like format and visitors can follow your social feed.
There are various solutions you can incorporate into your own web traffic system. Please feel free to contact us if you need assistance exploring this area further, or to 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 WordPress site.
WordPress – Configuring Your Website
The first step in configuring your WordPress site for traffic is to ensure that your global settings have been set up correctly.
Let’s go over some of the important points.
Global WordPress Settings
By default, your WordPress admin area includes a Settings section that allows you to configure your site’s global settings …
(WordPress settings menu)
General Settings
Sections like Site Title and Tagline can affect traffic by influencing your site’s SEO, search indexing, etc …
(Settings Menu – General Settings Section)
Writing
The Writing Settings area contains an important and frequently overlooked automated traffic notification system …
(Global Settings – Writing Settings)
As stated in this section,
When you publish a new post, WordPress automatically notifies the following site update services …
Unless you have purposely chosen to prevent search engines from indexing your site, then your site will automatically notify the services entered into the Update Services text box
By default, this section lists only one entry …
(Update Services – A Powerful Traffic Feature Of WordPress)
WordPress lets you notify dozens of update services automatically – just add a list of update services to this section and WordPress takes care of the rest …
(WordPress lets you notify dozens of update services automatically!)
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
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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 your content gets seen by visitors when they visit your home page and blog pages.
The syndication settings in this section can influence traffic. For example, your choice of displaying the full content vs a summary of your post, affects how your content shows up in RSS readers and RSS email campaigns, and could affect someone’s decision to explore your site further, and whether or not they will visit your website to read the rest of the content from excerpts, or read the content in full without the need to click through to your site.
As far as traffic is concerned, however, the most important setting here is whether the Search Engine Visibility check box is ticked or not.
Generally, you want to encourage search engines to visit your site. Leaving this box unchecked allows WordPress to automatically notify various update services whenever a new post gets published (see Writing Settings above). Unless there is a specific reason why search engines should not visit your site, leave this box unchecked …
(Global Settings – Reading Settings)
Discussion Settings
Although this section is 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 Section)
Permalink Settings
Permalinks enable WordPress to publish posts with SEO-friendly URLs …
(Settings Menu – Permalink Settings)
Here are some of the ways permalinks can be configured …
(Configuring SEO-friendly URLs)
We have written a detailed tutorial on using WordPress permalinks here: How To Improve Your WordPress SEO With Permalinks
Configuring Settings – WordPress Plugins
The WordPress developer community makes available plugins that help to add almost every kind of functionality imaginable to your website, including plugins that add traffic generation capabilities.
Let’s look at examples of plugin categories and plugins that can help to increase traffic
Blog Defender
Once again, it’s important to configure your WordPress site for dealing with both good traffic and bad traffic. No matter what kind of business you run or plan to run online and how small you think your web presence is, you simply cannot ignore the importance of website security.
(Security Plugins help prevent bad traffic from causing your website harm)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your blog invisible to hackers and bots.
More info:
SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
SEO plugins help drive traffic by improving your website’s SEO …
(Yoast SEO – WordPress Plugins For SEO)
Use a plugin like Yoast SEO (previously called WordPress SEO by Yoast) to improve your SEO. Properly configured, this plugin not only makes your web pages easier for search engines like Google to find, crawl and index, it also lets you specify how your content will show up in Google’s search results and social media pages, e.g. Facebook, Twitter, and GooglePlus.
Social Sharing Plugins
Allowing visitors to share your content with others online can help boost traffic to your site, especially if you provide content that adds real value to readers.
(You can easily add social sharing to your website using free or inexpensive WordPress plugins)
WordPress users can easily add social sharing features to their site using free or inexpensive WordPress plugins.
Many social plugins let you choose which social sites visitors can share your content to, embed social buttons into your content, set up custom update notifications, display/hide share counters (e.g. number of likes), etc. Some social sharing plugins even allow you to set up protected content areas on your pages which users can unlock by liking your page.
Themes
As well as configuring various plugins, many WordPress themes also include features that help you drive more traffic to your site.
For example, in addition to options and settings for configuring the design and layout of your site, many themes also provide options for improving search optimization and site navigation structure for better indexing, easily add tracking, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many themes like Graphene (a highly customizable free theme) have built-in traffic optimization features)
With many themes, adding social sharing buttons and features to your website is as easy as selecting the option to enable this functions …
(Many WordPress themes come with built-in social sharing features)
Additional Configuration Features For WordPress Traffic
Last but not least in the web traffic configuration process, are the elements that need to be configured outside of the global settings.
This includes the following:
Website 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 situations that can hurt your business when more and more people start finding and visiting your website.
If you make money online, it’s important that your website complies with all government regulations.
(Is Your Site Legally Compliant?)
If you need help understanding how to quickly add legal pages to your site, refer to this article:
Post Tags And Post Categories
Post tags & post categories help search engines index your web pages, which helps you get more traffic.
(WordPress post categories help improve traffic by improving your site’s SEO.)
As we strongly recommend in this article, your website’s post tags and categories should be discussed and set up during the Website Planning Stages.
In the configuration phase, you will want to review and make sure that your site’s post tags and post categories have been correctly set up to deliver optimal benefits and results.
Add A Site Map To Your WordPress Site
A site map that displays all of your pages and posts to visitors is not only a useful navigation tool, it can also help external applications find your website 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 different things. Although Google will index your pages just from an XML sitemap (which a plugin like Yoast SEO can provide – see earlier section), making it easier for visitors to find more pages on your site results in increased traffic.
Your Site’s 404 Page Not Found
When online visitors enter the wrong URL or click on a dead hyperlink, they will normally be presented with an error page (known as a 404 error page) …
(Default WordPress 404 Page)
A 404 Not Found page can be configured to funnel traffic to your functional web pages …
(Configuring your 404 page allows you to recover traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 page can be set up in your server, there are several WordPress plugins that let you easily configure your 404 page inside your WordPress dashboard.
WordPress Traffic Blueprint: Configuration Phase – Summary
Once your site has been fully set up and expertly configured, all you have to do then is add content consistently to automatically bring web traffic.
The process of expertly configuring your WordPress site, however, can be quite involved and elaborate and requires the configuration and integration of a number of different components and external web properties …
(WP Traffic System – Configuration Checklist)
The kind of knowledge and expertise required to perform the configuration process can take many web professionals months to learn.
Once you have expertly 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 Section Three
To continue reading this article, click on the link below:
This article is part of a comprehensive series of articles designed to help you learn how to grow your business online and drive traffic automatically with a WordPress website or blog and proven web marketing strategies.
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"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
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