Welcome to Part Three of our Website Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to drive traffic automatically to your site using the WordPress CMS platform.
In Part One of this article series, we provided an overview of the process, and explained why using an expertly configured WordPress site is the key to automating traffic to your website …
(With an expertly configured WordPress site, all you have to do to bring traffic is post web content on a consistent basis!)
In Part 2, we focused on critical setup decisions. We explained the best way to start if you don’t have a web presence yet, how to set things up if you already have a website, and what to do if your existing site was built with WordPress.
(In Part 2 we show you where to set up a WordPress website on your domain)
In this section of the series, we look at the configuration phase of the traffic automation process. We will explain what makes an expertly configured site different. You will also discover just what type of work needs to be done to ensure that when everything is fully configured, you will begin bringing new visitors automatically when you publish fresh content to your website.
WordPress Traffic Automation System – Configuration
Finding ways to drive more traffic to one’s website is often cited by website owners as the greatest challenge they face online. With business becoming increasingly more competitive worldwide, it’s worth learning about any and every advantage available to increase your own competitiveness online.
Having the ability to generate traffic on demand can be a huge advantage over the competition. With an expertly configured WordPress site, your business has a flying start and an immediate advantage online.
The Configuration Phase Is What Makes The Difference
There is a significant difference between an expertly configured WordPress site and a site that has been professionally installed and set up by an expert website builder but not necessarily configured to take advantage of everything WordPress can offer you.
Here is a simple way to describe the difference:
With a WordPress site that has been expertly configured you get a professional web presence with an automated online business marketing system!
(An expertly configured site gives you a web presence with a built-in automated online business marketing tool!)
Not only does it take more labor to build and integrate an automated online business marketing system into your website, it also takes a special type of expert knowledge.
Let’s illustrate this with a little story.
Knowing Where To Tap
All was going well in the gizmo assembly factory when suddenly, everything ceased working.
No one could figure out what happened and so the floor manager decided to call in an expert.
Shortly after arriving, the expert walked immediately towards the control box. After staring silently at the board for what seemed like 3 minutes, the expert then produced a teeny-weeny hammer and made a very gentle tap near the left-hand corner of the unit.
Immediately, the whole workshop lit up and sprang to life.
The floor manager was filled with joy as he thanked the expert, who left as quickly as he had arrived.
A few days later, the manager received an invoice for the sum of $5,000.
The manager dialled the expert, demanding to know why they had been charged such a ridiculously high fee for so little time spent delivering such a minimal amount of work and promptly requested an itemized invoice before hanging up.
The next day, an invoice statement arrived and was placed on the manager’s desk. Upon opening the envelope, this is what he saw:
The main challenge most businesses face online is being able to consistently drive web traffic to their sites.
In the above story, how much money did the widget plant stand to lose when production stopped functioning and no one in the business had the expertise to fix it? Did the expert in our story not have the right to ask to be compensated fairly for years spent acquiring the knowledge, skills and expertise that enabled him to immediately assess and repair a costly problem?
Similarly, if you could have a WordPress website fully set up and configured so all you had to do is publish content to it and Google, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and dozens of other traffic-generating online properties would be automatically notified, how much time and money would this save you?
(How much time and money would you save if you could automate the process of driving traffic to your website?)
While many experts often make complex things look easy, it rarely is that simple or easy when you are trying to figure things out.
Knowing how to expertly configure a WordPress site requires more than adding some pages with content and configuring a few basic settings. It requires knowing where to tap! In other words, knowing things like:
- Which plugins need to be installed to get desired functionalities on your site.
- Which services you need to set up and activate to achieve certain outcomes
- Which settings need to be configured to make sure things work to plan, etc.
(Driving new traffic automatically with WordPress is a process that requires knowledge and expertise)
This part of the traffic automation system is not so technically challenging, but it’s quite involved and complicated. It’s not just about installing a solution, tweaking some settings in your dashboard area … it’s all of this and much more.
Expertly configuring your website is a complex process that involves your web server, your website or blog, and various external sites …
(Expertly configuring your website involves more than just configuring some WordPress settings)
If all the steps involved in the configuration process were to be flowcharted, it would look something like this …
(A simplistic flowchart of the configuration phase)
Let’s examine these steps in more detail.
Web Server Configuration
We’re not talking about the process of configuring your web-hosting account for website installation purposes. What we are talking about, is fine-tuning settings in your web server specifically for handling web traffic …
(In the configuration stage, your server settings need to be fine-tuned for handling both good and bad traffic)
Not all web traffic is welcome traffic. Some of the web traffic your website may attract will be unwanted traffic like spam, malicious threats, bot-hacking attempts, etc.
This aspect of the configuration process, therefore, requires evaluating your needs, planning for good and bad traffic and then adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This includes looking at things like implementing spam protection and threat prevention, to configuring domain and email redirections, setting up htaccess redirections, etc …
(Have you configured your hosting control panel settings for handling things like email forwarding, page error redirects, etc?)
Once your server settings have been fine-tuned and configured, the next step of the configuration phase is to set up various external sites and online services.
Configuring External Sites
The concept behind setting up external sites is that all content should be posted to one central location (your WordPress site) and from there, syndicate automatically to other components of your web traffic system, or notify traffic-related web properties and applications.
Once you incorporate these external platforms into your traffic network, content linked back to your website is automatically published on search, social and aggregator sites. Your content will then be given exposure to new sources of traffic and new audiences.
Some of these external web properties and online solutions will need to be 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, here are just some of the accounts you will need to have set up:
Google Webmasters
(Google Search Console – create a Google-friendly site)
Google Webmasters lets you tell Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for faster page indexing, and provides site owners with important data, SEO tools, and reports about their website.
Once your account and site data have been set up, your information can be used with web traffic-related settings and notifications in WordPress and other applications.
Google Analytics
(Google Analytics)
Google Analytics lets you improve your site’s performance, SEO, marketing efforts, and more, by tracking all user behaviour, pages visited, keywords searched for, search engine referrers, etc.
Once your Google Analytics account and site data have been set up, visitor tracking code can be added to all pages in WordPress via a simple plugin and automatically sent to many other useful applications.
Bing Data And Tools
(Bing Webmaster Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Webmaster Tools. After setting up your Bing Webmaster Tools account and entering site data, use this information with web traffic-related settings in WordPress using plugins like Yoast SEO (see further below) and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As explained in Part Two, WordPress offers a hosted and a self-hosted option. We recommended choosing the self-hosted WordPress platform if you plan to build a professional business presence online.
WordPress.com (the hosted option), however, provides some great tools, which a number of WordPress plugins can access. We recommend setting up an account at WordPress.com, therefore, and we’ll explain how to integrate these features into your automated traffic generation system in the next installment of this article series.
Social Media
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media sites and attract new traffic to your site)
You will need to have already set up your various social accounts before you can configure these as part of 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 get new traffic to your site.
You should have accounts and pages set up with all the main social networks – Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, YouTube, etc.
There are loads of social sites you can set up. You don’t need to go crazy, just select the ones that will work well with your setup and/or content syndication tools.
(You can syndicate your content to many social bookmarking sites. Image source ShareThis.com)
Additional Solutions, Content Aggregators, Etc.
There are many emerging platforms and content 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 your WordPress blog feed …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse – Distribute your content to social networks)
RebelMouse is a news aggregator for your RSS feeds and social profiles. Your content displays in a Pinterest-like format and visitors can follow your account.
There are many different technologies and third-party applications you can incorporate into your own traffic blueprint. Please feel free to contact us if you need assistance exploring this area further, or to discuss a configuration strategy to suit your needs.
After you have configured your server settings and set up external service accounts, it’s time to configure your site’s settings.
WordPress Traffic Configuration
The first step in configuring your WordPress site for traffic is to ensure that your global settings have been correctly set up.
Let’s go over some of the important points.
Global Settings – WordPress
By default, all WordPress installations include a Settings section that allows you to set up your site’s main settings …
(WordPress settings menu)
General Settings
Sections like Site Title and Tagline can influence your site’s SEO, search listings, etc …
(Settings Menu – General Settings Section)
Writing Settings
The Writing Settings area contains one of the most powerful and frequently overlooked traffic notification systems available to website owners …
(WordPress Settings – Writing Settings)
As described in this section,
When you publish a new post, WordPress automatically notifies the following site update services …
Unless you or your webmaster have specifically chosen to discourage search engines from indexing your site, then your site will automatically notify the services entered into the Update Services section
By default, this section includes only one entry …
(Update Services – A Powerful Traffic Feature Of WordPress)
WordPress lets you notify dozens of update services automatically …
(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 visitors will see your content when they visit your home page and blog pages.
The syndication settings on this page can have an influence traffic. For example, your choice of displaying the full content vs summaries of your post, affects how your content displays to users in RSS feeds and RSS email campaigns, and could impact someone’s choice to explore your content further, and whether or not they will visit your site to get the rest of the content from summaries, 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 feature is enabled or not.
Typically, you would want search engines to visit your site. Leaving the box unchecked enables your site to instantly ping all the update services you have listed whenever a new post gets published (see Writing Settings above). Unless you have a specific reason to discourage search engines from visiting your site, do not check this box …
(Settings Menu – Reading Settings)
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 …
(WordPress Settings – Discussion Settings)
Permalinks
Your Permalink settings allow you to create SEO-friendly URLs …
(Global Settings – Permalinks Section)
The examples below show some of the ways your permalink URLs can be configured …
(Configuring permalinks)
We have created a detailed tutorial on using permalinks in WordPress here: Improve Your WordPress SEO With Permalinks
Configuring WordPress Plugin Settings For Traffic Generation
The WordPress developer community makes available thousands of plugins that can add almost every kind of functionality to your site, including traffic generation.
Let’s take a brief look at some types of plugin categories that affect traffic and plugin examples
Blog Defender Security Plugin
Once again, it’s important to configure your site for handling both good traffic and bad traffic. No website is immune from a cyberattack.
(Security Plugins stop bad traffic from causing your website harm)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your website invisible to hackers and bots.
Go here for more info:
WordPress SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
WordPress SEO plugins help drive traffic by improving the search engine friendliness of your web pages …
(Yoast SEO – WordPress Plugin)
Use a powerful plugin like Yoast SEO (previously called WordPress SEO by Yoast) to improve your website’s search engine optimization. Once properly configured, the Yoast SEO plugin not only makes your website easier for search engines to find, crawl and index, it also lets you configure how your content will show up in Google’s search results and social media sites Twitter, Facebook, and GooglePlus.
Social Sharing Plugins
Allowing visitors to easily share your content with others can help to increase traffic to your site, especially if your site provides content that adds real value to readers.
(WordPress users can easily add social sharing to their website with free or inexpensive WordPress plugins)
WordPress users can easily add social sharing features to their website with free or inexpensive WordPress plugins.
Most social plugins let you choose which 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 followers), etc. Some social sharing plugins even allow you to protect content or downloads which visitors can unlock by linking or tweeting your page.
Configuring Settings – WordPress Themes
As well as configuring various plugins, many WordPress themes also include features that can help improve your site’s traffic generation capabilities.
For example, in addition to options and settings for configuring the design and layout of your website, some themes also include built-in options for improving search optimization and site navigation structure for better indexing, add analytics snippets, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many WordPress themes allow you to configure options and settings for better traffic results)
With a number of themes, adding social sharing features to your website is as easy as clicking a button …
(Many WordPress themes have built-in social sharing features that can be easily enabled on with the click of a button)
Configuring Additional WordPress Sections
Last but not least in the web traffic configuration process, are the components that need to be set up outside of the global settings.
These include:
Compliance Pages
Once again, when preparing your website for an increase in visitor numbers, it’s important to plan not only for how to handle good and bad traffic but also for all the things that can go wrong when more and more people start finding and visiting your website.
If you are making money online (or plan to), it’s important that your website remains compliant with all regulations.
(Is Your Website Legally Compliant?)
We have created a detailed article about adding compliance pages to WordPress here:
Post Tags And Categories
Post categories and tags help improve traffic by improving your site’s SEO.
(WordPress post categories help search engines better organize and index your web pages, which improves traffic.)
As we recommend in this article, your website’s tags and categories should be reviewed and set up earlier on, during the Website Planning Stage.
In the configuration phase, you will want to review and make sure that your site’s post tags and post categories have been set up correctly to deliver optimal benefits.
Add A Site Map To Your WordPress Site
A visitor site map that lists all of your posts and pages is not only a useful navigation tool for users, it can also help external applications discover more of 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 not the same things. An HTML site map is a web page that links to all other content on your site, whereas an XML sitemap is mostly just a bunch of code that only search engine bots can interpret. Although Google will index your pages just using an XML sitemap (which a plugin like Yoast SEO will create for you – see earlier section), making it easier for visitors to find more pages on your site can result in increased traffic.
404 Page Not Found – Another Source Of Traffic!
When visitors searching for your site type in the wrong URL into their browser or click on an invalid link, they will normally be presented with a 404 error page …
(A WordPress 404 Not Found error page)
Configuring your 404 page allows you to recover web traffic that may otherwise be lost. …
(Configuring your 404 Error Page allows you to redirect traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 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.
WordPress Traffic Automation System: Configuration Phase – Summary
Once you have your website or blog expertly configured and fully set up, all you have to do is post fresh content regularly to drive web traffic organically.
The process of expertly configuring your WordPress site, however, is quite involved and elaborate and requires the configuration and integration of different components and web properties …
(Traffic Blueprint – Configuration Phase Checklist)
The kind of expertise required to perform the configuration phase of the traffic automation process typically takes some website professionals a long time to learn.
Once you have configured your WordPress site, the next step is to automate as much of the process as you can. This step is explained in the next section of the WordPress Traffic Automation System series.
This is the end of Section 3
To read the rest of this article, click on the link below:
This article is part of an tutorial series aimed at helping you learn how to grow your business online and drive traffic organically with a WordPress website and proven online marketing methods.
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