Welcome to Part Three of our WordPress Web Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to drive new visitors automatically to your website using the WordPress CMS.
In Part 1 of this series, we provided an overview of the process, and explained why using an expertly configured WordPress website or blog is the key to automating traffic to your site …
(With an expertly configured WordPress web site, all you have to do is add content consistently to begin attracting new traffic!)
In Part Two, we discussed the setup phase of this process. We helped you understand the best way to get started 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 site has been built using WordPress.
(In Part 2 we show you where to set up WordPress on your domain)
In this section, we will look at the configuration stage of this process. We explain how a WordPress site should be configured in order to automatically start attracting traffic when you post web content to your website.
WordPress Web Traffic Automation Blueprint – Configuration Phase
The ability to attract more visitors to one’s website is often cited by many business owners as one of their greatest challenges online. Also, the business landscape is becoming so much more competitive on a global scale and businesses are researching any and every advantage available to improve their results online.
Having the ability to automatically generate traffic on demand is a huge advantage over the competition. With an expertly configured website, your business has an immediate advantage from the very beginning.
The Configuration Stage Is What Makes All 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 take advantage of everything WordPress can offer.
Here is a simple way to understand the differences:
An expertly configured WordPress website gives you a web presence and an automated online business marketing system!
(An expertly configured site gives you a professional web presence with an automated online business marketing system!)
Not only does a whole lot more labor go into building and integrating an automated online business marketing system into your website, it also takes a special type of expertise.
Let’s illustrate this with an anecdote.
Ludicrous Or Fair? You Decide …
All is running smoothly in the gizmo factory when production suddenly stops.
No one can figure out what’s happened and so the floor manager decides to call in an expert to fix the problem.
The expert arrives shortly after being summoned and, without saying a word, walks directly towards the main control box. After staring at the electronic components for 3 minutes, the expert then produces a teeny-weeny hammer and makes a single tap near the right side of the unit.
Immediately, everything comes back to life.
The floor manager is overjoyed as he thanks the expert, who leaves just as quickly as he had arrived.
A couple of days later, the factory manager receives an invoice for $5,000.
Furious, the factory manager dials the expert. Why had he charged them so much for less than 5 minutes work? He then requests an itemized invoice and hangs up.
The next day, an invoice arrives in the manager’s intray. Upon opening the envelope, this is what he sees:
The #1 challenge most businesses face online is being able to drive traffic consistently to their sites.
In the story we’ve just described, how much money did the widget factory stand to lose when the equipment ground to a halt and no one in the factory floor had the expertise to fix it? Did the expert in our story not have the right to demand fair compensation for having invested years building up the knowledge, skills and expertise that allowed him to avert a serious crisis?
Similarly, if you could have a website configured so all you have to do is publish new content and Google, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and dozens of other web properties would be automatically notified, how much time and money would you save?
(How much time and money would you save if you could automate the process of driving traffic to your site?)
While experts often make complex solutions look simple, it rarely turns out to be that way.
Knowing how to expertly configure a WordPress site involves more than just installing a website and configuring a few internal settings. It involves knowing where to tap! This includes knowing things such as:
- Which programs you need to install to add various functionalities to your site.
- Which accounts you need to set up and activate to get specific results
- Which options you need to configure in order to make sure processes will run as envisioned, etc.
(Generating traffic automatically with WordPress is a process that requires knowledge and expertise)
Although this part of the traffic automation system may not seem so technically difficult, it can be quite involved and time-consuming. The reason why is because it’s not just about installing and configuring a plugin, configuring some settings in your admin area or clicking on a button or two … it’s all of this and much more.
The configuration stage involves the integration of many parts including your web hosting server, your web site, and a number of external sites and online services …
(Expertly configuring your website involves more than just configuring some settings in WordPress)
If the configuration process were to be flowcharted, it would look like this …
(A simplistic diagram showing all the steps involved in the configuration phase)
Let’s take a look at these areas in more detail.
Configuring Your Web Server
We’re not talking about the process of configuring your hosting account for installation purposes (this should have been done during the Setup phase). We’re talking about tweaking settings and options in your webhosting account specifically for handling web traffic …
(In the configuration phase, your web server settings need to be checked for handling both good and bad traffic)
Not all web traffic is beneficial traffic. Some of the web traffic your business can attract will be unwelcome traffic like bot spam, security threats, bot-hacking attempts, etc.
This aspect of the configuration process, therefore, is all about evaluating your needs, planning for good and unwanted traffic and then adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This could include things like configuring server-level spam protection and threat prevention, to configuring domain and email forwarding, etc …
(Have you configured your webhosting settings for handling things like email forwarding, page errors, etc?)
After your server settings have been fine-tuned and configured, the next step is to configure a number of external sites and services.
External Sites
The concept behind setting up external sites is that all content will be published from one central location (your site) and from there, it will radiate outwards automatically to other components of your web traffic generation system, or notify traffic-related web properties and applications.
Once you incorporate these external platforms into your traffic system, content pointing back to your site will get automatically fed to these platforms, indexed by search engines and distributed to social networks, even to users of the platform itself. Your content and site will be exposed to a new audience and source of traffic.
Some of the third-party sites and online services will need to have accounts set up before configuring your site to help speed up the configuration process and some will need to be done later, during the automation phase.
For example, you will want to set up the following accounts:
Google Webmaster Tools
(Google Search Console)
Google Webmaster Tools lets you inform Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for automatic page indexing, and provides site owners with useful information, SEO tools, and reports about their website.
Once your account and site data with Google Webmasters have been set up, you can use the account information with web traffic-related settings and notifications in WordPress using plugins like Yoast SEO and other applications.
Google Analytics
(Google Analytics)
Google Analytics lets you improve your website’s performance, SEO, user engagement, marketing activities, sales conversions, and more, by tracking all user engagement, pages visited, keywords searched for, social media referrers, etc.
After setting up your account, visitor tracking information can be added to WordPress using any of several Google Analytics plugins used with other applications.
Bing Data And Tools
(Drive more traffic with Bing Data And Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Webmaster Tools. Once your account has been set up, use the account information with web traffic-related settings and notifications in WordPress using plugins like Yoast SEO (see further below) and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As discussed in Part 2, WordPress offers a self-hosted and a hosted option. We recommended choosing the self-hosted WordPress version if you plan to build 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 with WordPress.com, therefore, and we’ll show you how to integrate this into your traffic generation system in the next installment of this article series.
Social Media And Social Bookmarking
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media sites and social bookmarking accounts and get new visitors 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 accounts and bring new visitors to your site.
Make sure you have set up accounts and profiles with all the big social networks – Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, YouTube, etc.
There are lots of social bookmarking sites you can set up and syndicate your content to. You don’t need to go crazy, just pick those that will work with your setup and/or content sharing tools (we discuss some of these tools in greater detail in the Automation phase).
(You can post your content to many social sites. Image: ShareThis.com)
Additional Solutions, RSS Aggregators, Etc.
There are many online technology platforms and RSS aggregators that can act as secondary sources of traffic. Some are free or provide free accounts, and some are paid services.
For example, here is a content aggregator that allows you to add your WordPress site feed …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse – Publishing platform for distributed content)
RebelMouse is a news aggregator for your RSS feeds and social profiles. Your content displays in a Pinterest-like format and users can follow your RebelMouse account.
There are many different solutions that can be incorporated into your own traffic blueprint. Please contact us if you need assistance exploring some of these, or to discuss a configuration strategy to suit your needs.
After you have configured your web server and set up third-party service accounts, it’s time to configure WordPress.
WordPress – Configuring Your Website
The first step in configuring your site for traffic is to make sure that its global settings have been correctly set up.
Let’s go over some key areas.
Configuring Global WordPress Settings
Your WordPress dashboard area contains a Settings section that allows you to configure your site’s global settings …
(WordPress settings menu)
General Settings
Fields like Site Title and Tagline can affect your site’s SEO, search indexing, etc …
(Settings Menu – General Settings)
Writing
The Writing Settings area contains a powerful and often overlooked built-in traffic notification system …
(WordPress Settings – Writing Settings Section)
As described below the Update Services section title,
When you publish a new post, WordPress automatically notifies the following site update services …
Unless you have intentionally configured your settings to discourage search engines from indexing your site, then your site will automatically notify the list of services entered into the Update Services text area
By default, this section displays only one entry …
(WordPress Update Services)
You can notify dozens of update services automatically with WordPress – just add a list of update services to this section and WordPress takes care of the rest …
(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
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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 in this section can influence traffic. For example, choosing to display the full text vs summaries of your post, affects how your content displays in RSS feeds and RSS email campaigns, and could impact someone’s decision to explore your site further, and whether or not they will visit your site to view the rest of the content from a partial feed, or read the content in full without the need to click through to your site.
As far as your traffic system is concerned, however, the most important setting here is whether the Search Engine Visibility check box is enabled or not.
Typically, you want search engines to visit your site. Leaving the box unchecked allows WordPress to instantly ping all the update services you have listed whenever new posts get published (see Writing Settings above). Unless there is a specific reason to discourage search engines from visiting your site, leave this box unchecked …
(WordPress Settings – Reading Settings Section)
Discussion Settings
Although discussion settings 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
Permalinks enable WordPress to publish posts with search engine-friendly URLs …
(Global Settings – Permalinks Screen)
Here are some of the ways post permalinks can be configured …
(Configuring post permalinks)
For a detailed tutorial about setting up permalinks, go here: How To Improve Your WordPress SEO With SEO-Friendly URLs
WordPress Plugin Settings
The WordPress developer community makes available thousands of plugins that help to add almost every type of functionality imaginable to your website, including many plugins that improve traffic generation.
Let’s take a brief look at examples of plugin categories and plugins that can help to attract more visitors to your site
Blog Defender Security Plugin
Once again, it’s important to configure your website for dealing with the effects of both good traffic and bad traffic. Regardless of the kind of business you run or plan to run online and how small you think your web presence is, website security is something you cannot ignore.
(WordPress Security Plugins help prevent bad traffic from harming your web presence)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your WordPress site invisible to hackers and botnets.
Go here for more info:
WordPress SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
SEO plugins help drive traffic by making your web content more indexable …
(WordPress SEO plugins help drive traffic by improving the search engine friendliness of your website)
A plugin like Yoast SEO can significantly improve your SEO. When properly configured, the Yoast SEO plugin not only makes your website easier for search engines to index, it also gives you control over how your content is presented to Google’s search results and social media pages, e.g. Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.
Social Sharing Plugins
Allowing your visitors to easily share your content online can help drive more traffic to your site, especially if you publish great content that adds real value to readers.
(WordPress users can easily add social sharing to their website using free or inexpensive plugins)
There are many social sharing plugins available for WordPress users.
Many social share plugins allow you to 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 shares), etc. Some plugins even allow you to ‘lock’ content or downloads which users can unlock by liking your page.
WordPress – Traffic Generation Theme Features
As well as configuring various plugins, many WordPress themes also include features that help grow your site’s traffic.
For example, in addition to options and settings for configuring the design and layout of your website, some themes also give you built-in options for improving search optimization and site linking structure for better indexing, easily add tracking, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many WordPress themes can be configured for improved traffic results)
With a number of themes, adding social sharing features to your site is as easy as clicking a few buttons and enabling the function …
(Many WordPress themes have built-in social sharing features)
Additional Configuration Features For Your WordPress Site
Last but not least in the WordPress traffic system configuration process, are the components that need to be set up outside of the global settings.
These include:
Compliance Web Pages
Once again, when preparing your website for a growth in traffic numbers, it’s important to plan not only for both good and unwelcome 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 (or plan to), it’s important that your website remains compliant with government legal requirements.
(Does Your Website Comply With All Legal Requirements?)
If you need help adding compliance pages to WordPress, go here:
WordPress Post Categories & Tags
Tags & categories help search engines index your web pages, which helps to increase traffic.
(Post categories help search engines classify and index your website, which helps you get more traffic.)
As we strongly recommend in this article, your site’s post tags and post categories should be discussed and set up during the Website Planning Phases.
In the configuration phase, you will want to review and make sure that your site’s post categories and tags have been correctly set up to deliver optimal benefits.
Add A WordPress Site Map
A site map that displays all of your site’s pages and posts to visitors is not only a useful navigation tool, it can also help external sites discover your site’s content …
(A site map is not just great for visitors, but for traffic too!)
An HTML site map and an XML sitemap are not the same things. HTML site maps provide visitors with a logical map of how your content is structured, while XML sitemaps are mostly filled with code that only search bots can understand. Although Google can 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 results in increased traffic.
404 Error Page – A Source Of Lost Traffic Opportunities!
When visitors searching for your website enter the wrong URL into their browser or click on hyperlinks pointing to destinations on your site that no longer exist, they are greeted with an error page (known as a 404 page) …
(A 404 Page)
Configuring your 404 Error Page allows you to redirect web traffic that may otherwise be lost. …
(Configuring your 404 page allows you to redirect traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 error page can be set up in your web server, there are several WordPress plugins that let you easily configure your 404 page from your WordPress admin.
WordPress Traffic Automation Blueprint: Configuration Phase – Summary
Once you have your site expertly configured and fully set up, all you then need to do to automatically attract more traffic is post content on a consistent basis.
The process of expertly configuring your WordPress site, however, can be quite involved and elaborate and requires the configuration and integration of different components and web properties …
(Traffic Blueprint – Configuration Checklist)
The skills and expertise involved in expertly configuring a WordPress site typically takes some website professionals months to acquire.
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 series.
This is the end of Section 3
To read the rest of this article, click here:
This article is part of a comprehensive series of tutorials aimed at helping you learn how to grow your business online and drive traffic automatically using a WordPress-powered website or blog and proven online marketing strategies.
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