Welcome to Part 3 of our WordPress Web Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to automate traffic to your site using the WordPress CMS.
In Part One of this article series, we 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 automatically start generating traffic is add fresh content consistently!)
In Part Two, we looked at the setup phase. We explained 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 site has been built with WordPress.
(In Part 2 we show you where to set up WordPress on your domain)
In this section, we discuss the configuration phase of the traffic system. The focus of this section is to help you understand why an expertly configured WordPress site is different, and just what type of work needs to be done to ensure that when all is set up and configured, you can automatically start to get visitors when you publish content on your WordPress site.
WordPress Traffic System – Configuration
Finding ways to drive more traffic to one’s website is often cited by many website owners as their greatest challenge online. Businesses are becoming so much more competitive and are exploring any opportunity they can to get better results online.
The ability to generate traffic on demand can provide you with a huge advantage. For WordPress users, having an expertly configured website allows their business to get off with a flying start as soon as their website is launched.
The Configuration Stage Is What Makes The Difference
There is a significant difference between an expertly configured WordPress site and a website that has been professionally installed and set up by an expert website builder but not necessarily configured to its fullest advantage.
Here is a simple way to understand the main difference:
An expertly configured WordPress website gives you a web presence and online business marketing automation!
(An expertly configured website gives you a professional web presence with an automated online business marketing process!)
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 kind of expertise.
Let’s illustrate this with an amusing little story.
A Semi-True Story …
All is humming along in the gizmo assembly line when things come to a sudden stop.
No one can figure out what’s happened and so the plant manager decides to call in an expert to fix the problem.
Soon afterwards, the expert arrives and, without uttering a word, heads directly towards the control box. After staring silently at the control unit for less than 5 minutes or so, the expert then takes out a teeny-weeny hammer from his tool box and makes a gentle tap about 2 inches from the bottom-left edge of the box.
Immediately, everything returns once more to normal.
The manager is filled with joy as he thanks the expert, who leaves as quickly as he had arrived.
A few days later, the manager receives an invoice for $5,000.
Bordering on outrage, the manager picks up the phone and calls the expert. Why had they had been charged such a ridiculously high fee for so little time delivering such minimal amount of work? He promptly requests an itemized invoice to be sent and hangs up.
The next day, an invoice arrives and is placed on the manager’s desk. Upon opening the envelope, this is what he sees:
The number one challenge most businesses face online is driving new visitors to their sites.
How much money did the widget factory stand to lose when the machines stopped functioning and no one in the business had the expertise required to get things up and running again? Did the expert in our story not have the right to be compensated fairly for having invested years developing the knowledge and expertise that enabled him to immediately assess and fix a potentially costly problem?
Similarly, if you could have your WP blog configured so all you had to do is publish content to it and Google, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest and dozens of other 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 many experts often make difficult solutions look simple, it rarely is that simple or easy.
Knowing how to expertly configure a WordPress site involves more than adding some pages with content and configuring a few basic settings. It also involves knowing where to tap! This includes knowing things such as:
- Which programs you need to install to add specific functionalities to your site.
- Which services need to be set up to achieve specific results
- Which internal and external settings need to be configured in order to ensure that processes will run exactly as you have planned, etc.
(Generating new traffic automatically with WordPress is a process that requires knowledge and expertise)
This part of the WordPress traffic automation system is not so technically difficult, but it’s quite complicated. The reason why is because it’s not just about installing a plugin, clicking on a button or two, or tweaking some options and settings in your admin area … it’s all of this and so much more.
Expertly configuring your website involves the integration of different parts including your web server, your website or blog, and various third-party sites and online services …
(The configuration phase involves more than just configuring some settings in WordPress)
If the steps involved in the configuration process were to be flowcharted, it would look something like this …
(A simplistic diagram of the configuration process)
Let’s examine these areas.
Your Web Server – Configuration
We’re not talking about the process of configuring your web-hosting account for installation purposes. We’re talking about configuring settings and options in your server specifically for handling web traffic …
(During the configuration phase, your web server settings need to be checked for handling both good and bad traffic)
Not all traffic is welcome traffic. Some of the web traffic you will attract will be unwelcome traffic like bot spam, security threats, brute-force bot attacks, etc.
This aspect of the configuration process, therefore, requires evaluating your needs, planning for bad and good traffic and adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This includes looking at things like server-level spam protection and preventing security threats, to configuring your domain and email forwarding, etc …
(Have you configured your hosting control panel settings for handling things like emails, page errors, etc?)
After fine-tuning your server settings and configuring these (if required), the next step is to configure a number of external sites and/or online services.
External Services
The concept behind setting up external sites is that all content should be posted to a central location (your site) and from there, syndicate automatically to other parts of your web traffic system, or notify traffic-related web properties and applications.
After adding these external services to your traffic system, content pointing back to your site gets automatically posted to these platforms. Your content and website will be given added exposure to new audiences and new sources of traffic.
Some sites and online solutions will need to be set up before configuring your site to speed up the configuration 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 Search Console
(Google Search Console – create a Google-friendly site)
Google Webmaster Tools lets you inform Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for faster page indexing, and provides you with essential information, SEO tools and diagnostic reports about your website.
After setting up your account and entering site details, this information can be used to integrate and automate traffic settings in WordPress using plugins like Yoast SEO (see further below) and other applications.
Google Analytics
(Google Analytics)
Google Analytics lets you improve your website’s performance, SEO, marketing activities, and more, by tracking all user engagement, pages visited, keywords searched for, search engine and social media referrers, etc.
After setting up your up your Google Analytics account and site details has been entered, traffic monitoring information can be integrated with WordPress using plugins and and sent to other useful applications and reporting tools.
Bing Webmaster Tools
(Bing Webmaster Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Webmaster Tools. After setting up your account, use your information with traffic-related settings and notifications in WordPress and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As explained in Part 2, WordPress offers a self-hosted and a hosted option. We recommended choosing the self-hosted WordPress platform if you plan to grow a professional online 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 web traffic system in the next installment of this article series.
Social Media And Social Bookmarking
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and get new traffic to your site)
You will need to set up your social media accounts in order to 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 sites and social bookmarking accounts and drive new traffic to your site.
Set up accounts with all the leading social networks – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, YouTube, etc.
There are loads of social sites you can post your content to. You don’t need to go crazy, just pick those that will work with your setup and/or content syndication tools (we discuss some of these tools in greater detail when we discuss the Automation phase).
(There are loads of social sites you can syndicate your content to. Image: ShareThis.com)
Additional Solutions, Content Aggregators, Etc.
There are many emerging web platforms and content aggregators that can act as second-tier traffic generation sources. Some are free or provide free accounts, and some offer a range of pricing plans to suit different user types.
For example, here is a content aggregator that lets you add your WordPress blog feed …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse)
RebelMouse is a news aggregator for your RSS feeds and social profiles. Your content is displayed in a Pinterest-like format and visitors can follow your RebelMouse page.
There are various platforms you can incorporate into your traffic system. Please feel free to contact us if you would like to explore your options and discuss a strategy to suit your needs.
Once you have configured your web server and set up accounts with external sites, it’s time to configure your site.
WordPress Traffic Configuration
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 key areas.
Configuring Global WordPress Settings
The WordPress dashboard area contains a Settings menu that allows you to set up your site’s main settings …
(WordPress admin menu – Settings)
General Settings
Sections like Site Title and Tagline can affect your site’s SEO, search indexing, etc …
(WordPress Settings – General Settings Screen)
Writing Settings
The Writing Settings area contains one of the most important and often overlooked built-in traffic notification systems available to WordPress users …
(WordPress Settings – Writing Settings)
As described in the Update Services section,
When you publish a new post, WordPress automatically notifies the following site update services …
Unless you have purposely configured your settings to prevent search engines from indexing your site – see next section, then your site will automatically notify the list of services entered into the Update Services box
By default, when WordPress is installed, only one service is available …
(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 will do 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
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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
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 have an influence web traffic. For example, your choice of displaying the full text vs summaries of your post, affects how your content displays in RSS readers and blog post digests, and could impact 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 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 in this section is whether the Search Engine Visibility check box is enabled or not.
Typically, you want to encourage search engines to visit your site. Leaving this box unchecked enables WordPress to automatically ping your list of update services when a new post gets published (see Writing Settings above). Unless there is a specific reason why search engines should not visit your site, do not check this box …
(WordPress Settings – Reading Settings Screen)
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 …
(WordPress Settings – Discussion Settings Section)
Permalink Settings
Permalinks allow you to create search engine-friendly URLs …
(WordPress Settings – Permalink Settings Section)
The examples below show some of the options for configuring your permalinks …
(Configuring permalink URLs)
If you need help setting up permalinks in WordPress, go here: How To Set Up WordPress Permalinks
Configuring WordPress Plugin Settings For Traffic Generation
WordPress provides users with plugins that can add just about every type of functionality to your website, including traffic generation.
Let’s take a brief look at examples of plugin categories and plugins that can help drive more traffic 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. No site is guaranteed immunity from being attacked by hackers.
(Security Plugins help prevent bad traffic from causing your website harm)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your blog invisible to bot and hacker attacks.
More information:
SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
SEO plugins help drive traffic by improving your website’s SEO …
(SEO plugins like Yoast SEO help drive traffic by improving your site’s ability to rank better in search engines)
Use a powerful plugin like Yoast SEO (previously called WordPress SEO by Yoast) to improve your SEO. Once properly configured, the Yoast SEO plugin not only makes your website easier for search engines like Google and Bing to find and index, it also lets you specify how to display your content to Google’s search results and social media sites Facebook, Twitter, and GooglePlus.
Social Sharing Plugins
Allowing visitors to share your content online can help to increase traffic to your site, especially if you provide great content that adds real value to readers.
(You can easily add social sharing features to your site using free or inexpensive plugins)
WordPress users can easily add social sharing to their site with free or inexpensive plugins.
Most social share plugins allow you to specify which sites visitors can share your content to, embed social buttons into your content, set up custom notifications, display/hide share counters (e.g. number of followers), etc. Some plugins even allow you to set up protected content sections on your pages which visitors can unlock by liking your page.
Themes
As well as configuring various plugins, many WordPress themes also include features that can help you drive more traffic to your site.
For example, as well as options and settings for configuring design and layout aspects of your site, many themes also include options for improving SEO and site linking structure for better indexing, easily add analytics code, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many themes can be configured for better traffic results)
With many WordPress themes, adding social sharing features to your pages is as easy as clicking a couple of buttons to enable the function …
(Many WordPress themes include built-in social sharing features that can be easily turned on with the click of a button)
WordPress Traffic Automation System – Other Areas To Consider
Last but not least in the traffic configuration process, are the elements that need to be configured outside of the global settings.
These include:
Legal Pages
Once again, when preparing your website for a growth in traffic 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 as more and more people start finding and visiting your website.
If you are making money online, it’s important that your website is found to comply with legal requirements of government agencies that regulate business practices online.
(Is Your Site Compliant?)
If you need help adding legal pages to WordPress, go here:
Post Tags And Post Categories
Post tags and categories help improve traffic by allowing search engines to better classify and index your web pages.
(WordPress categories help improve traffic by allowing search engines to better index your website.)
As we strongly recommend in this article, it’s best to discuss and set up your site’s tags and categories earlier on, during the Website Planning Stages.
When looking at ways to automate and improve web traffic, you will want to review and make sure that the post tags and post categories you have set up.
Add A WordPress Site Map
A site map that displays all of your site’s posts and pages to visitors is not only a useful navigation tool for users, it can also help external tools discover your website content …
(A site map is not just great for visitors, but for traffic too!)
Note: An HTML site map and an XML sitemap are not the same thing. Although search engines like Google can index your site just from an XML sitemap (which plugins 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 – Don’t Forget This!
When online visitors enter the wrong web address into their browser or click on an invalid link, they are presented with an error – page not found message (known as a 404 page) …
(Default WordPress 404 Page)
A 404 Not Found error page can be turned into a useful source of traffic to your functional pages …
(Configuring your 404 Error Page allows you to recover web traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 page can be set up on your server, there are plugins for WordPress that let you easily configure your 404 page inside your WordPress admin.
WordPress Traffic Blueprint: Configuration Process – Summary
Once your website or blog has been expertly configured and fully set up, all you need to do to begin attracting more traffic is publish fresh content on a consistent basis.
The process of expertly configuring your WordPress site, however, can be quite involved and requires the configuration and integration of various components and web properties …
(Traffic System – Configuration Phase Checklist)
The skills and expertise required to perform the configuration process typically takes many website professionals months to learn.
Once you have expertly configured your WordPress site, the next step is to automate the aspects of the process that can be automated. This step is addressed in the next section of the WordPress Traffic 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 a comprehensive series of tutorials aimed at helping you learn how to grow your business online inexpensively with a WordPress website and proven web marketing methods.
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