Welcome to Part 3 of our Website Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to create an automated traffic machine using the WordPress CMS.
In Part One of this series, we explained why using an expertly configured WordPress website is the key to generating automated web traffic …
(With an expertly configured WordPress web site, all you have to do to drive more traffic is add great content on a consistent basis!)
In Part 2, we discussed the setup phase of this process. We explained the best way to start if you don’t have a website yet, how to set things up if you already have a website, and what to do if your site was built with WordPress.
(In Part 2 we show you where to set up a WordPress web site on your domain)
In this section, we look at the configuration phase of this process. We will show you why an expertly configured WordPress site is different, and how much work is required to ensure that when all is set up and fully configured, you will bring new traffic automatically simply by adding new content on your site.
WordPress Traffic Blueprint – Configuration
Finding ways to attract more visitors to one’s website is often cited by website owners as their greatest challenge online. With competition making business survival progressively tougher businesses are looking for any and every advantage available to get better results online.
Being able to generate traffic on demand can be a tremendous competitive advantage. With an expertly configured WordPress site, you have a flying start and an immediate competitive advantage online.
The Difference Is In The Way Your Site Is Configured
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 developer but not necessarily configured to take advantage of everything WordPress can offer.
Here’s a simple way to explain the difference:
With a WordPress website that has been expertly configured you get a professional web presence and online business marketing automation!
(An expertly configured website gives you a professional web presence with a built-in automated online business marketing system!)
Not only does it take extra work to build and integrate an automated online business marketing system into your website, it also takes a special type of expertise.
Let’s illustrate this with a little story.
A True Story (Kind Of) …
Everything was going fine in the widget plant when things ground to a sudden halt.
As no one could figure out what happened, the floor manager decided to call in an expert to fix the problem.
Shortly after arriving, the expert immediately went towards the main control box. After staring at the wiring board for less than 3 minutes, the expert then produced a teensy-weensy little hammer from his utility belt and made a single tap about three and half inches from the right corner of the unit.
Immediately, the machinery returned to normal.
The plant manager was overjoyed as he thanked the expert, who left as quickly as he had arrived.
A few days after resolving the incident, the factory manager received a service bill for $5,000.
The factory manager called the expert, demanding to know why they were charged so much for less than 5 minutes work. He promptly requested an itemized invoice before hanging up.
The next day, a bill of payment arrived on the manager’s desk. Upon opening it, this is what he saw:
The #1 challenge most businesses face online is driving new traffic to their sites.
How much money did the widget factory stand to lose when production ground to a halt and no one in the factory floor had the expertise to fix it? Did the expert not have every right to get paid fairly for having invested years developing the knowledge and expertise that enabled him to repair a costly problem?
Similarly, if you could have your WordPress website or blog set up and configured so all you ever had to do is publish content to it and Google, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and dozens of other traffic-generating online properties would be instantly notified, how much time and money would you save?
(How much time and money would you save if you could automate the process of attracting new visitors to your site?)
Although many experts often make complicated solutions look simple, it rarely turns out to be that way.
Expertly configuring a WordPress site involves more than adding some pages with content and configuring a few internal settings. It requires knowing where to tap! In other words, knowing things such as:
- Which plugins need to be installed for certain things to occur on your site.
- Which accounts you need to set up and activate to achieve certain results
- Which internal and external settings need to be configured to ensure that things work as expected, etc.
(Generating new traffic automatically with WordPress is a process that requires expertise)
Although this stage of the WordPress traffic automation system may not seem so technically challenging, it can be quite involved and time-consuming. The reason why is because it’s not just about installing a plugin, clicking a button, 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 …
(Expertly configuring your website involves more than just configuring some settings in WordPress)
If the activities involved in the configuration process were to be flowcharted, it would look something like this …
(A simplistic diagram of the steps involved in the configuration process)
Let’s take a look at these steps in more detail.
Server Configuration
We’re not talking about the process of configuring your hosting account for website installation purposes. We’re talking about configuring settings in your server that affect how you will handle all web traffic …
(In the configuration phase, your 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 you may attract will be unwelcome traffic like spam, security threats, brute-force bot attacks, etc.
This area of the configuration process, therefore, requires planning for good and bad traffic and then adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This includes looking at things like integrating server-level spam protection and securing server files, to configuring domain and email forwarding, setting up 404 error page redirections, etc …
(Have you configured your control panel settings for handling things like emails, page errors, etc?)
After checking your server settings and configuring these, the next step is to configure a number of third-party sites and/or online services.
External Web Properties And Services – Configuration
The purpose of choosing external sites is that all content will get published to a central location (your WordPress site) and from there, it will get distributed automatically to other parts of your web traffic system, or notify traffic-related web properties and applications.
After incorporating these external sites into your setup, content with links pointing back to your site will get automatically fed to search, social and aggregator sites. Your content and website will be given exposure to new sources of traffic and new audiences.
Some of the third-party sites and online services will need to be 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 site:
Google Webmaster Tools
(Google Webmaster Tools)
Google Webmaster Tools lets you tell Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for faster page indexing, and provides site owners with a range of useful information, SEO tools, and diagnostic reports about their website.
After setting up your account and entering site data with Google, you can use your information with traffic settings and notifications in WordPress (e.g. using plugins like Yoast SEO) 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 engagement, pages visited, keywords searched for, search engine referrers, etc.
Once your Google Analytics account and site details have been set up, account code can be added to WordPress using a simple Google Analytics plugin used with other applications.
Bing Data And Tools
(Bing Webmaster Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Webmasters. Once your Bing Webmaster Tools account and site data are set up, this information can be used to automate web traffic settings and notifications in WordPress using plugins like Yoast SEO and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As explained in Part Two, WordPress offers both the option of a hosted vs self-hosted website. 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 various WordPress plugins. We recommend setting up an account with WordPress.com, therefore, and we’ll show you how to integrate this into your automated traffic system in Part Four of this series.
Social Media Accounts
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and bring new visitors to your site)
You will need to have already set up your 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 bring new visitors to your site.
You should have pages set up with all the big social networks – Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, Pinterest, etc.
There are lots of social sites you can set up. You don’t need to go crazy, just pick the ones that will work well with your system and/or content sharing tools (we discuss some of these tools in more detail in the Automation phase).
(There are loads of social bookmarking sites you can post your content to. Image: ShareThis.com)
Additional Services, RSS Aggregators, Etc.
There are many emerging technology platforms and content aggregators that can serve as second-tier sources of traffic. Some are free or provide free accounts, and some offer a range of pricing plans.
For example, here is a content aggregator site that allows you to add your WordPress site feed …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse – Distribute social content to social networks)
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 page.
There are various solutions that can be incorporated into your own web traffic blueprint. Please feel free to contact us if you need assistance exploring some of these, or to discuss a configuration plan to suit your needs.
After you have configured your web server and set up accounts with third-party services, it’s time to configure your WordPress site.
WordPress Site Configuration
The first step in configuring your WordPress site for traffic is to make sure that its global settings have been set up correctly.
Let’s go over some key areas.
WordPress – Global Settings
The WordPress dashboard area contains a Settings menu that allows you to set up your site’s main settings …
(WordPress dashboard menu – Settings)
General Settings
Fields like Site Title and Tagline can affect your site’s SEO, search results, etc …
(WordPress Settings – General Settings Screen)
Writing Settings
The Writing Settings section contains one of the most important and frequently overlooked built-in traffic notification systems available to website owners …
(WordPress Settings – Writing Settings Area)
As stated 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 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 text box
By default, when WordPress is installed, this section displays only one entry …
(Update Services – A Powerful Traffic Feature)
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
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 web traffic. For example, your choice of displaying the full content vs a summary of your post, affects how your content displays in RSS readers and blog post digests, and could impact someone’s choice to explore your content further, and whether or not they will visit your website to read 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 check box is ticked or not.
Generally, you would want search engines to visit your site. Leaving the box unchecked allows WordPress to instantly ping all the update services you have listed in the Update Services box whenever new posts get published (see Writing Settings above). Unless you have a specific reason to discourage search indexing spiders from visiting your site, make sure this box is left unticked …
(Settings Menu – 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 posts, 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)
Permalinks
Permalinks allow you to create SEO-friendly URLs …
(Global Settings – Permalink Settings)
Here are some of the ways post permalinks can be configured …
(Configuring permalink URLs)
To learn more about setting up permalinks in WordPress, go here: Changing WordPress Permalinks
WordPress Plugin Settings
WordPress provides users with thousands of plugins that can add almost every kind of functionality imaginable to your site, including plugins with features that help to improve traffic generation.
Here are some types of plugin categories that affect traffic and plugin examples
Security Plugins – Blog Defender
Once again, it’s important to configure your WordPress site 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, you cannot afford to ignore the importance of securing your site.
(WordPress Security Plugins help prevent bad traffic from harming your web presence)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your blog invisible to attacks from hackers and botnets.
Go here for more info:
SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
WordPress SEO plugins help drive more traffic by improving the search engine friendliness of your website …
(Yoast SEO – WP Plugins For SEO)
A plugin like Yoast SEO (formerly known as WordPress SEO by Yoast) can significantly improve your site’s search engine optimization. Properly configured, the Yoast SEO plugin not only makes your website easier for search engines to find and index, it also gives you control over how your content is presented to Google’s search results and social media sites Facebook, Twitter, and Google+.
Social Plugins
Allowing visitors to share your content online can help drive more traffic to your site, especially if you publish content that adds value to readers.
(WordPress users can easily add social sharing buttons to their website with WordPress plugins)
WordPress users can easily add social sharing buttons to their site using free or inexpensive WordPress plugins.
Most social share plugins let you select which social sites your content can be shared to, embed social buttons into your content, set up custom notifications, display/hide share counters (e.g. number of followers), etc. Some social plugins even allow you to ‘lock’ content which visitors can unlock by liking your page.
WordPress – Theme Settings
As well as configuring various plugins, many WordPress themes also include features that help improve your site’s traffic generation capabilities.
For example, as well as options and settings for configuring the layout and design of your website, many themes also include built-in options for improving SEO and site navigation structure for faster indexing, add analytics, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many WordPress themes can be configured for better traffic results)
With a number of themes, adding social sharing buttons and features to your site is as easy as clicking a button …
(Many WordPress themes provide built-in social sharing features that can be easily enabled on with the click of a button)
Configuring Other WordPress Areas
Last but not least in the WordPress traffic system configuration process, are the things that need to be set up outside of the global settings.
These include:
Compliance Web Pages
Once again, when preparing your site for a growth in traffic, it’s important to plan not only for how to deal with good and unwelcome traffic but also for all the situations that can seriously affect your business as more and more people find and begin to visit your website.
If you engage in any form of commercial activity online, you need to ensure that your site stays compliant with regulatory agencies.
(Is Your Website Compliant?)
We have written a detailed article on the importance of having a compliant website here:
Post Tags And Post Categories
WordPress post categories and tags help search engines classify and index your website, which improves traffic.
(Categories help to improve your site’s SEO, which improves traffic.)
As we strongly recommend in this article, your website’s post tags and post categories should be reviewed and set up during the Website Planning Process.
In the configuration phase, you will want to review and make sure that the tags and categories you have set up.
Visitor Site Map
A visitor site map that lists all of your site’s posts and pages is not only a useful navigation tool for users, it can also help external applications find more of your online 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 things. 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), allowing visitors to find more pages on your site results in increased traffic.
Your WordPress 404 Page
When visitors searching online for your site type in the wrong URL into their browser or click on a hyperlink pointing to an incorrect destination on your site, they are greeted with a 404 Not Found error page …
(A WordPress 404 Page)
Configuring your 404 Error Page allows you to redirect web traffic that may otherwise be lost. …
(Configuring your 404 Not Found error page allows you to redirect traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 Not Found error page can be set up in your web server, there are several plugins for WordPress that let you easily configure your 404 page inside your WordPress dashboard.
WordPress Traffic Automation Blueprint: Configuration Process – Summary
Once you have your website or blog fully set up and expertly configured, all you need to do then is publish new content consistently to bring more traffic organically.
The process of expertly configuring a WordPress site, however, is quite involved and elaborate and requires the configuration and integration of different elements and web properties …
(WordPress Traffic System – Configuration Checklist)
The kind of expertise involved in expertly configuring a WordPress site can take some website 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 section of the WordPress Traffic Blueprint series.
This is the end of Part 3
To read the rest of this article, click here:
This article is part of a comprehensive article series designed to help small business owners learn how to grow their business online using a WordPress-driven website or blog and proven marketing methods that are easy to implement.
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