Welcome to Part 3 of our Web Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to automate traffic to your site using the WordPress CMS.
In Part 1 of this article series, we explained why using an expertly configured WordPress website is the key to automating traffic to your site …
(With an expertly configured WordPress site, all you have to do to attract traffic is post web content on a consistent basis!)
In Part Two, we focused on the setup phase of the blueprint. We explained 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 was built with WordPress.
(In Part 2 we show you where to set up a WordPress website or blog on your domain)
In this section, we will look at the configuration stage of the traffic automation process. You will understand what makes an expertly configured WordPress site different from a professionally configured one. You will also learn how much work is required to ensure that when all is fully configured, web traffic will automatically start flowing when you begin to add content to your website.
WordPress Traffic Automation Blueprint – Configuration
The ability to drive more traffic to one’s website is often cited by many business owners as the greatest challenge they face online. With competition becoming increasingly more difficult businesses are looking for any and every advantage they believe will help them get better results online.
The ability to automatically generate traffic on demand can provide website owners with a tremendous advantage over the competition. Having an expertly configured WordPress site gives you a significant advantage from the very start.
The Configuration Phase Is What Makes The Difference
There is a 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 take advantage of everything WordPress has to offer.
Here is a simple way to understand the differences:
An expertly configured WordPress website gives you a professional web presence plus online business marketing automation!
(An expertly configured site gives you a web presence and a built-in automated online business marketing tool!)
Not only does it take extra work to build and integrate an automated online business marketing process into your website, but also a special kind of expertise.
Let’s illustrate this with a joke.
Knowing Where To Tap
Things are going just fine in the gizmo-making assembly line when everything grinds to a sudden stop.
No one can figure out what’s happened and so the floor manager decides to call in an expert to fix the problem.
Promptly after arriving, the expert heads out directly to the control box. After staring silently at the wires and circuitry for less than 2 minutes, the expert then takes out a teeny-weeny hammer and makes a single tap about 3 cm from the bottom-right side of the box.
Immediately, everything returns to normal.
The plant manager is grateful and relieved as he thanks the expert, who leaves as quickly as he had arrived.
A few days after resolving the incident, the factory manager receives an invoice for $5,000.
Angrily, the manager picks up the phone and rings the expert. Demanding to know why they were expected to pay so much for so little time spent delivering such minimal amount of work, he promptly requests an itemized invoice to be sent and hangs up.
The next day, a bill of payment arrives on the manager’s desk. Upon opening it, this is what he sees:
The #1 challenge most businesses face online is being able to drive new visitors to their sites.
How much money did the plant stand to lose when the equipment ground to a halt and no one in the factory floor was able to get things up and running again? Did the expert not have every right to demand fair compensation for having spent years developing the knowledge, skills and expertise that allowed him to quickly avert a serious crisis?
Similarly, if you could have your WP website set up so all you have to do is publish new content and search engines, social networking sites and dozens of other traffic-generating online properties would be instantly 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 attracting new visitors to your website?)
Although many experts often make complicated solutions look simple, it rarely turns out to be that way.
Expertly configuring a WordPress site is more than installing a website and configuring some basic settings. It also requires knowing where to tap! In other words, knowing things like:
- Which programs need to be installed to add certain functionalities to your site.
- Which third-party accounts need to be set up and activated to achieve desired results
- Which settings you need to configure in order to make sure processes will work as envisioned, etc.
(Generating traffic automatically with WordPress is a process that requires knowledge and expertise)
Although this part of the WordPress traffic automation system may not seem so technically difficult, it can be quite involved. The reason why is because it’s not as easy as installing and configuring a plugin, clicking a couple of buttons, or configuring 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 a number of different parts such as your server, your WP site, and various third-party sites and services …
(The configuration stage involves more than just configuring a few 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 steps involved in the configuration phase)
Let’s examine these areas in more detail.
Your Web Server – Configuration
We’re not talking here about the process of configuring your webhosting account for installation purposes. What we are talking about, is configuring settings and options in your web server that affect how you will handle all web traffic …
(In the configuration stage, your server settings need to be checked for handling both good and bad traffic)
Not all web traffic is positive traffic. Some of the traffic your site will attract will be unwanted traffic like spam, security threats, bot-hacking attempts, etc.
This part of the configuration process, therefore, is about planning for both bad and good traffic and then adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This could include looking at things like configuring server-level spam protection and securing server files, to configuring your domain and email forwarding, etc …
(Have you configured your hosting control panel settings for handling things like email forwarding, page error redirections, etc?)
After checking your server settings and configuring these, the next step of the configuration phase is to set up a number of third-party sites or online services.
External Accounts
The basic idea of setting up external sites is that all of your content will be published to one central location (your WordPress site) and from there, it will get distributed automatically to other components of your traffic generation system, or notify traffic-related web properties and applications.
Once you incorporate these external services into your setup, content linking back to your site gets automatically fed to these platforms, indexed by search engines and distributed to social networks, even to users of the platform itself. Your business will then receive increased exposure online, helping your business tap into a new audience and traffic source.
Some of the web properties and online platforms will need to be set up before configuring your settings 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 Webmaster Tools – create a Google-friendly website or blog)
Google Webmasters lets you tell Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for automatic page indexing, and provides you with useful information, SEO tools and reports about your website.
After setting up your account and entering site details with Google, the details can be used with traffic-related settings and notifications 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 results, SEO, user engagement, marketing campaigns, and more, by tracking all user engagement, pages visited, keywords searched for, social media referrals, etc.
Once your Google Analytics account is set up, visitor tracking information can be added to WordPress via a simple plugin used with other applications.
Bing Data And Tools
(Bing Data And Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Search Console. After setting up your account with Bing Webmaster Tools, this information can be used to integrate and automate traffic settings and notifications in WordPress using plugins like Yoast SEO and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As discussed in Part Two, WordPress offers website owners a self-hosted (WordPress.org) and a hosted (WordPress.com) option. We recommended choosing the self-hosted WordPress version 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 show you how to integrate these features into your automated web traffic system in Part Four of this article series.
Social Media And Social Bookmarking Sites
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media sites and bring new traffic to your site)
You will need to set up your various social media and social bookmarking 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 bring new traffic to your site.
You should have accounts set up with all of the big social networks – Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, YouTube, etc.
There are many social bookmarking sites you can set up and post your content to. You don’t need to go crazy, just choose those that will work with your system and/or content syndication tools.
(There are many social bookmarking sites you can post your content to. Image: ShareThis.com)
Additional Platforms, RSS Aggregators, Etc.
There are many emerging web platforms and RSS aggregators that can act as secondary-level traffic generation sources. Some are free or provide free accounts, and some offer a range of pricing plans to suit different users.
For example, here is a content aggregator site that lets you add a feed from your site …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse – Distribute social content to social networks)
RebelMouse is an aggregator for your RSS feeds and social profiles. Your content displays in a Pinterest-like format and users can follow your website.
There are many different solutions that can be added to your web traffic blueprint. Please contact us if you need assistance exploring some of these further, or to discuss a strategy to suit your needs.
Once you have configured your web server and set up external service accounts, it’s time to configure your site’s settings.
WordPress Configuration
The first step in configuring your site for traffic is to ensure that its global settings have been set up correctly.
Let’s go over some key areas.
Configuring Global WordPress Settings
Your WordPress dashboard area contains a Settings menu that allows you to configure your site’s main settings …
(WordPress menu – Settings)
General Settings
Fields like Site Title and Tagline can affect traffic by influencing your site’s SEO, search results, etc …
(Global Settings – General Settings)
Writing Settings
The Writing Settings section contains one of the most powerful and frequently overlooked automated traffic notification systems available to WordPress site owners …
(Settings Menu – Writing Settings)
As stated below the Update Services section,
When you publish a new post, WordPress automatically notifies the following site update services …
Unless you have intentionally chosen to discourage search engines from indexing your site, then your site will automatically ping the list of services entered into the Update Services section
With an ‘out of the box’ WordPress installation, this section displays only one entry …
(Update Services – A Powerful Traffic Feature Of WordPress)
You can notify dozens of update services automatically with WordPress – just add a list containing all of the update services you want notified to this section …
(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
***
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 your content gets seen by visitors when they visit your home page and blog pages.
The syndication settings on this page can influence web traffic. For example, your choice to display the full text vs a summary of your post, affects how your content shows up in RSS readers and RSS email campaigns, and could impact someone’s choice to explore your content further, and whether or not they will visit your website to get the rest of the content from summaries, or read the content in full without the need to click through to your site.
The most important setting in this section as far as traffic is concerned 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 enables your site to notify the update services list when new posts get published (see Writing Settings above). Unless there is a specific reason why search engines should not visit your site, make sure this box is left unchecked …
(Global Settings – 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 sites linked to from your articles, 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 …
(Settings Menu – Discussion Settings)
Permalinks
Your Permalink settings allow you to display posts with SEO-friendly URLs …
(Global Settings – Permalink Settings)
The examples below show some of the ways post permalinks can be configured …
(Configuring permalink URLs)
If you need help setting up WP permalinks, refer to this tutorial: Improve Your WordPress SEO With Permalinks
WordPress Plugins – Configuration
WordPress provides users with thousands of plugins that help to add just about every type of functionality imaginable to your website, including plugins with features that help to improve traffic generation.
Let’s take a brief look at some types of plugin categories that affect traffic and plugin examples
Blog Defender
Once again, it’s important to configure your website for dealing with both good traffic and bad traffic. Regardless of the type 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 web security.
(WordPress Security Plugins help prevent bad traffic from causing your website harm)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your website 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 web pages …
(WordPress SEO plugins help drive traffic by improving your site’s SEO)
Use a powerful plugin like Yoast SEO (formerly known as WordPress SEO by Yoast) to improve your site’s SEO. Once properly configured, this plugin not only makes your website easier for search engines to index, it allows you to specify how your content will show up in Google’s search results and social media pages, e.g. Facebook, Twitter, and Google+.
Social Sharing Plugins
Allowing visitors to easily share your content with others online can help to increase 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)
There are many social sharing plugins available for WordPress users.
Most social share plugins allow you to specify which social sites visitors can share your content to, embed social buttons into your content, set up default notifications, display/hide share counters (e.g. number of shares), etc. Some social share plugins even allow you to ‘lock’ content or downloads which visitors can unlock by linking or tweeting your page.
Configuring WordPress Theme Settings
As well as configuring various plugins, many WordPress themes also include features that can help grow your traffic.
For example, in addition to options and settings for configuring the design and layout of your site, some themes also provide built-in features that let you improve search optimization and site navigation structure for faster indexing, add analytics code, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many themes like Graphene (a highly customizable free theme) include built-in traffic optimization features)
With many quality themes, adding social sharing buttons to your website is as easy as clicking a button …
(Many WordPress themes have built-in social sharing features)
Other Areas To Configure For Better Traffic Flow
Last but not least in the configuration process, are the components that need to be set up outside of the global settings.
These include the following:
Website Legal Pages
Once again, when preparing your site for an increase in visitor numbers, it’s important to plan not only how to handle good and unwelcome traffic but also for all the things that can go wrong as more and more people begin to visit your website.
If you are making money online (or are planning to), you need to make sure that your website stays compliant with regulatory agencies.
(Is Your Website Or Blog Legally Compliant?)
To learn more about how to quickly add all necessary legal pages to your website, see this article:
Post Categories And Tags
Post tags and post categories help improve traffic by allowing search engines to better organize and index your website.
(Post categories help improve traffic by allowing search engines to better organize and index your pages.)
As we recommend in this article, your site’s tags and categories should be set up during the Website Planning Phase.
In the configuration phase, you will want to review and make sure that your site’s categories and tags have been set up correctly to deliver optimal results.
Visitor Site Map
A site map that lists all of your site’s pages and posts to visitors is not only a useful navigation tool for users, it can also help external tools discover your web content …
(A site map is not just great for visitors, but for web traffic too!)
Note: An HTML site map and an XML sitemap are not the same thing. Although search engines like Google will 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 – Don’t Forget To Configure This Too!
When visitors enter the wrong URL into their browser or click on a link pointing to an incorrect destination on your website, they are greeted with an error page …
(A 404 Page)
A 404 Error Page can be configured to redirect confused visitors to your functional pages …
(Configuring your 404 Not Found page allows you to redirect traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 page can be set up on your server, there are WordPress plugins that let you easily configure your 404 page inside your WordPress dashboard.
WordPress Traffic System: Configuration Phase – Summary
Once your site has been fully set up and expertly configured, all you need to do then is add new content on a regular basis to start generating web traffic organically.
The process of expertly configuring a WordPress site, however, can be quite involved , requiring the configuration and integration of a number of different components and web properties …
(WP Traffic System – Configuration Checklist)
The kind of expertise required to perform the configuration stage of the traffic automation process typically takes many web professionals months to acquire.
Once you have configured your WordPress site, the next step is to automate the aspects of the process that can be automated. This step is explained in the next article in our WordPress Traffic Automation System series.
This is the end of Part 3
To read more, click here:
This tutorial is part of a comprehensive article series aimed at helping site owners learn how to grow their business and drive traffic automatically with a WordPress-powered website and proven web marketing methods.
Subscribe To Our Site And Get Notified When New Tutorials Get Published!
***
"I was absolutely amazed at the scope and breadth of these tutorials! The most in-depth training I have ever received on any subject!" - Myke O'Neill, DailyGreenPost.com
***