Welcome to Part 3 of our Web Site Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to automate traffic to your site using the WordPress CMS.
In Part 1 of this series, we described 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 publish fresh content regularly to attract web traffic!)
In Part Two, 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 everything up if you already have a site, and what to do if your existing website has been built using WordPress.
(In Part 2 we show you where to set up a WordPress website or blog on your domain)
In this section, we discuss the configuration phase of the traffic automation process. The focus of this section is to help you understand why an expertly configured WordPress site is different, and what kind of work needs to be done to make sure that when all is fully configured, you can automatically attract new traffic as you begin adding new content on your site.
WordPress Traffic Blueprint – Configuration Phase
Being able to drive more traffic to one’s website is often cited by most business owners as one of the greatest challenges they face online. With business getting ever more competitive, it’s worth looking into any and every advantage that can help you get better results online.
Being able to automatically generate traffic on demand can be a tremendous competitive advantage. Having an expertly configured website gives you a flying start as soon as your site is launched.
The Configuration Stage Is What Makes All The Difference
There is a 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’s a simple way to describe the differences:
With a WordPress website that has been expertly configured you get a professional web presence with online business marketing automation!
(An expertly configured website gives you a web presence with a built-in automated online business marketing system!)
Not only does it take extra labor to build and integrate an automated online business marketing process into your website, it also takes a special kind of expertise.
Allow me to illustrate this point with an amusing anecdote.
A Semi-True Story …
All was moving along in the widget-making workshop when things came to a sudden stop.
No one could figure out what has gone wrong and so the floor manager decided to call in an expert.
Soon afterward, the expert arrived and went directly to the main control box. After staring at the wires and circuitry for 2 minutes, the expert then produced a teeny-weeny little hammer and made a gentle tap about 1 cm from the right edge of the unit.
Immediately, every machine returned to normal.
The manager was greatly relieved as he thanked the expert, who left as quickly as he had arrived.
A couple of days later, the factory manager received a request for payment of $5,000.
The manager dialled the expert, demanding to know why they were expected to pay such a ridiculously high fee for less than 5 minutes work and promptly requested an itemized invoice before hanging up.
The next day, a bill of payment arrived and was placed in the manager’s intray. Upon opening it, this is what he saw:
The #1 challenge most businesses face online is being able to drive traffic to their sites.
How much money did the factory stand to lose when production ground to a halt and no one on the business had the expertise required to fix it? Did the expert in our story not have the right to be compensated fairly for years spent building up the knowledge, skills and expertise that allowed him to immediately avert a serious crisis?
Similarly, if you could have a WP web site 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 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 site?)
Although experts often make complex situations and problems look simple, it rarely turns out to be that way.
Expertly configuring a WordPress site requires more than installing a website and configuring basic settings. It involves knowing where to tap! In other words, knowing things like:
- Which plugins you need to install to add desired functionalities to your site.
- Which third-party accounts need to be set up and activated to get desired outcomes
- Which settings need to be configured to ensure that processes will work to plan, etc.
(Driving 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. The reason why is because it’s not as simple as installing one or two plugins, tweaking some settings in your admin area … it’s all this and much more.
Expertly configuring your website involves the integration of different parts including your server, your site, and various external sites and services …
(The configuration phase 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 simplified flowchart showing 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 web hosting account for site installation purposes. What we are talking about, is fine-tuning settings and options in your server specifically for handling all web traffic …
(In the configuration phase, your webhosting account settings need to be checked for handling both good and bad traffic)
Not all traffic is positive traffic. Some of the traffic your website can attract will be unwelcome traffic like spam, malicious threats, brute-force bot attacks, etc.
This part of the configuration process, therefore, requires evaluating your needs, planning for both bad and good traffic and then adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This includes looking at things like integrating spam protection and preventing security threats, to configuring domain and email redirections, etc …
(Have you configured your control panel settings for handling things like emails, page errors, 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 or online services.
Configuring External Services
The concept behind adding external sites is that all content will get posted to a central location (your site) and from there, it will get syndicated automatically to other components of your traffic 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 gets automatically published on these platforms, indexed by search engines and distributed to social networks, even to visitors attracted to the platform itself. Your website will then be exposed to new sources of traffic and new audiences.
Some of the sites and online solutions will need to have accounts set up before configuring your WordPress settings to help 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 Search Console
(Google Webmasters)
Google Search Console lets you notify Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for automatic page indexing, and provides site owners with essential data, SEO tools, and reports about their website.
Once your Google Webmaster Tools account is set up, this information can be used to integrate and automate traffic settings in WordPress and other applications.
Google Analytics
(Google Analytics)
Google Analytics lets you improve your website’s performance, SEO, user engagement, marketing activities, and more, by tracking all user behaviour, pages visited, keywords searched for, search engine referrals, etc.
Once your Google Analytics account is set up, you can add visitor tracking information to WordPress using a simple plugin and send data instantly to many other online 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 details, use the account information with traffic-related settings in WordPress using plugins like Yoast SEO 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 option if you are planning to grow a professional business presence online.
WordPress.com (the hosted option), however, provides some great tools, which various WordPress plugins can access. We recommend setting up an account at WordPress.com, therefore, and we’ll show you how to integrate this into your traffic generation system in the next installment of this series.
Social Media
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and drive new visitors to your site)
You will need your various social media and social bookmarking accounts set up in order to 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 pages and attract new traffic to your site.
You should set up accounts with all the main social networks – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Pinterest, etc.
There are loads of social sites you can You can post your content to many social bookmarking sites. You don’t need to go crazy, just choose the ones that will work with your system and/or content sharing tools (we will look at some of these tools in more detail in the Automation phase).
(There are lots of social bookmarking sites you can post your content to. Image source ShareThis.com)
Additional Platforms, Content Aggregators, Etc.
There are many online web platforms and content aggregators that can serve as secondary traffic generation sources. Some are free or provide free levels, and some offer a range of pricing plans to suit different users.
For example, here is a content aggregator that allows you to add a feed from your WordPress site …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse)
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 social feed.
There are many different solutions you can add to your own traffic blueprint. Please feel free to contact us if you need assistance exploring some of these further, or to discuss a configuration strategy to suit your needs.
After you have configured your server settings and set up accounts with third-party sites, it’s time to configure your WordPress settings.
WordPress – Configuring Your Website Or Blog For Traffic
The first step in configuring your WordPress site for traffic is to make sure that your global settings have been correctly set up.
Let’s go over some of the important areas.
Global Settings – WordPress
The WordPress admin area contains a Settings menu that allows you to modify your site’s global settings …
(WordPress settings section)
General Settings
Fields like Site Title and Tagline can influence your site’s SEO, search results, etc …
(Settings Menu – General Settings Section)
Writing Settings
The Writing Settings area contains an important and frequently overlooked automated traffic notification system …
(Global Settings – Writing Settings)
As stated in the Update Services section,
When you publish a new post, WordPress automatically notifies the following site update services …
Unless you have purposely chosen to prevent search engines from indexing your site – see next section, then your site will automatically ping the list of update services entered into the Update Services text area
By default, when WordPress is installed, only one service is available …
(Update Services – A Powerful Traffic Feature)
WordPress lets you notify dozens of update services automatically – just add a list of all the update services you want to notify as soon as you publish a new post to this section …
(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 influence web traffic. For example, choosing to display the full text vs a summary of your post, affects how your content displays to users in RSS readers and blog post digests, and could play a part in someone’s choice to explore your content further, and whether or not they will visit your website or blog 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 your traffic system is concerned, however, the main setting in this section is whether the Search Engine Visibility checkbox is enabled or not.
Typically, you would want search engines to visit your site. Leaving this box unchecked enables your site to automatically ping various update services whenever a new post is published (see Writing Settings above). Unless you have a specific reason why search engines should not visit your site, do not check this box …
(WordPress Settings – Reading Settings)
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 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 Screen)
Permalink Settings
Permalinks allow you to display posts with search engine-friendly URLs …
(Settings Menu – Permalinks Section)
The examples below show some of the ways your permalink URLs can be configured …
(Configuring SEO-friendly URLs)
If you need help setting up WordPress permalinks, go here: How To Improve Your WordPress SEO With Permalinks
Plugins
The WordPress developer community makes available thousands of plugins that help to add almost every kind of functionality to your website, including many plugins that improve traffic generation.
Here are examples of plugin categories and plugins that can help drive more traffic to your site
Security Plugins – Blog Defender
Once again, it’s important to configure your website for handling both good traffic and bad traffic. No matter what type of business you run or plan to run online and how small you think your web presence is, you cannot ignore the importance of website security.
(Security Plugins stop bad traffic from causing your website harm)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your blog invisible to hackers and botnets.
More information:
WordPress SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
WordPress SEO plugins help drive traffic by improving the search engine friendliness of your website …
(WordPress SEO plugins help drive traffic by improving the search engine friendliness of your website)
Use a plugin like Yoast SEO to improve your SEO. When properly configured, the Yoast SEO plugin not only makes your web pages easier for search engines to index, it also gives you control over how your content is displayed in Google’s search results and social media pages, e.g. Facebook, Twitter, and GooglePlus.
Social Sharing Plugins
Allowing visitors to easily share your content online can help boost traffic to your site, especially if you publish content that adds value to readers.
(WordPress users can easily add social sharing features to their website using free or inexpensive WordPress plugins)
WordPress users can easily add social features to their site using free or inexpensive plugins.
Most social sharing plugins let you choose 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 followers), etc. Some social plugins even allow you to ‘lock’ content or downloads which visitors can unlock by liking your page.
Configuring Settings – WP Themes
As well as configuring various plugins, many WordPress themes also include features that can help grow your traffic.
For example, as well as options and settings for configuring layout and design aspects of your site, many themes also provide built-in options for improving SEO and site navigation structure for better indexing, add analytics, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many themes have built-in traffic optimization features)
With a number of themes, adding social sharing features to your content is as easy as clicking a button …
(Many WordPress themes provide users with built-in social sharing features)
Other Configuration Steps For Your WordPress Site
Last but not least in the web traffic configuration process, are the areas that need to be set up outside of the global settings.
This includes:
Compliance Pages
Once again, when preparing your website for an increase in visitor numbers, it’s important to plan not only how to handle good and unwanted 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, it’s important that your site stays compliant with regulatory agencies.
(Is Your Website Or Blog Compliant?)
If you need help adding legal pages to WordPress, go here:
Post Tags & Post Categories
WordPress tags and post categories help improve traffic by improving your site’s SEO.
(WordPress categories help search engines index your pages, which improves traffic.)
As we strongly recommend in this article, it’s best to review and set up your website’s post tags and categories earlier on, during the Website Planning Stage.
In the configuration phase, you will want to review and make sure that the post tags and categories that have been set up.
A Site Map Of Your Pages and Posts
A site map that displays all of your site’s posts and pages to visitors is not only a useful navigation tool, it can also help external applications find more of your site’s content …
(A site map is not just great for visitors, but for web traffic too!)
An HTML site map and an XML sitemap are not the same things. Only search engines can understand an XML sitemap. Although Google can index your pages just using an XML sitemap (which a plugin like Yoast SEO will create for you – see earlier section), allowing visitors to find more pages on your site can result in increased traffic.
404 Error Page – An Additional Source Of Traffic!
When visitors searching for your website enter the wrong web address or click on an invalid hyperlink, they are greeted with an error – page not found message (known as a 404 error page) …
(A 404 Error Page)
Configuring your 404 Not Found page allows you to redirect web traffic that may otherwise be lost. …
(Configuring your 404 page allows you to redirect web traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 error page can be set up on your web server, there are several plugins for WordPress that let you easily configure your 404 page inside your WordPress admin area.
WordPress Traffic Blueprint: Configuration Phase – Summary
Once you have your WordPress site fully set up and expertly configured, all you then have to do to begin attracting new web traffic is publish great content regularly.
The process of expertly configuring a WordPress site, however, is quite involved and elaborate and requires the configuration and integration of a number of different elements and external web properties …
(Traffic System – Configuration Checklist)
The skills and expertise involved in expertly configuring a WordPress site can take some web developers a long time to acquire.
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 explained in the next article in the WordPress Traffic System series.
This is the end of Section Three
To read the rest of this article, click here:
This tutorial is part of a comprehensive series of articles aimed at helping website owners learn how to grow their business online using a WordPress-driven website or blog and proven web marketing methods.
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