Welcome to Part 3 of our Web Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to automate traffic to your website using the WordPress CMS.
In Part One of this article 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 website, all you have to do to begin bringing more web traffic is add content consistently!)
In Part Two, we discussed the setup phase of the traffic automation 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 existing website has been built using WordPress.
(In Part 2 we show you where to set up a WordPress site on your domain)
In this section of the series, we will look at the configuration phase of the WordPress traffic automation system. We will explain what makes an expertly configured WordPress site different, and how much work is required to ensure that when everything is fully set up and configured, you can automatically begin bringing new visitors whenever you post new content on your web site.
WordPress Web Traffic Automation Blueprint – Configuration
The ability to drive more traffic to one’s website is often cited by website owners as one of the greatest challenges they face online. Also, the business landscape is becoming so much more competitive worldwide and businesses are exploring every advantage they can that can help you get better results online.
Being able to automatically generate traffic on demand can be a tremendous competitive advantage. With an expertly configured WordPress site, your business has a flying start and a significant competitive advantage online.
The Configuration Process Is What Makes All The Difference
There is a difference between an expertly configured WordPress site and a website that has been professionally set up by an expert website builder but not necessarily configured to take advantage of everything WordPress can offer.
Here’s a simple way to understand the main difference:
An expertly configured WordPress site gives you a professional web presence plus online business marketing automation!
(An expertly configured website gives you a web presence and an automated online business marketing tool!)
Not only does a whole lot more work go into building and integrating an automated online business marketing process into your website, it also takes a special kind of expert knowledge.
Let me illustrate this with an anecdote.
A Semi-True Story …
All is moving along in the gizmo-making assembly line when production suddenly stops.
As no one can figure out what’s happened, the floor manager decides to call in an expert.
Promptly after arriving, the expert immediately goes to the control box. After staring silently at the wiring board for no more than 3 minutes or so, the expert then produces a teensy-weensy hammer from his tool box and makes a very gentle tap about two and half inches from the bottom-right corner of the unit.
Immediately, all the machinery comes back to life.
The plant manager is filled with joy as he thanks the expert, who then leaves just as quickly as he had arrived.
A couple of days after resolving the incident, the manager receives a service bill for $5,000.
Bewildered, the manager dials the expert. Demanding to know why they were charged so much for less than five minutes work, he then requests an itemized invoice to be sent and hangs up.
The next day, an invoice statement arrives and is placed on the manager’s desk. Upon opening the envelope, this is what he sees:
The #1 challenge most businesses face online is being able to drive new traffic consistently to their sites.
How much money did the gizmo plant stand to lose when the machines ground to a halt and no one on the business had the expertise to get things up and running again? Did the expert not have the right to demand fair compensation for having spent years acquiring the knowledge and expertise that enabled him to assess and avert a very serious crisis?
Similarly, if you could have your WordPress web site set up and configured so all you have to do is publish new content and search engines, social sites and dozens of other online properties would be immediately 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 experts often make difficult situations and problems look easy, it rarely turns out to be that way.
Expertly configuring a WordPress site requires more than installing a website and configuring basic settings. It requires knowing where to tap! This includes knowing things such as:
- Which plugins you need to install to get desired functionalities on your site.
- Which services you need to set up and activate to get specific outcomes
- Which options need to be configured in order to make sure processes will work how you have planned, etc.
(Driving 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. This is because it’s not just about installing a piece of software, configuring some options and settings in your admin area or clicking on a button or two … 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 web server, your site, and various third-party sites or online services …
(The configuration stage involves more than just configuring some settings in WordPress)
If we create a simple diagram of the activities involved in the configuration process, it would look something like this …
(A simplified diagram showing the activities involved in the configuration phase)
Let’s examine these areas in more detail.
Configuring Your Server
We’re not talking here about the process of configuring your webhosting account for installation purposes. We’re talking about fine-tuning settings in your web-hosting account that affect how you will handle all web traffic …
(During the configuration phase, your hosting account settings need to be checked for handling both good and bad traffic)
Not all web traffic is positive traffic. Some of the web traffic your site may attract will be unwanted traffic like bot spam, malicious threats, bot-hacking attempts, etc.
This aspect of the configuration process, therefore, is all about planning for both good and unwanted traffic and then adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This could include looking at things like implementing spam protection and preventing security threats, to configuring domain and email redirections, etc …
(Have you configured your hosting control panel settings for handling things like email forwarding, page errors, etc?)
After your web server settings have been checked and configured, the next step of the configuration phase is to set up various external sites and services.
External Sites & Accounts – Configuration
The purpose of choosing external sites is that all of your content gets posted to a central location (your WordPress site) and from there, it then gets automatically distributed to other parts of your traffic system, or notify traffic-related web properties and applications.
Once these external platforms have been added to your traffic network, content pointing back to your site will be automatically added to 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 audiences and new sources of traffic.
Some of these external sites and online services 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, you will want to set up the following accounts:
Google Webmasters
(Google Webmasters – create a Google-friendly website)
Google Search Console lets you notify Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for automatic page indexing, and provides you with useful data, SEO tools and diagnostic reports about your website.
After setting up your Google Search Console account, this information can be used to integrate and automate web traffic-related settings and notifications in WordPress (e.g. using plugins like Yoast SEO – see further below) and other applications.
Google Analytics
(Google Analytics)
Google Analytics lets you improve your site’s results, SEO, user engagement, marketing campaigns, and more, by tracking all user behavior, pages visited, keywords searched for, search engine and organic referrals, etc.
Once your Google Analytics account and site data have been set up, your account information can be easily integrated with WordPress using a plugin and and sent to other useful applications.
Bing Webmaster Tools
(Drive more traffic with Bing Data And Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Search Console. After setting up your account and entering site data with Bing Webmaster Tools, you can use this information to integrate and automate web traffic settings and notifications in WordPress and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As discussed in Part Two, WordPress provides users with the option of a hosted vs self-hosted website. We recommended choosing the self-hosted WordPress option if you plan to grow a professional online presence.
WordPress.com (the hosted option), however, provides a number of useful features, which a number of WordPress plugins can access. We recommend setting up an account at WordPress.com, therefore, and we’ll explain how to integrate these features into your web traffic generation system in Part Four of this series.
Social Media
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and drive new traffic to your site)
You will need to set up your various social media accounts before you can configure these as part of your traffic generation system.
After setting up and configuring everything, you will be able to syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and get new visitors to your site.
You should have accounts and profile pages with all the popular social networks – Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, Pinterest, etc.
There are lots of social sites you can set up accounts with and post your content to. You don’t need to go crazy, just choose those that will work well with your setup and/or content syndication tools (we will look at some of these tools in greater detail when we discuss the Automation phase).
(There are many social sites you can post your content to. Image source ShareThis.com)
Additional Platforms, Aggregators, Etc.
There are a number of emerging web platforms and RSS aggregators that can serve as secondary traffic generation sources. Some are free or provide free accounts, and some are more suitable for enterprise-level applications.
For example, here is a content aggregator site that allows you to add your WordPress blog feed …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse – Distribute your 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 users can follow your website.
There are many different sites and platforms you can add to your own web traffic system. Please contact us if you need assistance exploring this area further, or to discuss a configuration plan to suit your needs.
Once you have configured your server settings and set up accounts with third-party services, it’s time to configure your WordPress settings.
WordPress – Configuring Your Site For Traffic
The first step in configuring your WordPress 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
By default, your WordPress administration area includes a Settings menu that allows you to modify your site’s global settings …
(WordPress menu – Settings)
General Settings
Sections like Site Title and Tagline can influence your site’s SEO, search indexing, etc …
(WordPress Settings – General Settings Screen)
Writing
The Writing Settings section contains a powerful and often overlooked traffic notification system …
(Settings Menu – 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 intentionally chosen to prevent search engines from indexing your site, then your site will automatically ping the update services entered into the Update Services section
With an ‘out of the box’ WordPress installation, only one service is listed …
(Update Services – A Powerful Traffic Feature Of WordPress)
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 your content gets seen by visitors when they visit your home page and blog pages.
The syndication settings in this section can influence traffic. For example, your choice of displaying the full content vs summaries of your post, affects how your content shows up in RSS readers and blog post digests, and could impact someone’s decision to explore your site further, and whether or not they will visit your website 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 traffic is concerned, however, the main setting in this section is whether the Search Engine Visibility checkbox is enabled or not.
Generally, you want search engines to visit your site. Leaving the box unchecked allows 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, leave this box unchecked …
(WordPress Settings – Reading Settings Section)
Discussion
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 …
(WordPress Settings – Discussion Settings)
Permalinks
Permalinks allow you to create SEO-friendly URLs …
(Settings Menu – Permalink Settings Section)
Here are some of the options for configuring your site’s search-friendly URLS …
(Configuring permalinks)
For a detailed step-by-step tutorial on setting up permalinks in WordPress, go here: Setting Up WordPress Permalinks
Configuring WordPress Plugin Settings For Traffic Generation
The WordPress developer community makes available plugins that can add almost every kind of functionality imaginable to your website, including plugins that add traffic generation capabilities.
Let’s take a brief look at examples of plugin categories and plugins that can help to increase traffic
Blog Defender Security Plugin
Once again, it’s important to configure your WordPress site for handling both good traffic and bad traffic. No web site is immune from being targeted.
(Security Plugins stop bad traffic from harming your web presence)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your WordPress blog invisible to hackers and bots.
To learn more, go here:
SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
WordPress SEO plugins help drive more traffic by improving the search engine friendliness of your web pages …
(Yoast SEO – WP Plugins For SEO)
Use a powerful plugin like Yoast SEO (previously called WordPress SEO by Yoast) to improve your SEO. Properly configured, this plugin not only makes your website easier for search engines like Google and Bing to index, it also gives you control over how your content is presented to Google’s search results and social media sites Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.
Social Plugins
Allowing your visitors to share your content with members of their own social communities can help drive more traffic to your site, especially if your site provides content that adds real value to readers.
(WordPress users can easily add social sharing features to their site using WordPress plugins)
WordPress users can easily add social sharing features to their website with WordPress plugins.
Many social plugins allow you to specify which sites visitors can share your content to, embed social buttons into your content, set up custom post messages, display/hide share counters (e.g. number of followers), etc. Some social plugins even allow you to set up protected content areas on your site which visitors can unlock by linking or tweeting your page.
WordPress Traffic Generation Theme Features – Configuration
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 the layout and design of your site, some themes also provide built-in features that let you improve search optimization and site navigation structure for faster indexing, easily add tracking code, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many WordPress themes include built-in traffic optimization features)
With a number of quality themes, adding social sharing buttons and features to your website is as easy as clicking a button …
(Many WordPress themes provide users with built-in social sharing features that can be easily enabled on with the click of a button)
Configuring Additional WordPress Features
Last but not least in the traffic configuration process, are the elements that need to be configured outside of the global settings.
These include:
Website Compliance Pages
Once again, when preparing your website for an increase in traffic numbers, it’s important to plan not only for how to handle bad and good traffic but also for all the situations that can damage your business when more and more people find and begin to visit your website.
If you are making money online, you need to make sure that your site complies with legal requirements of government agencies that regulate business online.
(Does Your Website Comply With The Law?)
If you need help adding compliance pages to WordPress, go here:
WordPress Categories And Tags
Tags & categories help improve traffic by allowing search engines to better classify and index your web pages.
(WordPress post categories help to improve your site’s search engine optimization, which helps you get more traffic.)
As we strongly recommend in this article, it’s best to discuss and set up your website’s post tags and post categories earlier on, during the Website Planning Phases.
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 benefits and results.
Add A Site Map To Your WordPress Site
A site map that lists 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 find your site’s content …
(Site Map – great for visitors and beneficial for traffic too!)
Note: An HTML site map and an XML sitemap are two different things. Only search engines can read an XML sitemap. Although Google will 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 results in increased traffic.
Don’t Forget Your 404 Page Not Found
When visitors searching for your site type in the wrong web address into their web browser or click on links pointing to an incorrect destination on your website, they are presented with an error – page not found message (known as a 404 page) …
(A WordPress 404 Page)
A 404 Error Page can be configured to funnel traffic to your functional web pages …
(Configuring your 404 Not Found 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 WordPress plugins that allow you to easily configure your 404 page inside your WordPress admin.
WordPress Traffic Blueprint: Configuration Stage – Summary
Once your website has been expertly configured and fully set up, all you need to do is publish web content on a regular basis to bring traffic.
The process of expertly configuring a WordPress site, however, is quite involved , requiring the configuration and integration of various elements and external web properties …
(WordPress Traffic System – Configuration Phase Checklist)
The skills and knowledge involved in expertly configuring a WordPress site can take many web developers 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 our series.
This is the end of Section 3
To read more, click here:
This tutorial is part of a comprehensive series of tutorials aimed at helping you learn how to grow your business online and drive traffic automatically with a WordPress-driven website or blog and proven marketing methods that are easy to implement.
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"This is an awesome training series. I have a pretty good understanding of WordPress already, but this is helping me to move somewhere from intermediate to advanced user!" - Kim Lednum
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