Welcome to Part Three of our Web Site Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to create an automated web traffic generation machine using WordPress.
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 website, all you have to do is add content on a consistent basis to automatically attract traffic!)
In Part Two, we focused on critical setup decisions. 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 site, and what to do if your 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 stage of the traffic system. We will show you how a WordPress site should be configured in order to get new visitors automatically when you begin to publish content on your WordPress site.
WordPress Web Traffic Automation Blueprint – Configuration Phase
The ability to drive more traffic to one’s website is often cited by many business owners as one of the greatest challenges they face online. With competition becoming increasingly more difficult businesses are researching every advantage they can that can help you increase their competitiveness online.
Having the ability to automatically generate traffic on demand can be a huge advantage over other competitors. For businesses, having an expertly configured website means having a significant advantage from the very start.
Configuration Is 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 developer but not necessarily configured to take advantage of everything WordPress can offer.
Here is a simple way to understand the differences:
An expertly configured WordPress website gives you a web presence and an automated online business marketing tool!
(An expertly configured site gives you a professional web presence and an automated online business marketing process!)
Not only are more steps needed to build and integrate an automated online business marketing system into your website, it also takes a special kind of expertise.
Let’s illustrate this with an anecdote.
A Semi-True Story …
Things are going well in the gizmo assembly line when the machines suddenly grinds to a halt.
No one can figure out what went wrong and so the plant manager decides to call in an expert to try and fix the problem.
Soon afterward, the expert arrives and immediately heads towards the main control box. After staring silently at the box for no more than 2 minutes, the expert then produces a teensy-weensy little hammer from his utility belt and makes a single tap about 1 inch from the left edge of the box.
Immediately, everything starts working as before.
The manager is delighted as he thanks the expert, who leaves as quickly as he had arrived.
A few days later, the manager receives a request of payment for services for $5,000.
With great anger, the manager picks up the phone and calls the expert. Demanding to know why they were charged such an exorbitant fee for less than 5 minutes work, he then requests an itemized invoice and hangs up.
The next day, an invoice notice arrives in the manager’s intray. Upon opening it, this is what he sees:
The #1 challenge most businesses face online is being able to consistently drive visitors to their sites.
In the above story, how much money did the widget factory stand to lose when the equipment stopped functioning and no one in the factory floor had the expertise required to fix it? Did the expert in our story not have every right to demand fair compensation for investing years developing the knowledge, skills and expertise that allowed him to immediately assess and avert a very serious crisis?
Similarly, if you could have a 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 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 site?)
Although the solution to many problems may seem quite easy once it’s been implemented, it rarely is that simple or easy when you try to work things out.
Expertly configuring a WordPress site requires more than adding some pages with content and configuring a few internal settings. It also involves knowing where to tap! This includes knowing things such as:
- Which plugins need to be installed to add specific functionalities to your site.
- Which 3rd-party accounts you need to set up and activate to get desired outcomes
- Which settings you need to configure in order to ensure that everything will function as planned, etc.
(Driving traffic automatically with WordPress is a process that requires expertise)
Although this part of the WordPress traffic automation system may not seem technically challenging, it can be quite involved and time-consuming. It’s not as easy as installing one or two plugins, clicking on a button or two … it’s all this and much more.
The configuration phase involves the integration of different components such as your web hosting server, your WordPress site, and a number of third-party sites or online services …
(Expertly configuring your website involves more than just configuring a few WordPress settings)
If we create a simplified flowchart showing the configuration process, it would look something like this …
(A simplified flowchart of the activities involved in the configuration process)
Let’s take a look at what’s involved in more detail.
Your Web Server – Configuration
We’re not talking here about the process of configuring your web hosting account for installation purposes. We’re talking about configuring settings and options in your web hosting account specifically for handling all web traffic …
(During the configuration phase, your web server settings need to be fine-tuned for handling both good and bad traffic)
Not all web traffic is positive traffic. Some of the traffic you can attract will be unwelcome traffic like spam, security threats, brute-force bot attacks, etc.
This part of the configuration process, therefore, is about evaluating your needs, planning for both good and unwelcome traffic and adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This includes looking at things like configuring server-level spam protection and threat prevention, to configuring your domain and email redirections, etc …
(Have you configured your webhosting settings for handling things like email forwarding, page error redirections, etc?)
Once your web server settings have been checked and configured (if required), the next step of the configuration phase is to set up a number of third-party sites and/or online services.
External Sites
The purpose of adding external sites is that all content will be posted to a central location (your WordPress site) and from there, it will get automatically distributed to other parts of your traffic system, or notify traffic-related web properties and applications.
After adding these external services to your traffic network, content pointing back to your site will get automatically syndicated to search, social and aggregator sites. Your content will be exposed to new sources of traffic and new audiences.
Some of these sites and services will need to be set up before configuring your WordPress 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 before configuring your WordPress site:
Google Search Console
(Google Webmaster Tools)
Google Search Console lets you inform Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for automatic page indexing, and provides you with important information, tools and diagnostic reports about your website.
Once your Google Webmasters account and site data are set up, use your account information with traffic-related settings in WordPress (e.g. using plugins like Yoast SEO) and other applications.
Google Analytics
(Google Analytics)
Google Analytics lets you improve your website’s performance, SEO, user engagement, marketing efforts, and more, by tracking all user behaviour, pages visited, keywords searched for, social media referrals, etc.
Once your Google Analytics account and site details are set up, you can add traffic monitoring information to WordPress using a simple Google Analytics plugin and send data instantly to other applications and reporting tools.
Bing Data And Tools
(Bing Data And Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Search Console. After setting up your Bing Webmaster Tools account, you can use your details with web traffic-related settings and notifications in WordPress and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As discussed in Part Two, WordPress offers 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 web presence.
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 traffic system in Part 4 of this series.
Social Media And Social Bookmarking
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media sites and social bookmarking accounts and attract new visitors to your site)
You will need to set up your social media and social bookmarking accounts before you can integrate these with 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 bring new traffic to your site.
You should have pages set up with all of the leading social networks – Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, Pinterest, etc.
There are many social bookmarking sites you can set up. You don’t need to create accounts with all of them, just pick those that will work well with your setup and/or content syndication tools.
(There are loads of social sites you can syndicate your content to. Image: ShareThis.com)
Additional Services, Aggregators, Etc.
There are a number of new online web platforms and content 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 that lets you add your WordPress site feed …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse)
RebelMouse is an aggregator for your social profiles and RSS feeds. Your content is displayed in a Pinterest-like format and users can follow your own RebelMouse social feed.
There are many different technologies and third-party applications that can be added to your web traffic system. Please feel free to contact us if you need assistance exploring some of these, or to discuss a strategy to suit your needs.
After you have configured your server settings and set up accounts with external services, it’s time to configure WordPress.
WordPress – Configuring Your Site
The first step in configuring your WordPress site for traffic is to make sure that its global settings have been correctly set up.
Let’s go over some key areas.
Configuring WordPress Settings
Your WordPress admin area contains a Settings menu that allows you to configure your site’s main settings …
(WordPress settings menu)
General Settings
Sections like Site Title and Tagline can influence your site’s SEO, search indexing, etc …
(WordPress Settings – General Settings)
Writing
The Writing Settings section contains a powerful and frequently overlooked built-in traffic notification system …
(Settings Menu – Writing Settings Area)
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 configured your site settings to prevent search engines from indexing your site, then your site will automatically notify the services entered into the Update Services text area
By default, when WordPress is installed, only one service is listed …
(Update Services)
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 Settings
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, choosing to display the full text vs summaries of your post, affects how your content displays to users in RSS feeds and RSS email campaigns, and could play a part in someone’s choice to explore your content further, and whether or not they will visit your site to read the rest of the content from excerpts, 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.
Normally, you would want search engines to visit your site. Leaving the box unchecked enables your site to automatically ping all the update services you have specified in the Update Services area 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 …
(Settings Menu – Reading Settings Section)
Discussion Settings
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)
Permalink Settings
Permalinks allow you to create search engine-friendly URLs …
(Global Settings – Permalink Settings Section)
Here are some of the ways your SEO-friendly URLs can be configured …
(Configuring post permalinks)
We have created a detailed tutorial on using WP permalinks here: Improve Your WordPress SEO With SEO-Friendly URLs
WordPress – Plugins
The WordPress developer community makes available plugins that can add just about every type of functionality to your website, including many plugins that improve traffic generation.
Here are examples of plugin categories and plugins that can help to bring more visitors to your site
Blog Defender WordPress Security Plugin
Once again, it’s important to configure your site for handling both good traffic and bad traffic. No website is safe from being attacked.
(WordPress Security Plugins help prevent bad traffic from harming your web presence)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your WordPress site invisible to hackers and bots.
More information:
SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
SEO plugins help drive traffic by improving your site’s SEO …
(WordPress SEO plugins like Yoast SEO help drive traffic by making your website more search engine friendly)
Use a plugin like Yoast SEO to improve your SEO. Properly configured, the Yoast SEO plugin not only makes your web pages easier for search engines like Google to find and index, it also gives you control over how your content is presented in Google’s search results and social media sites Twitter, Facebook, and GooglePlus.
Social Plugins
Allowing your visitors to easily share your content online can help drive significant traffic to your site, especially if you post great content that adds real value to readers.
(WordPress users can easily add social sharing buttons to their site with WordPress plugins)
You can easily add social features to your website with free or inexpensive WordPress plugins.
Many social plugins let you select 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 protect content or downloads which users can unlock by linking or tweeting your page.
Configuring Settings – WP Themes
As well as configuring various plugins, many WordPress themes also include features that help you drive more traffic to your site.
For example, as well as options and settings for configuring the design and layout of your website, many themes also give you options for improving search optimization and site navigation structure for faster indexing, add tracking snippets, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many themes like Graphene (a highly customizable free theme) have built-in traffic optimization features)
With a number of quality themes, adding social sharing buttons to your content is as easy as selecting the option to enable this functions …
(Many WordPress themes provide users with built-in social sharing features that can be easily turned on with the click of a button)
WordPress Traffic Configuration – Other Steps
Last (but by no means least) in the web traffic system configuration process, are the elements that need to be set up outside of the global settings.
These include the following:
Compliance Web Pages
Once again, when preparing your website for an increase in visitor numbers, it’s important to plan not only for how to deal with bad and good traffic but also for all the situations that can damage your business as more and more people begin to visit your website.
If you are making money online (or plan to), you need to make sure that your site is compliant with regulatory agencies.
(Does Your Site Comply With The Law?)
If you need help adding compliance pages to WordPress, see this article:
Post Categories And Tags
Tags & post categories help search engines classify and index your web pages, which helps you get more traffic.
(Categories help improve traffic by allowing search engines to better understand and index your pages.)
As we recommend in this article, it’s best to review and set up your website’s post categories and tags earlier on, during the Website Planning Phase.
When considering ways to automate and improve traffic, you will want to review and make sure that the post tags and post categories you have set up.
Add A Site Map To Your WordPress Site
A site map that displays all of your site’s pages and posts to visitors is not only a useful navigation tool, it can also help external tools find 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 two different things. An HTML site map is a web page that links to all other content on your site, while an XML sitemap is mostly filled with code that only search engine bots can interpret. Although Google can index your pages just using an XML sitemap (which plugins 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 – Don’t Forget This!
When visitors searching online for your website enter the wrong web address or click on an invalid link, they will normally be greeted with a 404 Not Found page …
(Default WordPress 404 Error Page)
Configuring your 404 Not Found page allows you to redirect traffic that may otherwise be lost. …
(Configuring your 404 Error Page allows you to recover traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 error page can be set up on your web server, there are plugins for WordPress that allow you to easily configure your 404 page from your WordPress admin.
WordPress Traffic Automation System: Configuration Process – Summary
Once you have your WordPress site expertly configured and fully set up, all you then have to do to attract web traffic is post web content on a consistent basis.
The process of expertly configuring a WordPress site, however, can be quite involved and elaborate , requiring the configuration and integration of various elements and external web properties …
(Traffic Blueprint – Configuration Phase Checklist)
The expertise involved in expertly configuring a WordPress site can take many web developers months 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 Automation Blueprint 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 site owners learn how to grow their business with a WordPress-driven website or blog and proven marketing strategies that are easy and quick to implement.
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"These tutorials have so much information and are easy to understand. If you use WordPress or plan to in the future these will help you with everything you need to know." - Valisa (Mesa, Arizona)
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