Welcome to Part Three of our Web Site Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to turn a site into an automated traffic machine using the WordPress CMS platform.
In Part One 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 website or blog, all you have to do to drive more web traffic is add web content on a regular basis!)
In Part Two, we discussed critical setup decisions. We explained the best way to start if you don’t have a web presence yet, how to set everything up if you already have a website, and what to do if your existing site was built using WordPress.
(In Part 2 we show you how to set up a WordPress website or blog on your domain)
In this section of the series, we look at the configuration phase of the WordPress traffic automation system. You will learn how a WordPress site should be configured to attract web traffic automatically as you begin publishing content to your site.
WordPress Web Traffic Blueprint – Configuration Phase
Being able to attract more visitors to one’s website is often cited by most business owners as one of the greatest challenges they face online. With competition becoming increasingly more difficult businesses are looking for any and every advantage they can that can help you improve their results and performance online.
Having the ability to automatically generate traffic on demand can provide you with a huge advantage. With an expertly configured website, your business has 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 set up by an expert website builder but not necessarily configured to take advantage of everything WordPress has to offer.
Here’s a simple way to describe the key difference:
An expertly configured WordPress website gives you a professional web presence and an automated online business marketing tool!
(An expertly configured website gives you a web presence with an automated online business marketing tool!)
Not only does it take more work to build and integrate an automated online business marketing process into your website, but also a special type of expert knowledge.
To illustrate this point here’s a story.
Are Experts Worth The Money They Charge?
Things are moving along in the widget assembly factory when suddenly, production stops.
As no one can figure out what went wrong, the manager decides to call in an expert to try and fix the problem.
Shortly after arriving, the expert heads out immediately to the main control box. After staring silently at the wiring board for 3 minutes or less, the expert then produces a teeny-weeny hammer and makes a gentle tap near the top-left edge of the control unit.
Immediately, the machinery springs back to life.
The manager is filled with joy as he thanks the expert, who leaves as quickly as he had arrived.
A few days after resolving the incident, the manager receives a service bill for $5,000.
With great anger, the factory manager picks up the phone and calls the expert. Demanding to know why they were charged such a large amount of money for so little time spent delivering such a minimal amount of work, he promptly requests an itemized invoice and hangs up.
The next day, a bill of payment arrives in the manager’s intray. Upon opening the envelope, this is what he sees:
The #1 challenge most businesses face online is being able to drive new traffic to their sites.
How much money did the gizmo plant stand to lose when the equipment ground to a halt and no one in the business had the expertise required to get things up and running again? Did the expert in our story not have the right to demand fair compensation for years spent developing the knowledge, skills and expertise that enabled him to repair a potentially costly problem?
Similarly, if you could have your WordPress website or blog fully configured so all you had to do is publish new content and Google, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest and dozens of other online properties would be immediately 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 driving traffic to your website?)
While the solution to many challenges is often quite simple in hindsight, it rarely is that simple or easy.
Expertly configuring a WordPress site is more than installing a website and configuring settings for a client. It also involves knowing where to tap! This includes knowing things like:
- Which plugins you need to install to get various functionalities on your site.
- Which services you need to set up to get specific outcomes
- Which settings need to be configured to make sure everything functions as expected, etc.
(Generating web traffic automatically with WordPress is a process that requires expertise)
Although this stage of the WordPress traffic automation system may not seem technically difficult, it can be quite involved and time-consuming. The reason why is because it’s not as easy as installing and configuring a plugin, configuring some settings in your admin area … it’s all of this and much more.
The configuration phase is a process that involves your web server, your web site, and a number of external sites and online services …
(The configuration stage involves more than just configuring a few WordPress settings)
If all the steps involved in the configuration process were to be flowcharted, it would look something like this …
(A simplified flowchart of the steps involved in the configuration phase)
Let’s examine what’s involved in more detail.
Your Web Server – Configuration
We’re not talking about the process of configuring your web hosting account for installation purposes. We’re talking about configuring settings in your server specifically for handling web traffic …
(During 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 business may attract will be unwelcome traffic like spam, malicious threats, brute-force bot attacks, etc.
This area of the configuration process, therefore, is all about planning for both bad and good traffic and adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This could include things like implementing server-level spam protection and security threat prevention, to configuring domain and email redirections, setting up htaccess and error page redirections, etc …
(Have you configured your control panel settings for handling things like emails, page errors, etc?)
Once your web server settings have been checked and configured, the next step is to configure a number of third-party sites.
External Accounts
The basic idea of adding external sites is that all content should be posted to one central location (your WordPress site) and from there, syndicate automatically to other components of your traffic system, or notify traffic-related web properties and services.
After adding these external sites to your system, content pointing back to your website will get automatically published on these platforms, indexed by search engines and distributed to social sites, even to users of the platform itself. Your content and site will benefit from added exposure online, helping you tap into a new audience and source of traffic.
Some third-party sites and online solutions will need to have accounts set up before configuring your site’s 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 before configuring your WordPress settings:
Google Webmasters
(Google Webmasters – create a Google-friendly site)
Google Webmaster Tools lets you tell Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for faster page indexing, and provides you with important information, tools and diagnostic reports about your website.
After setting up your account and entering site data with Google Webmaster Tools, your information can be used with web 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 performance, SEO, marketing campaigns, and more, by tracking all user behaviour, pages visited, keywords searched for, organic referrals, etc.
After setting up your Google Analytics account and site data, your account code can be added to all web pages in WordPress via any of several Google Analytics plugins used with other applications.
Bing Data And Tools
(Drive more traffic with Bing Webmaster Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Webmasters. Once your account with Bing Webmaster Tools are set up, your account details can be used with traffic settings and notifications in WordPress and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As explained in Part Two, WordPress offers users the option of a hosted vs self-hosted website. We recommended choosing the self-hosted WordPress version if you are planning to build a professional online presence for your business.
WordPress.com (the hosted option), however, provides some great tools, which various WordPress plugins can access. We recommend setting up an account with WordPress.com, therefore, and we’ll explain how to integrate these features into your automated web traffic generation system in Part Four of this article series.
Social Media And Social Bookmarking Accounts
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and get new traffic to your site)
You will need your various social media accounts set up before you can 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 and social bookmarking accounts and attract new visitors to your site.
Make sure you have accounts and profiles set up with all of the popular social networks – Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, Pinterest, etc.
There are loads of social bookmarking sites you can set up accounts with. You don’t need to create accounts with all of them, just select those that will work with your setup and/or content syndication tools.
(You can post your content to many social bookmarking sites. Image: ShareThis.com)
Additional Solutions, RSS Aggregators, Etc.
There are a number of new online technology platforms and RSS aggregators that can act as second-tier traffic generation sources. Some are free or provide free access levels, 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 – Distribute your content to social networks)
RebelMouse is an aggregator for your RSS feeds and social profiles. Your content is displayed in a Pinterest-like format and users can follow your own RebelMouse social feed.
There are various platforms that can be incorporated into your own traffic system. Please feel free to contact us if you would like to explore some of these further and discuss a configuration strategy to suit your needs.
After you have configured your web server and set up third-party service accounts, it’s time to configure your WordPress settings.
WordPress Site 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.
WordPress – Global Settings
Your WordPress admin area contains a Settings menu that allows you to set up your site’s global settings …
(WordPress dashboard menu – Settings)
General Settings
Fields like Site Title and Tagline can influence your site’s SEO, search listings, etc …
(Global Settings – General Settings)
Writing Settings
The Writing Settings area contains one of the most important and often overlooked automated traffic notification systems available to WordPress site owners …
(WordPress Settings – Writing Settings)
As described in the Update Services section,
When you publish a new post, WordPress automatically notifies the following site update services …
Unless you or your webmaster have specifically configured your site settings 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 area
By default, when WordPress is installed, this section lists only one entry …
(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
***
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 have an influence web traffic. For example, your choice of displaying the full text vs summaries of your post, affects how your content appears in RSS feeds and RSS email campaigns, and could play a part in someone’s choice to explore your site 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.
As far as traffic is concerned, however, the main setting here is whether the Search Engine Visibility checkbox is ticked or not.
Typically, you want search engines to visit your site. Leaving this box unchecked enables WordPress to ping the list of update services whenever a new post is published (see Writing Settings above). Unless you have a specific reason to discourage search engines from visiting your site, make sure this box is left unticked …
(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 sites 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)
Permalinks
Your Permalink settings allow you to create search engine-friendly URLs …
(Global Settings – Permalinks)
The examples below show some of the ways SEO-friendly URLs can be configured …
(Configuring permalinks)
To learn more about setting up WP permalinks, go here: Setting Up Your WordPress Permalinks
Configuring WordPress Traffic Plugins
The WordPress developer community makes available thousands of plugins that can add almost every type of functionality imaginable to your site, including many plugins that improve traffic generation.
Let’s look at examples of plugin categories and plugins that can help to attract more visitors to your site
WordPress Security Plugins – Blog Defender
Once again, it’s important to configure your site for dealing with the effects of 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, securing your website or blog is something you cannot ignore.
(WordPress Security Plugins stop bad traffic from causing your website harm)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your website invisible to bot and hacker attacks.
Go here to learn more:
SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
SEO plugins help drive traffic by making your web pages easier for search engines like Google to index …
(WordPress SEO plugins help drive traffic by making your website more search engine friendly)
A plugin like Yoast SEO (previously called WordPress SEO by Yoast) can improve your SEO. Once properly configured, the Yoast SEO plugin not only makes your site easier for search engines like Google to index, it also gives you control over how your content is displayed in Google’s search results and social media sites Twitter, Facebook, and GooglePlus.
Social Plugins
Allowing your visitors to share your content online can help drive significant traffic to your site, especially if you publish great content that adds real value to readers.
(You can add social sharing buttons to your site easily using free or inexpensive WordPress plugins)
WordPress users can easily add social sharing to their site using WordPress plugins.
Most social sharing plugins let you choose which sites visitors can share your content to, embed social buttons into your content, set up default post messages, display/hide share counters (e.g. number of likes), etc. Some social sharing plugins even allow you to set up protected content sections on your pages which users can unlock by liking your page.
WordPress – Traffic Generation Theme Features
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 layout and design of your site, many themes also provide built-in options for improving SEO and site linking structure for better indexing, easily add tracking snippets, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many themes like Graphene (a free theme) include built-in traffic optimization features)
With a number of WordPress themes, adding social sharing buttons to your site is as easy as clicking a couple of buttons to enable the feature …
(Many WordPress themes come with built-in social sharing features that can be easily turned on with the click of a button)
Configuring Other WordPress Settings For More Traffic Results
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 site for a growth in traffic, it’s important to plan not only for how to handle good and bad traffic but also for all the things that can go wrong as more and more people start finding and visiting your website.
If you do business online (or plan to), you need to ensure that your site complies with legal requirements of government agencies that regulate how business online is done.
(Does Your Website Comply With All Legal Requirements?)
We have written a detailed article on the importance of having a compliant website here:
WordPress Categories And Tags
Categories & post tags help improve traffic by allowing search engines to better understand and index your web pages.
(Post categories help search engines index your website, which helps you get more traffic.)
As we recommend in this article, it’s best to set up your site’s tags and categories during the Website Planning Phases.
In the configuration phase, you will want to review and make sure that the categories and tags you have set up.
A Site Map Of Your Pages and Posts
A site map that lists all of your posts and pages to visitors is not only a useful navigation tool for users, it can also help external tools discover more of your web content …
(Site Map – great for site visitors and beneficial for traffic too!)
An HTML site map and an XML sitemap are different things. HTML site maps provide readers with a logical map of how your content is structured, whereas XML sitemaps contain code that only search bots can understand. Although Google will index your pages just using 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 results in increased traffic.
Configure Your Site’s 404 Error Page
When visitors type in the wrong web address into their web browser or click on links pointing to destinations on your website that no longer exist, they will normally be presented with a 404 page …
(Default WordPress 404 Error Page)
Configuring your 404 Not Found error page allows you to recover web traffic that may otherwise be lost. …
(Configuring your 404 Not Found error page allows you to recover traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 error page can be set up in your web server, there are several WordPress plugins that allow you to easily configure your 404 page inside your WordPress admin area.
WordPress Traffic System: Configuration Process – Summary
Once your website or blog has been fully set up and expertly configured, all you have to do then is add fresh content regularly to automatically begin attracting more web traffic organically.
The process of expertly configuring your WordPress site, however, can be quite involved and elaborate and requires the configuration and integration of different components and external web properties …
(WordPress Traffic System – Configuration Phase Checklist)
The knowledge and expertise involved in expertly configuring a WordPress site can take some web professionals a long time 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 explained in the next article in the series.
This is the end of Part 3
To read the rest of this article, click here:
This article is part of an tutorial series designed to help website owners learn how to grow their business using a WordPress-driven website and proven web marketing methods.
Subscribe Using The Form Below And Get Notified Of New Tutorials!
***
"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)
***