Welcome to Part 3 of our Web Site Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to automate traffic to your site using WordPress.
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 is add new content regularly to automatically attract web traffic!)
In Part 2, we looked at the setup phase of the 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 site, and what to do if your website was built with WordPress.
(In Part 2 we show you how to set up WordPress on your domain)
In this article, we look at the configuration stage of this process. We will help you understand what makes an expertly configured site different from a professionally configured website, and how much work needs to be done to make sure that when everything is fully set up and configured, web traffic will automatically start flowing whenever you post fresh content on your site.
WordPress Traffic System – Configuration
Finding ways to attract more visitors to one’s website is often cited by most website owners as their greatest challenge online. With business getting so much more competitive on a global scale, it’s worth learning about any and every opportunity you can to increase your own competitiveness online.
Having the ability to automatically generate traffic on demand is a tremendous advantage over the competition. For businesses, an expertly configured website gives WordPress users a flying start from the moment their site is launched.
The Configuration Process Is What Makes The Difference
There is a significant difference between an expertly configured WordPress site and a site that has been professionally installed and set up by a web-building expert but not necessarily configured to its fullest advantage.
Here’s a simple way to explain the differences:
With a WordPress site that has been expertly configured you get a web presence and online business marketing automation!
(An expertly configured site gives you a web presence with a built-in automated online business marketing tool!)
Not only are more steps required 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 an amusing little story.
Ludicrous Or Fair? You Decide …
All is humming along in the widget-making manufacturing plant when suddenly, things grinds to a complete stop.
No one can figure out what’s happened and so the manager decides to call in an expert to fix the problem.
Shortly after arriving, the expert heads immediately towards the main control box. After staring at the board for 3 minutes, the expert then takes out a teeny-weeny little hammer from his pocket and makes a very gentle tap about one cm from the top-left side of the box.
Immediately, everything returns to normal.
The floor manager is relieved 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.
Furious, the manager calls the expert. Why were they charged such a ridiculously high fee for so little time delivering a minimal amount of work? He then requests an itemized invoice to be sent and hangs up.
The next day, an invoice statement arrives on the manager’s desk. Upon opening the envelope, this is what he sees:
The #1 challenge most businesses face online is driving new visitors to their sites.
How much money did the gizmo factory stand to lose when production stopped functioning and no one on the business had the expertise to get things up and running again? Did the expert in our story not have every right to demand fair compensation for years spent acquiring the knowledge and expertise that enabled him to fix a costly problem?
Similarly, if you could have a website or blog configured so all you had to do is publish content to it and Google, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest and dozens of other web properties would be automatically notified, how much time and money would this save you?
(How much better would your business be if you could automate the process of driving traffic to your site?)
Although many experts often make complex situations and problems look simple, it rarely is that simple or easy when you try to work things out.
Expertly configuring a WordPress site is more than just installing a website and configuring a few basic settings. It involves knowing where to tap! In other words, knowing things such as:
- Which plugins need to be installed to add various functionalities to your site.
- Which accounts need to be set up and activated to get desired outcomes
- Which settings need to be configured to make sure processes will run as you have imagined, etc.
(Driving new 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 and configuring one or two plugins, clicking a button … it’s all of this and so much more.
The configuration phase involves the integration of many components including your server, your web site, and various third-party sites …
(The configuration phase involves more than just configuring a few settings in WordPress)
If the activities involved in the configuration process were to be flowcharted, it would look like this …
(A simplified flowchart of the configuration process)
Let’s examine what’s involved.
Configuring Your Web Server
We’re not talking about the process of configuring your web-hosting account for website installation purposes. We’re talking about fine-tuning settings in your hosting account specifically for handling all web traffic …
(In the configuration phase, your server settings need to be fine-tuned for handling both good and bad traffic)
Not all traffic is welcome traffic. Some of the web traffic your website may attract will be unwelcome traffic like spam, malicious threats, bot-hacking attempts, etc.
This aspect of the configuration process, therefore, is about evaluating your needs, planning for both good and unwanted traffic and then adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This includes looking at things like implementing server-level spam protection and preventing security threats, to configuring domain and email redirections, etc …
(Have you configured your webhosting settings for handling things like emails, page errors, etc?)
After fine-tuning your server settings and configuring these (if required), the next step of the configuration phase is to set up various third-party sites.
External Sites
The concept behind adding external sites is that all of your content is posted to a central location (your WordPress site) and from there, it then gets distributed automatically to other components of your traffic generation system, or notify traffic-related web properties and applications.
Once these external sites have been added to your network, content pointing back to your site gets automatically posted to these platforms. Your content and business will be exposed to a new audience and source of traffic.
Some sites and services will need to have accounts set up before configuring your WordPress site’s settings to help save time 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 Search Console – create a Google-friendly website or blog)
Google Search Console lets you notify Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for automatic page indexing, and provides you with a range of essential data, SEO tools and diagnostic reports about your website.
After setting up your account, you can use the details with 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 traffic results, SEO, marketing efforts, and more, by tracking all user behaviour, pages visited, keywords searched for, social media referrals, etc.
Once your Google Analytics account is set up, you can add your account code to all of your pages in WordPress using a Google Analytics plugin and feed data automatically to many other online applications and web properties.
Bing Webmaster Tools
(Bing Data And Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Webmaster Tools. After setting up your account and entering site details with Bing, use your account information with web traffic-related settings in WordPress (e.g. using plugins like Yoast SEO) and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As discussed in Part 2, WordPress offers users a self-hosted and a hosted option. We recommended choosing the self-hosted WordPress option if you plan to build a professional web presence.
WordPress.com (the hosted option), however, provides some great features, which a number of WordPress plugins can access. We recommend setting up an account with WordPress.com, therefore, and we’ll explain how to integrate this into your automated traffic system in Part Four of this article series.
Social Media And Social Bookmarking
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media sites and social bookmarking accounts and get new traffic to your site)
You will need to set up your social accounts in order to 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 drive new visitors to your site.
You should have profiles with all of the popular social networks – Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, YouTube, etc.
There are lots of social bookmarking sites you can set up. You don’t need to create accounts with all of them, just choose those that will work with your setup and/or content sharing tools.
(You can post your content to loads of social bookmarking sites. Image: ShareThis.com)
Additional Solutions, Content Aggregators, Etc.
There are a number of new online technology 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 lets you add a feed from your site …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse – Publishing platform for distributed content)
RebelMouse is a news aggregator for your social profiles and RSS feeds. Your content displays in a Pinterest-like format and visitors can follow your own RebelMouse account.
There are many different sites and platforms that can be added to your web traffic system. Please feel free to contact us if you would like to explore some of these further and discuss a configuration plan to suit your needs.
After you have configured your web server and set up accounts with external services, it’s time to configure your WordPress site’s settings.
WordPress – Configuring Your Web Site
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 of the important points.
Global WordPress Settings
Your WordPress dashboard area contains a Settings menu that allows you to configure your site’s global settings …
(WordPress settings section)
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
The Writing Settings section contains one of the most important and frequently overlooked built-in traffic notification systems available to website owners …
(Settings Menu – Writing Settings Screen)
As stated 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 purposely configured your settings to prevent search engines from indexing your site – see next section, then your site will automatically notify the list of update services entered into the Update Services text box
With an ‘out of the box’ WordPress installation, only one service is available …
(Update Services – A Powerful Traffic Feature)
WordPress lets you notify dozens of update services automatically …
(You can 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 visitors will see your content when they visit your home page and blog pages.
The syndication settings on this page can have an influence web traffic. For example, your choice to display the full text vs summaries 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 site further, and whether or not they will visit your website to read 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 here as far as traffic is concerned is whether the Search Engine Visibility feature is enabled or not.
Generally, you want to encourage search engines to visit your site. Leaving the box unchecked enables WordPress to notify the update services list when new posts are 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)
Discussion Settings
Although this section is mostly concerned with how users engage with content on your site, you have the option to allow notifications to blogs 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 …
(Settings Menu – Discussion Settings)
Permalink Settings
Permalinks enable your site to publish posts with SEO-friendly URLs …
(Settings Menu – Permalink Settings Screen)
The examples below show some of the ways your site’s permalinks can be configured …
(Configuring search-friendly URLS)
To learn more about setting up permalinks, refer to this step-by-step tutorial: Configuring WordPress Permalinks
Plugin Settings
WordPress provides users with plugins that help to add just about every kind of functionality to your website, including traffic generation.
Let’s look at 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 website for handling 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 web sites is something you simply cannot ignore.
(Security Plugins help prevent bad traffic from harming your web presence)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your blog invisible to bots and hackers.
Go here for more info:
SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
SEO plugins help drive more traffic by making your web content more indexable …
(WordPress Plugin – Yoast SEO)
A plugin like Yoast SEO (formerly known as WordPress SEO by Yoast) can improve your SEO. Once properly configured, the Yoast SEO plugin not only makes your web pages 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. Twitter, Facebook, and GooglePlus.
WordPress Social Sharing Plugins
Allowing your visitors to easily share your content online can help to increase traffic to your site, especially if you post great content that adds real value to readers.
(You can easily add social features to your site with WordPress plugins)
There are loads of free or inexpensive social sharing plugins available for WordPress users.
Many social plugins allow you to specify which sites your content can be shared to, embed social buttons into your content, set up custom post messages, display/hide share counters (e.g. number of likes), etc. Some plugins even allow you to set up protected content areas on your site which users can unlock by sharing your page.
Configuring WordPress Traffic Features In 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 the layout and design of your website, many themes also provide built-in features that let you improve search optimization and site navigation structure for faster indexing, easily add tracking snippets, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many themes like Graphene (a highly customizable free theme) come with built-in traffic optimization features)
With a number of themes, adding social sharing features to your pages is as easy as clicking a button …
(Many WordPress themes come with built-in social sharing features that can be easily enabled on with the click of a button)
Additional Areas Of WordPress To Configure
Last but not least in the WordPress traffic configuration process, are the areas that need to be set up outside of the global settings.
This includes:
Website Legal Pages
Once again, when preparing your website for an increase in traffic, it’s important to plan not only for both good and unwelcome traffic but also for all the things that can go wrong when more and more people start finding and visiting your website.
If you do business online (or are planning to), it’s important that your site stays compliant with regulatory agencies.
(Is Your Website Compliant?)
We have created a detailed article on how to quickly add legal pages to your website here:
Tags & Categories
Categories and post tags help search engines index your pages, which helps you get more traffic.
(Post categories help to improve your site’s SEO, which helps to increase traffic.)
As we strongly recommend in this article, your site’s post tags and categories should be discussed and set up during the Website Planning Phase.
When configuring your web site to automate and improve web traffic, you will want to review and make sure that the categories and tags that have been set up.
A Site Map Of Your Pages and Posts
A site map that displays 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 site’s content …
(Site Map – great for site visitors and beneficial for traffic too!)
It’s important to note that an HTML site map and an XML sitemap are two different things. Although Google can index your site just from an XML sitemap (which plugins like Yoast SEO will create for you – see earlier section), allowing visitors to find more pages on your site results in increased traffic.
404 Error Page – A Source Of Lost Traffic Opportunities!
When visitors searching online for your website enter the wrong URL or click on links pointing to destinations on your site that no longer exist, they will typically be presented with an error page …
(A WordPress 404 Page)
A 404 Error Page can redirect confused visitors to your functional web pages …
(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 server, there are several WordPress plugins that let you easily configure your 404 page inside your WordPress admin.
WordPress Traffic Automation System: Configuration Stage – Summary
Once you have your website expertly configured and fully set up, all you then need to do to automatically attract more traffic is publish content on a regular basis.
The process of expertly configuring your WordPress site, however, is quite involved and requires the configuration and integration of different components and web properties …
(Traffic System – Configuration Phase Checklist)
The expertise involved in expertly configuring a WordPress site can take some web professionals a long time to acquire.
Once you have expertly configured your WordPress site, the next step is to automate the process. This step is explained in the next article in the series.
This is the end of Part 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 inexpensively using a WordPress website and proven marketing methods that are easy and quick to implement.
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"Wow! I never knew there's so much to learn about WordPress! I bought one of the WordPress for Dummies three years ago, such authors need to be on this course!" - Rich Law, Create A Blog Now
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