Welcome to Part 3 of our WordPress Web Site Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to turn your site into an automated web traffic machine using the WordPress CMS platform.
In Part One of this series, we explained why using an expertly configured WordPress site is the key to generating automated web traffic …
(With an expertly configured WordPress web site, all you have to do is add web content on a regular basis to automatically begin attracting more traffic!)
In Part 2, we looked at the setup phase. We explained the best way to start if you don’t have a web presence yet, how to set things up if you already have a website, and what to do if your existing site was built with WordPress.
(In Part two we show you where to set up a WordPress site on your domain)
In this section of the series, we discuss the configuration phase of the traffic blueprint. We will show you how a WordPress site should be configured in order to ensure that web traffic will automatically start flowing just by adding new content on a consistent basis to your website.
WordPress Traffic Automation System – Configuration Phase
Being able to attract more visitors to one’s website is often cited by website owners as one of their greatest challenges online. Businesses are becoming increasingly more competitive worldwide and are researching every advantage they can to get better results online.
The ability to generate traffic on demand can be a huge advantage. An expertly configured website gives you a flying start and a significant competitive advantage online.
The Configuration Phase Is The Difference
There is a significant difference between an expertly configured WordPress site and a site that has been professionally set up by an expert website builder but not necessarily configured to its fullest advantage.
Here is a simple way to explain the differences:
An expertly configured WordPress site gives you a web presence plus online business marketing automation!
(An expertly configured website gives you a professional web presence and a built-in automated online business marketing system!)
Not only is more labor required to build and integrate an automated online business marketing process into your website, it also takes a special kind of expertise.
Let’s illustrate this with a joke.
A Semi-True Story …
All was moving along in the widget assembly line when everything ground to a sudden halt.
As no one could figure out what was wrong, the plant manager decided to call in an expert to fix the problem.
Soon afterwards, the expert arrived and, without uttering a word, headed immediately towards the main control box. After staring silently at the wires and circuitry for what seemed like about 2 minutes or so, the expert then took out a teeny-weeny hammer from his tool belt and made a gentle tap about 1 cm from the top-right side of the unit.
Immediately, everything returned to normal.
The plant manager was greatly overjoyed as he thanked the expert, who left as quickly as he had arrived.
A few days later, the factory manager received a bill for $5,000.
The manager dialled the expert, demanding to know why they were expected to pay so much for so little time spent delivering such minimal amount of work and promptly requested an itemized invoice before hanging up.
The next day, an invoice statement arrived and was placed on the manager’s desk. Upon opening the envelope, this is what he saw:
The main challenge most businesses face online is being able to drive traffic to their sites.
How much money did the widget plant stand to lose when the equipment stopped working and no one on the business was able to get things up and running again? Did the expert in our story not have the right to demand fair compensation for having spent years building up the knowledge, skills and expertise that enabled him to quickly assess and avert a very serious crisis?
Similarly, if you could have your WordPress site set up so all you had to do is publish new content 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 difficult things look easy, it rarely is that simple or easy.
Knowing how to expertly configure a WordPress site is more than adding some pages with content and configuring some basic settings. It also requires knowing where to tap! In other words, knowing things such as:
- Which programs you need to install to get certain functionalities on your site.
- Which accounts you need to set up to get specific results
- Which settings need to be configured to make sure everything will work as you have imagined, etc.
(Driving web traffic automatically with WordPress is a process that requires knowledge and expertise)
Although this part of the WordPress traffic automation system may not seem technically difficult, it can be quite involved and time-consuming. It’s not as easy as installing and configuring a piece of software, clicking a couple of buttons, or configuring some options and settings in your dashboard area … it’s all of this and so much more.
The configuration phase involves the integration of many parts such as your server, your site, and various third-party sites …
(Expertly configuring your website involves more than just configuring some WordPress settings)
If the configuration process were to be flowcharted, it would look like this …
(A simplistic flowchart of the activities involved in the configuration process)
Let’s take a brief look at these areas.
Your Server – Configuration
We’re not talking here about the process of configuring your web-hosting account for installation purposes. What we are talking about, is configuring settings in your web server that affect how you will handle all web traffic …
(In the configuration stage, your web server 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 website can attract will be unwanted traffic like bot spam, security threats, bot-hacking attempts, etc.
This stage 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 could include things like server-level spam protection and securing server files, to configuring your domain and email redirections, etc …
(Have you configured your hosting control panel settings for handling things like email forwarding, page errors, etc?)
After your server settings have been checked and configured (if required), the next step is to set up and configure various third-party sites.
Third-Party Accounts
The idea behind setting up external sites is that all of your content will be posted to a central location (your site) and from there, it will radiate outwards automatically to other components of your web traffic system, or notify traffic-related web properties and services.
Once you add these external sites to your traffic network, content pointing back to your site gets automatically published on search, social and aggregator sites. Your site receives added exposure online, helping you tap into a whole new audience and source of traffic.
Some of the sites and services will need to be set up before configuring your site’s settings to help save time 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 Search Console – create a Google-friendly site)
Google Webmasters lets you inform Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for automatic page indexing, and provides you with a range of important data, SEO tools and reports about your website.
After setting up your account and entering site data with Google, this information can be used with traffic settings in WordPress using plugins like Yoast SEO and other applications.
Google Analytics
(Google Analytics)
Google Analytics lets you improve your website’s performance, SEO, marketing campaigns, sales conversions, and more, by tracking all user engagement, pages visited, keywords searched for, search engine and organic referrals, etc.
Once your Google Analytics account and site details have been set up, account code can be added to WordPress using plugins and and sent to many other useful applications.
Bing Webmaster Tools
(Bing Webmaster Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Search Console. Once your account is set up, use this information with web traffic-related settings and notifications in WordPress (e.g. using plugins like Yoast SEO – see further below) and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As explained in Part 2, WordPress offers both the option of a hosted vs self-hosted website. We recommended choosing the self-hosted WordPress version if you plan to build a professional web presence.
WordPress.com (the hosted option), however, provides a number of useful tools, which can be accessed by a number of WordPress plugins. 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 4 of this article series.
Social Media And Social Bookmarking Accounts
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and bring new visitors to your site)
You will need your various social media and social bookmarking accounts set up in order to 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 sites and social bookmarking accounts and drive new traffic to your site.
You should have accounts and profiles set up with all the leading social networks – Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Pinterest, etc.
There are loads of social bookmarking sites you can set up. You don’t need to go crazy, just choose those that will work with your system and/or content sharing tools.
(You can post your content to many social bookmarking sites. Image: ShareThis.com)
Additional Services, RSS Aggregators, Etc.
There are many new online platforms and RSS aggregators that can act as secondary traffic generation sources. Some are free or provide free levels, and some are more suitable for enterprise-level applications.
For example, here is a content aggregator site that lets you add your WordPress site feed …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse)
RebelMouse is an aggregator for your RSS feeds and social profiles. Your content is displayed in a Pinterest-like format and visitors can follow your page.
There are various solutions you can incorporate into your own traffic system. Please contact us if you would like to explore your options and discuss a configuration strategy to suit your needs.
After you have configured your web server and set up external service accounts, it’s time to configure your WordPress site’s settings.
WordPress Site Configuration
The first step in configuring your WordPress site for traffic is to make sure that your global settings have been set up correctly.
Let’s go over some key areas.
Configuring WordPress Settings
The WordPress admin area contains a Settings menu that allows you to configure your site’s global settings …
(WordPress settings menu)
General Settings
Sections like Site Title and Tagline can influence your site’s SEO, search results, etc …
(WordPress Settings – General Settings Screen)
Writing
The Writing Settings area contains an important and often overlooked 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 or your webmaster have specifically chosen to discourage search engines from indexing your site – see next section, then your site will automatically notify the list of services entered into the Update Services section
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 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 traffic. For example, your choice of displaying the full text vs summaries of your post, affects how your content appears in RSS feeds and blog post digests, and could affect someone’s choice to explore your content further, and whether or not they will visit your blog to view the rest of the content from excerpts, or read the content in full without the need to click through to your site.
The main setting here as far as traffic is concerned is whether the Search Engine Visibility check box is enabled or not.
Typically, you want search engines to visit your site. Leaving this box unchecked enables your site to notify all the update services you have listed when new posts get published (see Writing Settings above). Unless there is a specific reason why search engines should not visit your site, do not check this box …
(Settings Menu – Reading Settings Section)
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 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 Section)
Permalinks
Permalinks allow you to create search engine-friendly URLs …
(WordPress Settings – Permalink Settings)
Here are some of the ways permalink URLs can be configured …
(Configuring permalink URLs)
We have created a detailed tutorial about using permalinks in WordPress here: How To Change Your WordPress Permalinks
Configuring Settings – Plugins
WordPress provides users with plugins that can add almost every type of functionality imaginable to your website, including many plugins that improve traffic generation.
Let’s take a brief look at examples of plugin categories and plugins that can help to increase traffic
Blog Defender
Once again, it’s important to configure your website 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, you simply cannot ignore the importance of website security.
(Security Plugins stop bad traffic from harming your web presence)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your website invisible to hackers and bots.
For more details, go here:
SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
SEO plugins help drive traffic by improving improving how search engines find and index your web pages …
(WordPress SEO plugins like Yoast SEO help increase traffic by improving your site’s SEO)
A plugin like Yoast SEO (previously known as WordPress SEO by Yoast) can significantly improve your SEO. Properly configured, the Yoast SEO plugin not only makes your website easier for search engines to index, it also lets you specify how to display your content to Google’s search results and social media sites Facebook, Twitter, and Google+.
WordPress Social Plugins
Allowing your visitors to share your content online can help drive significant traffic to your site, especially if you provide great content that adds real value to readers.
(WordPress users can easily add social sharing features to their site using WordPress plugins)
You can easily add social sharing to your website using free or inexpensive plugins.
Many social plugins allow you to specify which social sites visitors can share your content to, embed social buttons into your content, set up custom notifications, display/hide share counters (e.g. number of shares), etc. Some social plugins even allow you to set up protected content areas on your pages which visitors can unlock by sharing your page.
Configuring WordPress Theme Settings For Traffic Generation
As well as configuring various plugins, many WordPress themes also include features that can help grow your site’s traffic.
For example, in addition to options and settings for configuring the design and layout of your website, some themes also give you built-in options for improving SEO and site linking structure for better indexing, add analytics, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many themes can be configured for improved traffic results)
With a number of themes, adding social sharing features to your site 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 enabled on with the click of a button)
Configuring Additional WordPress Areas
Last but not least in the web traffic configuration process, are the areas that need to be configured outside of the global settings.
This includes the following:
Website Compliance Pages
Once again, when preparing your site for an increase in traffic numbers, it’s important to plan not only for both good and unwelcome traffic but also for all the situations that can seriously affect your business when more and more people start finding and visiting your website.
If you do any type of business online (or are planning to), you need to make sure that your site is found to comply with all government regulations.
(Is Your Website Legally Compliant?)
For a detailed article on why it’s important to have a compliant website, go here:
Tags & Post Categories
Post tags and post categories help search engines better classify and index your website, which helps you get more traffic.
(Post categories help to improve your site’s search engine optimization, which helps to increase traffic.)
As we recommend in this article, it’s best to set up your site’s post categories and tags during the Website Planning Stages.
When configuring your website to automate and improve web traffic, you will want to review and make sure that the post tags and post categories that have been set up.
Add A WordPress Site Map
A site map that displays all of your pages and posts is not only a useful navigation tool for users, it can also help external tools discover your web content …
(A site map is not just great for visitors, but for traffic too!)
It’s important to note that an HTML site map and an XML sitemap are not the same things. Only search engines can interpret an XML sitemap. Although Google can index your site just from an XML sitemap (which plugins like Yoast SEO can provide – see earlier section), allowing visitors to find more pages on your site results in increased traffic.
404 Page Not Found – Don’t Forget This!
When visitors searching online for your site enter the wrong URL into their browser or click on an invalid hyperlink, they will typically be presented with a 404 Not Found error page …
(Default WordPress 404 Not Found page)
A 404 Error Page can be configured to funnel traffic to your functional pages …
(Configuring your 404 Error Page allows you to redirect web traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 Not Found page can be set up on your server, there are plugins for WordPress that allow you to easily configure your 404 page inside your WordPress admin.
WordPress Traffic Automation Blueprint: Configuration Stage – Summary
Once your website has been expertly configured and fully set up, all you have to do then is add great content on a regular basis to start generating new traffic.
The process of expertly configuring your WordPress site, however, can be quite involved and elaborate , requiring the configuration and integration of various components and external web properties …
(Traffic Blueprint – Configuration Checklist)
The kind of expertise involved in expertly configuring a WordPress site can take many web developers a long time to learn.
Once you have 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 continue reading about this topic, click on the link below:
This tutorial is part of a comprehensive series of tutorials designed to help you learn how to grow your business with a WordPress website and proven marketing methods that are easy and quick 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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