Welcome to Part 3 of our Web Site Traffic Blueprint article series, where we show you how to automate traffic to your website using the WordPress CMS.
In Part 1 of this article series, we provided an overview of the process, and explained why using an expertly configured WordPress website is the key to automating traffic to your website …
(With an expertly configured WordPress website or blog, all you have to do is publish new content on a consistent basis to bring web traffic!)
In Part 2, we focused on critical setup decisions. 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 site has been built using WordPress.
(In Part two we show you how to set up a WordPress website or blog on your domain)
In this article, we will look at the configuration phase of this process. We explain what makes an expertly configured WordPress site different from a professionally configured one. You will also discover how much work is required to make sure that when all is set up and fully configured, you can automatically attract traffic simply by posting content to your website.
WordPress Web Traffic System – Configuration Phase
Finding ways to drive more traffic to one’s website is often cited by website owners as one of their greatest challenges online. With competition becoming progressively tougher businesses are researching any and every advantage available to improve their performance online.
The ability to automatically generate traffic on demand is a tremendous advantage over other competitors. With an expertly configured WordPress site, you have a significant advantage from the word “go”.
Configuration Is 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 has to offer.
Here’s a simple way to understand the difference:
With a WordPress website that has been expertly configured you get a web presence plus online business marketing automation!
(An expertly configured site gives you a web presence with a built-in automated online business marketing process!)
Not only does it take extra labor 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 a joke.
Ludicrous Or Fair? You Decide …
All is going fine in the gizmo plant when everything comes to a sudden stop.
As no one can figure out what’s happened, the floor manager decides to call in an expert.
Shortly after arriving, the expert heads out directly to the control box. After staring silently at the box for less than 2 minutes, the expert then produces a teeny-weeny hammer and makes a gentle tap about three cm from the left corner of the control unit.
Immediately, everything springs back to life.
The plant manager is grateful and relieved as he thanks the expert, who then leaves as quickly as he had arrived.
A couple of days later, the manager receives a request for payment of $5,000.
Feeling furious, the factory manager calls the expert. Why were they expected to pay such an exorbitant fee for less than 5 minutes work? He promptly requests an itemized invoice to be sent and hangs up.
The next day, an invoice arrives and is placed on the manager’s desk. Upon opening the envelope, this is what he sees:
The main challenge most businesses face online is being able to drive new traffic to their sites.
How much money did the gizmo factory stand to lose when the equipment ground to a halt and no one on the business was able to fix it? Did the expert not have the right to demand fair compensation for years spent building up the knowledge and expertise that enabled him to quickly fix a potentially costly problem?
Similarly, if you could have your website or blog fully set up so all you had to do is publish content to it and search engines, social sites like Facebook and LinkedIn and dozens of other web properties would be immediately 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?)
While the solution to many challenges can seem ridiculously simple once it’s been implemented, it rarely is that simple or easy when you try to figure things out.
Expertly configuring a WordPress site is more than adding some pages with content and configuring a few basic settings. It requires knowing where to tap! In other words, knowing things like:
- Which plugins need to be installed to add specific functionalities to your site.
- Which third-party services you need to set up to achieve desired results
- Which internal and external settings need to be configured in order to ensure that everything functions exactly as you have planned, etc.
(Driving web traffic automatically with WordPress is a process that requires expertise)
This stage of the traffic automation system is not so technically challenging, but it’s quite involved and complicated. This is because it’s not as easy as installing and configuring one or two plugins, clicking a couple of buttons, or configuring some options and settings in your admin area … it’s all of this and so much more.
The configuration stage is a complex process that involves your server, your web site, and a number of third-party sites and/or online services …
(Expertly configuring your website involves more than just configuring a few settings in WordPress)
If we create a simplified flowchart showing the activities involved in the configuration process, it would look something like this …
(A simplified flowchart showing the configuration phase)
Let’s take a look at these areas in more detail.
Your Server – Configuration
We’re not talking here about the process of configuring your web hosting account for installation purposes (this should have been done during the Setup phase). We’re talking about configuring settings and options in your webhosting account specifically for handling web traffic …
(During the configuration phase, your server settings need to be checked for handling both good and bad traffic)
Not all traffic is beneficial traffic. Some of the web traffic your website will attract will be unwanted traffic like spam, security threats, brute-force bot attacks, etc.
This aspect of the configuration process, therefore, is about evaluating your needs, planning for good and unwanted traffic and then adjusting settings in your server accordingly. This includes looking at things like integrating spam protection and securing server files, to configuring domain and email forwarding, setting up 404 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 a number of third-party sites and/or online services.
3rd-Party Services
The basic concept of adding external sites is that all of your content will be posted to a central location (your WordPress site) and from there, it will get distributed automatically to other components of your web traffic generation system, or notify traffic-related web properties and applications.
After adding these external platforms to your traffic network, content linked back to your website will get automatically fed to search, social and aggregator sites. Your content and website will be given additional exposure to new audiences and new sources of traffic.
Some of the external sites will need to have accounts 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, here are just some of the accounts you will need to have set up:
Google Webmasters
(Google Search Console – create a Google-friendly website)
Google Webmaster Tools lets you inform Google about your site’s pages, submit XML sitemaps for automatic page indexing, and provides you with a range of essential information, SEO tools and diagnostic reports about your website.
After setting up your Google Search Console account, the details can be used to automate traffic settings 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 results, SEO, user engagement, marketing efforts, and more, by tracking all user behavior, pages visited, keywords searched for, social media referrers, etc.
Once your Google Analytics account and site data have been set up, traffic tracking information can be integrated with WordPress via a simple plugin used with other applications and reporting tools.
Bing Data And Tools
(Drive more traffic with Bing Data And Tools)
Bing Webmaster Tools is similar to Google Webmasters. Once your Bing Webmaster Tools account is set up, use your account information to automate traffic settings and notifications in WordPress (e.g. using plugins like Yoast SEO) and other applications.
WordPress.com
(WordPress.com)
As discussed in Part 2, WordPress offers website owners the option of a hosted vs self-hosted website. We recommended choosing the self-hosted WordPress option if you plan to build a professional business presence online.
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 with WordPress.com, therefore, and we’ll explain how to integrate this into your automated traffic system in the next installment of this article series.
Social Media
(Syndicate your content automatically to your social media and social bookmarking accounts and get new traffic to your site)
You will need your social media accounts set up 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 pages and drive new visitors to your site.
You should have accounts and profiles set up with all of the popular social networks – Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, LinkedIn, etc.
There are many social bookmarking sites you can syndicate your content to. You don’t need to go crazy, just choose those that will work with your system and/or content sharing tools.
(You can syndicate your content to many social sites. Image source ShareThis.com)
Additional Sites, Aggregators, Etc.
There are a number of new online web platforms and RSS aggregators that can serve as secondary-level traffic generation sources. Some are free or provide free plans, and some offer a range of pricing plans.
For example, here is a content aggregator site that allows you to add an RSS feed from your site …
RebelMouse
(RebelMouse – Publishing platform for distributed content)
RebelMouse is an aggregator for your social profiles and RSS feeds. Your content displays in a Pinterest-like format and visitors can follow your RebelMouse account.
There are many different sites and platforms that can be added to your own traffic system. Please feel free to contact us if you would like to explore some of these and discuss a configuration plan to suit your needs.
After you have configured your server settings and set up accounts with third-party sites, it’s time to configure your WordPress site.
WordPress Site Configuration
The first step in configuring your WordPress site for traffic is to ensure that your global settings have been set up correctly.
Let’s go over some of the important areas.
Global Settings – WordPress
By default, all WordPress installations include a Settings section that allows you to modify your site’s main settings …
(WordPress dashboard menu – Settings)
General Settings
Content entered into fields like Site Title and Tagline can influence your site’s SEO, search listings, etc …
(Global Settings – General Settings Section)
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 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 intentionally configured your settings to prevent search engines from indexing your site, then your site will automatically ping the services entered into the Update Services text box
By default, when WordPress is installed, this section includes only one entry …
(Update Services – A Powerful Traffic Feature)
You can notify dozens of update services automatically with WordPress …
(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
This section affects how your content gets seen by visitors when they visit your home page and blog pages.
The syndication settings on this page can influence traffic. For example, choosing to display the full text vs summaries of your post, affects how your content appears in RSS readers and blog post digests, and could impact someone’s choice to explore your content further, and whether or not they will visit your website or blog 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 main setting in this section as far as traffic is concerned is whether the Search Engine Visibility checkbox is enabled or not.
Typically, you would want search engines to visit your site. Leaving this box unchecked enables WordPress to ping the update services list whenever new posts are published (see Writing Settings above). Unless there is a specific reason to discourage search indexing spiders from visiting 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 Section)
Permalink Settings
Permalinks enable your site to publish posts with search engine-friendly URLs …
(Global Settings – Permalink Settings)
The examples below show some of the ways your post permalinks can be configured …
(Configuring post permalinks)
If you need help setting up permalinks in WordPress, see this step-by-step tutorial: Configuring WordPress Permalinks
Configuring WordPress Plugin Settings For Traffic Generation
The WordPress developer community makes available thousands of plugins that can add just about every type of functionality imaginable to your site, including many plugins that improve traffic generation.
Let’s take a brief look at some types of plugin categories that affect traffic and plugin examples
WordPress Security Plugins – Blog Defender
Once again, it’s important to configure your site for handling both good traffic and bad traffic. No matter what kind of business you run or plan to run online and how small you think your web presence is, you cannot afford to ignore the importance of securing your web sites.
(WordPress Security Plugins help prevent bad traffic from harming your web presence)
Security plugins like Blog Defender help to make your WordPress blog invisible to malicious attacks from hackers and botnets.
Go here to learn more:
WordPress SEO Plugins – Yoast SEO
SEO plugins help drive traffic by improving your site’s SEO …
(SEO plugins help drive traffic by making your website more search engine friendly)
Use a powerful plugin like Yoast SEO (previously called WordPress SEO by Yoast) to improve your SEO. Properly configured, the Yoast SEO plugin not only makes your site easier for search engines like Google and Bing to find and index, it also lets you configure how your content will show up in Google’s search results and social media pages, e.g. Facebook, Twitter, and GooglePlus.
Social Plugins
Allowing visitors to easily share your content online can help boost traffic to your site, especially if you publish content that adds real value to readers.
(WordPress users can easily add social sharing features to their website using free or inexpensive WordPress plugins)
WordPress users can easily add social features to their website using WordPress plugins.
Most social share plugins let you choose which social sites visitors can share your content to, embed social buttons into your content, set up default update notifications, display/hide share counters (e.g. number of shares), etc. Some plugins even allow you to protect content or downloads which visitors can unlock by liking your page.
Themes
As well as configuring various plugins, many WordPress themes also include features that help you drive more traffic to your site.
For example, in addition to options and settings for configuring the design and layout of your site, many themes also include built-in features that let you improve search optimization and site linking structure for faster indexing, easily add tracking snippets, social sharing buttons, etc …
(Many WordPress themes can be configured for improved traffic results)
With a number of WordPress themes, adding social sharing buttons to your site is as easy as clicking a couple of buttons and enabling the feature …
(Many WordPress themes have built-in social sharing features)
Additional Configuration Steps For WordPress Traffic Automation
Last (but by no means least) in the traffic configuration process, are the elements that need to be set up outside of the global settings.
This includes:
Website Legal Pages
Once again, when preparing your site for an increase 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 when more and more people find and begin to visit your website.
If you make money online (or plan to), it’s important that your site remains compliant with regulatory agencies.
(Does Your Site Comply With The Law?)
If you need help adding compliance pages to WordPress, see this article:
WordPress Post Categories & Tags
WordPress categories and tags help search engines better classify and index your web pages, which helps to increase traffic.
(Categories help to improve your site’s SEO, which improves traffic.)
As we strongly recommend in this article, it’s best to set up your website’s post categories and tags during the Website Planning Phases.
When looking at ways to automate and improve traffic, you will want to review and make sure that the categories and tags that have been set up.
Add A Site Map To Your WordPress Site
A site map that lists all of your pages and posts is not only a useful navigation tool for users, it can also help external tools discover more of your web content …
(A site map is not just great for visitors, but for traffic too!)
An HTML site map and an XML sitemap are two different things. HTML site maps provide visitors with a logical map of how your content is organized, whereas XML sitemaps contain code that only search engines can read. Although search engines like Google will index your site 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.
Don’t Forget Your Site’s 404 Page Not Found
When visitors enter the wrong URL into their web browser or click on an invalid hyperlink, they will typically be presented with a 404 error page …
(Default WordPress 404 Not Found error page)
A 404 page can be configured to redirect confused visitors to your functional web pages …
(Configuring your 404 Error Page allows you to recover web traffic that may otherwise be lost.)
Although a 404 Not Found error page can be set up in your server, there are several WordPress plugins that let you easily configure your 404 page inside your WordPress dashboard.
WordPress Traffic System: Configuration Stage – Summary
Once you have your WordPress site expertly configured and fully set up, all you then have to do is publish fresh content consistently to attract more traffic.
The process of expertly configuring your WordPress site, however, can be quite involved and requires the configuration and integration of various components and web properties …
(WP Traffic System – Configuration Checklist)
The knowledge and expertise required to perform this process can take many website developers months to acquire.
Once you have expertly configured your WordPress site, the next step is to automate as much of the process as you can. This step is addressed in the next article in the WordPress Traffic Automation System series.
This is the end of Section Three
To continue reading, click on the link below:
This tutorial is part of a comprehensive series of articles aimed at helping you learn how to grow your business online cost-effectively with a WordPress website or blog and proven marketing methods that are easy to implement.
Would You Like To Get Automatically Notified When New WordPress Tutorials Are Published? Then Subscribe Using The Form Below!
***
"I have used the tutorials to teach all of my clients and it has probably never been so easy for everyone to learn WordPress ... Now I don't need to buy all these very expensive video courses that often don't deliver what they promise." - Stefan Wendt, Internet Marketing Success Group
***