WordPress is one of the most powerful and flexible tools out there for bloggers. When you choose to use WordPress, you have at your fingertips a vast array of features you can use to customize your blog. To learn more about these options, you should read the advice in the following article.
If you are doing a WordPress blog for professional or search engine optimization purporses, don’t let WordPress actually host your blog. Put your blog on a different host and then just use the WordPress application there. Blogs at WordPress’ website are sometimes deleted for being too commercial or deemed spammy in content.
WordPress makes it easy for users to incorporate video blogging into their site. It can takes some extra preparation time, but it can be worth the effort. Visuals grab your readers’ attention. A video can show them things that the written word just can’t convey, and as a result, it can be a very powerful tool.
If you haven’t customized your WordPress sidebar, it could be cluttered with useless items that are doing nothing but confusing your readers. Your sidebar should only contain things you actually want visitors to click on. Navigate to Appearance & Widgets to edit the appearance of your sidebar and remove anything there that doesn’t actually benefit you or your visitors directly.
Remember to make good use of the footer area at the bottom of your WordPress blog pages. In this area you can include additional information about yourself and/or your copyright. You can also add a link to another page if you wish. Different themes give you more use of this area, so choose your themes carefully to maximize the value of your page footers.
WordPress has many keyboard shortcuts which make working with posts a snap. For example, ctrl-c allows you to copy text, while ctrl-x lets you cut it. Ctrl-v will paste it somewhere else. Ctrl-b is bold, ctrl-i is italic and ctrl-u is underline. These basic keyboard shortcuts will save you a lot of time if you memorize them.
Many people are responding to video blogs, so consider this option. Video blogging is not only becoming more popular, it is also becoming much easier to use. WordPress, in its current version, makes the use of video blogging easy. This can really increase traffic by drawing those who are less inclined to read.
You can help your site’s rank on the search engines by simply taking a few minutes when adding images to your site. Never forget to include a title and the alt attribute. If a viewer pins your picture on Pinterest, your title is what will appear on their screen.
Your username should never be “admin” or anything similar. Bots are more likely to attack a blog that has “administrator” or “admin” as a username. It is a risk of your security. Go to your “user” page and erase anything that has to do with usernames that contain “administrator” or “admin”. Use another username.
Do not forget about Facebook. Visitors to your site should be able to leave comments or register with your site through their Facebook account. There are plugins that will help you getting things rolling on your page, and they are easy to download and use. Since so many people are on Facebook, it is important to ensure that your page incorporates the social media site in some way.
Be sure to back up your site often! The best way to do this is to have your host back up your site every day for you. If they don’t offer this service, instead back it up yourself. There are plugins which will do the job for you, or you can just download it to your own computer.
Be sure to use a robust spam plug-in to filter out spam and bad content. People with ill-intentions are always looking for ways to spam a blog for link building purposes. This kind of spam will create a bad impression on your blog because your legitimate readers will think that your blog has security issues.
If you want to post on off-days, schedule them a few days before via WordPress. It is possible to have posts published at specified times, no matter where you happen to be. Look for the Publish box on the Edit screen. Beneath that, look for “Publish Immediately.” Set the times in military time and the day, month and year you want to post it. Click OK. When you spot your “schedule for” screen, select it and then hit “schedule” if things look right.
Back up your content on your WordPress blog. Sure WordPress is a very well-known and stable platform, but things still do go wrong from time to time. You don’t want to be caught without a content backup if somethings gone the wrong way. You can simply copy and paste your articles into Evernote or another notes platform.
Read reviews of a plugin you want to use. Anyone who can program can make their own plugin. A plugin could be full of bugs and problems that could damage your computer. If a plugin has been downloaded a lot and has high ratings, it is probably a safe bet.
If you just want to dabble in WordPress without installing it on your web hosting account, consider opening an account with WordPress.com. You will get a subdomain to the WordPress domain, and your blog is hosting by WordPress for free. This is a good way to get your feet wet into blogging.
When linking internally, you don’t have to enter your domain name into the URL field. Instead, just include the information which comes after the first /, such as /index.html. Don’t forget to also insert an SEO keyword-rich title so that you can get even more bang for your search rank.
Getting started with WordPress is not difficult. The program is easy to use, and anyone can start blogging in a few minutes. However, some of the program’s more powerful features may take some more time to learn. Use the advice that you have read in this article to get the most out of WordPress.
