Over my many years of using WordPress I’ve learned some expert tips to give your site a jumpstart.
If you’re looking to start a WordPress blog read my guide here.
These are especially helpful for sites with small budgets and just want to get their content online.
1. Host Your Site on a Kickass Server
You can waste loads of time optimizing and securing your WordPress site. Well now there are web hosts specifically designed for WordPress and I’ve found them well worth the extra monthly cost.
Flywheel (I use Flywheel personally, starts at $15/month), MeltedIceberg and WP Engine (starts at $30/month) both services are essentially the same they’ll handle things like performance, security and updates so you can focus on your site.
2. Download a Premium Theme
Themes are the heart of WordPress so it’s important to start with a fantastic one.ThemeForest has a MASSIVE selection of themes to choose from.
The quality level on ThemeForest is set very high but always be sure to find a theme with 4.5+ stars. From restaurants to wedding sites you’ll be sure find a theme to match your content.
Most themes are around $50 and well worth the price when building your business.
3. Start with Essential Plugins
WordPress SEO by Yoast – SEO is important for almost every site and this SEO plugin from Yoast gives you essentially everything you need. From custom titles, meta descriptions and sitemaps this is indispensable for any site wanting to get indexed by search engines.
Jetpack – Built by Automattic Jetpack offers a load of tweaks many sites require. Things like contact forms, adding custom CSS, mobile themes, security, and more are available to pick and choose when adding this plugin. The anti-spam and anti-brute force capabilities are alone worth adding this to your site.
Google Analytics by Yoast – If you use Google Analytics this free plugin allows you to easily enable it on your WordPress site.
Taken from my LinkedIn Post
