Your website is one of the most important tools for growing your business. But it can be intimidating to manage if you’re not very technically inclined. Don’t let that scare you. You don’t have to be a tech wizard to manage your site and get it to its fullest potential. Here are some website tips for bloggers:
[ ] Good Hosting
Use a reliable yet affordable hosting service when starting out. GreenGeeks, HostGator and Bluehost are great hosting services and affordable.
[ ] Keywords for SEO
Use the free Yoast plugin for WordPress (you can download it under “plugin’s” in your WP dashboard).
Once you have it installed, go to “Settings” in your dashboard, select Yoast and enter a title, description for your business and the top keywords for your business. An example of a keyword would be “paranormal fiction author”, or “delivery service”, or “Niagara veterinary hospital”.
Then, on each page and post, you’ll want to add a title, description and keywords specific to that page or post. There will be a place to do this underneath where you write the content on the New Post or Page.
[ ] Social Sharing Buttons
You’ll want your content and images to be easily shareable on social media! Use a free, simple plug in to put social media buttons next to your content. Be sure the plug in makes sharing images on Pinterest easy for your readers as well, as Pinterest is an excellent source of traffic for your website – and traffic brings extra readers and potentially extra customers!
[ ] Limit Plugins
While plugins are great and add functionality to your WordPress blog, you don’t want to install too many plugins and you definitely want to deactivate or uninstall any that you aren’t using. Too many plugins can slow down the speed of your site.
[ ] Google Analytics
Go to www.google.com/analytics, create an account, and then plug the code into your WordPress website. Depending on your theme, where you place the code will vary. Most themes have a place in “theme settings” for you to put your GA code.
Google Analytics will help you keep track of your traffic, the source of your traffic and which pages on your site are most visited. This is important info to track!
[ ] Opt-in Box for List Building
Make sure you are collecting email addresses! Even if you are selling a product and not trying to do regular email blasts, you should be collecting the email addresses from everyone who visits your site. Offer something useful and free to encourage sign-ups.
Use a service like Mailchimp, MailerLite or ConvertKit to do this. Most of these services have a plugin that will help you place the opt-in box on your site.
Place opt-in boxes in these key places on your site:
- Homepage –above the fold (so visitors don’t have to scroll down to see it)
- Top of side-bar or in header
- Bottom of every blog post
- Bottom of About page
Another great strategy for growing an email list is to offer lead magnets that are specific to each blog post.
Note: If you use a pop up to ask for emails for your newsletter, do not have it pop before someone can actually read a bit of your website. Give readers a chance to decide if they like your content first.
You Can Do It!
Managing your blog can feel overwhelming. It can feel like there are a million “impossible” things to do, but if you break down each action item into a daily or weekly “to-do” and tackle each item one at a time it becomes much easier. Hopefully these website tips for bloggers helped – and if you need more help, just reach out to us.