15 WordPress Tips for Beginners: An Expert’s Guide

In this article, we’ll explore valuable WordPress tips and tricks to empower beginners in creating and optimizing their websites.

Key Takeaways

1. Select the Right Hosting: Select a fast and reliable web hosting provider to ensure efficient site performance.
2. Preview Theme Demos for WordPress Insights: Preview and assess different themes before making a choice to match your website’s design.
3. Boost Your Site’s SEO with WordPress Plugins: Enhance your site’s search engine visibility and optimization.
4. Add Google Analytics to WordPress: Gain insights into your website’s traffic and user behavior for better decision-making.
5. Choose the Perfect WordPress Theme: Choose a theme that aligns with your project, ensuring a visually appealing website.
6. Consider Image Compression and Speed: Optimize image sizes to improve site speed and performance.
7. Prioritize Which WordPress Plugins You Use: Be cautious with plugin usage to prevent security risks and maintain site speed.
8. Set up your Gravatar: Personalize your comments with an avatar for better engagement.
9. Keep WordPress Updated: Regularly update WordPress, themes, and plugins to improve security and functionality.
10. Manage your comments: Engage with visitors by moderating and responding to comments effectively.
11. Declutter WordPress Content: Present a clean and organized website for a positive user experience.
12. Edit your WordPress permalinks: Customize URLs for better SEO and user-friendly links.
13. Prioritize Your WordPress Safety: Prioritize website security through SSL certificates and security plugins.
14. Use title tags and alt text: Optimize images for accessibility and search engine visibility.
15. Set featured images: Enhance visual appeal by using prominent images to represent your content.

1. Select the Right Hosting

If you’re anything like most of us who use the web, you probably can’t stand waiting forever for a website to load. Many of us won’t think twice about leaving a website that takes ages to load. To ensure your website doesn’t fall into that category, having a speedy web hosting provider is crucial. 

Here’s a simple breakdown of what to consider when picking a web hosting plan:

• WordPress Core Management and Security Updates: Make sure your hosting provider takes care of managing WordPress core software updates and security patches. This ensures your site is always up-to-date and secure.
• Unlimited Bandwidth: This means your site won’t have restrictions on the amount of traffic it can handle, preventing any lag or slow loading times.
• Ample Storage and Fast Servers: You’ll want enough storage space to accommodate all your website’s content. Additionally, fast servers are a must for quick loading times.
• Global Content Delivery Network (CDN): This feature ensures your site’s content is distributed across multiple servers worldwide, leading to faster loading times and redundancy.
• Protection Against DDoS and Malware: Ensure your hosting plan includes protection against distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks and malware detection.
• Automated Backups and Site Restoration: Accidents happen, and websites can crash. Having automated backups and site restoration services can be a lifesaver in such situations.
• Personalized Support: A supportive team that can assist with site setup, troubleshooting, and migration can make your experience much smoother.

When considering hosting providers, some of the most popular options for WordPress users include:

• SiteGround
• Bluehost
• IONOS
• WP Engine
• DreamHost
• Flywheel
• Kinsta
• InMotion
• Hostinger

WordPress-recommended hosts like Bluehost offer comprehensive plans that cover hosting, domain and SSL certificates, and business email. To make your journey even easier, Bluehost provides a one-click WordPress installation (or pre-installation) and a user-friendly, no-code page builder theme designed specifically for WordPress.

2. Preview Theme Demos for WordPress Insights

A lot of themes provide a free demo version that allows you to test its suitability. Don’t overlook this opportunity—the demo lets you ensure the theme meets your needs.

Remember, your theme lays the foundation for your website’s appearance, so picking one you enjoy and that fits your project is crucial. Even though WordPress can be customized, starting with a suitable theme is wise, especially if you’re not familiar with coding or working with a developer.

Here’s how you can go about it: find a theme that catches your eye, click “View Demo” or “Live Preview,” and visualize how it looks online. If you’re satisfied with the theme and decide to use it, you can personalize the demo content to make the theme your own truly!

3. Boost Your Site’s SEO with WordPress Plugins

WordPress comes with numerous built-in features for optimizing SEO, such as crafting titles, generating metadata, adding tags, enhancing alt text, customizing URLs, and more. However, SEO plugins take things up a notch by helping you fine-tune your web pages for improved search engine rankings.

These plugins prove especially handy when it comes to optimizing keywords. Many popular SEO plugins offer tools that provide insights into changes you can implement on each page, increasing the likelihood of better visibility in search results.

Among the crowd, Yoast SEO stands as the reigning champ of WordPress SEO plugins, boasting an impressive 25,857 5-star ratings as of the time of writing. Yoast offers user-friendly guidance on how well your website’s content will perform in Google searches. It also offers valuable features that seamlessly integrate with Google Search Console, further enhancing your SEO efforts.

Moreover, Yoast SEO empowers you to set keywords for every page on your website and then evaluates content performance with a color-coded indicator—red, orange, or green. The plugin even includes an XML sitemap generator, which you can link to Google Search Console, ensuring comprehensive indexing of your website and all its content.

The result? A website that excels in performance and ranks swiftly where it truly matters: the keywords you’ve selected.

4. Add Google Analytics to WordPress

In this era of data-driven practices, having a tool that offers in-depth information about your website visitors is vital. Among these tools, Google Analytics serves as a crucial asset, providing you with the following insights:

• Who has visited your site, and when
• Activities carried out by visitors to your website
• How visitors stumble upon your website
• Interaction patterns with your website’s content
• Additional details like visitor location, preferred browsers, default language, screen resolution, JavaScript support, and more.

This user data proves invaluable for strategizing and aids in tailoring your website, including themes and menu placements, as well as future enhancements.

For even more robust strategies and improvements, considering advanced analytics consulting can be worthwhile. These services delve deeper into your data, empowering you to make informed decisions and optimize your website efficiently.

Google Analytics 4 is the latest version that took center stage on 1st July 2023, marking the departure of universal analytics. To continue tracking website traffic, transitioning to GA4 is imperative.

To simplify this, employ a plugin for incorporating your Google Analytics tag code into WordPress.

Among the options, “Google Analytics for WordPress” by MonsterInsights stands as the most popular choice, seamlessly facilitating the addition of your Google Analytics code to your site.

While the free version suffices for basic needs, consider upgrading to the pro version for advanced tracking and reporting features, if desired.

5. Choose the Perfect WordPress Theme

Navigating WordPress’s site design can be less intuitive, leading most users to opt for a theme. These themes generally come equipped with site-wide settings, empowering you to personalize colors, fonts, and layouts, incorporate your logo, and craft navigation menus and widgets.

With over 9,000 themes available, both free and paid, in the WordPress theme repository, plus numerous offerings from theme marketplaces like Theme Forest, the importance of picking the right one cannot be overstated. This choice significantly streamlines the process of constructing your website.

Alongside basic customizations, many themes also offer adaptable templates designed for different types of web pages.

When selecting a theme, peruse user reviews to gauge its customizability and user-friendliness. Ensure it includes the necessary features for your site and receives regular updates. If updates are neglected, your website could break during WordPress core updates.

While free themes provide an excellent starting point, they often impose limits on customization. Allocating a budget for a premium theme is wise. Premium themes typically offer a wider array of elements and simplify adjustments to your site’s colors, fonts, and design elements, such as buttons and menus.

Here’s an insight: Web design statistics reveal that a brand’s credibility hinges 75% on its website design. Thus, dedicate the time to choose a theme that empowers you to construct a fully customized website aligned with your brand, delivering an exceptional user experience (UX).

6. Consider Image Compression and Speed

Another tactic to supercharge your website’s search engine optimization (SEO) involves compressing your images. This strategy matters because the speed at which your site loads for visitors significantly impacts your Google search rankings.

The site load velocity stands as a key gauge of user experience, and a sluggish-loading site translates to an unsatisfactory visitor journey. This factor becomes even more critical when you consider that 63% of searches stem from mobile devices.

When images are hefty, they can impose several seconds of loading time, thereby hampering your site’s overall performance. To circumvent this delay, trim image sizes using tools such as Adobe Photoshop or the online graphic design platform Canva.

Alternatively, WordPress users can integrate image compression plugins, ensuring visually stunning images without dragging down your site’s speed.

Pro tip: To evaluate your site’s loading speed, give Pingdom a shot. Pingdom’s services encompass performance monitoring for your website, and you can freely use their web speed tester by inputting a URL. This will help you stay ahead in delivering a seamless user experience. 

7. Prioritize Which WordPress Plugins You Use

Running an excessive number of WordPress plugins on your site can amplify security risks. While you can oversee the elements you code yourself, the reality is that you can’t be entirely certain about the security measures implemented by plugin developers. Each additional plugin introduced to your website introduces another possible vulnerability.

Furthermore, plugin overload can lead to sluggish site performance. Plugins require database resources each time a user accesses a new page. The more plugins in play, the longer it takes for them to retrieve necessary data. Streamlining the number of plugins on your site maintains its agility and ensures swift load times.

Now, how many plugins should you have to strike the right balance? The truth is, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all number that guarantees optimal power and speed for your site. The appropriate number of plugins hinges on your site’s unique attributes, resources, and requirements. What matters is avoiding unnecessary excess plugins.

Additionally, periodically assess your plugin lineup, confirm their utility, and contemplate consolidating a few into a single comprehensive plugin that fulfills the same tasks. 

8. Set Up Your Gravatar

Gravatar, which stands for Globally Recognized Avatar, serves as an online avatar platform. This web service enables users to upload an avatar and link it to their email address.

Consequently, when users log into WordPress using their email and leave comments on WordPress sites, Gravatar automatically associates the avatar with their profile. This avatar then appears alongside their comments.

Discover the two primary reasons for embracing Gravatar:

• Gravatar spares you the hassle of repeatedly uploading avatars for every blog you engage with. When you comment on websites integrated with Gravatar, your photo or brand logo takes the spotlight. Rather than a generic icon next to your name, your logo becomes recognizable. This cultivates brand consistency across the digital landscape.
• WordPress administrators can activate Gravatar on their sites, enhancing commenters’ brand visibility. Embracing Gravatar provides transparency regarding comment authors on your site. This straightforward step enriches the interaction between you and your audience, fostering a stronger online community.

9. Keep WordPress Updated

WordPress operates on an open-source foundation, so it undergoes near-constant enhancements to boost performance, security, and user-friendliness. While select components of WordPress receive automatic updates, the responsibility rests with you to remain vigilant about the rest. Below are vital aspects requiring continuous attention to uphold your site’s excellence:

• WordPress: Managed WordPress hosting often automates core and security updates, yet a manual check is wise. Your WordPress dashboard will signal the availability of a new version. Safeguard your data with a backup before proceeding to update WordPress to the latest release.
• Theme or page builder plugin: Developers regularly update theme software due to WordPress’s ongoing evolution. Some themes offer automatic updates, while others entail manual application. Access your theme’s details via Appearance → Themes in the dashboard. Your active theme will indicate if an update is required.
• Plugins: Plugin software updates aren’t bound by a fixed schedule. Consequently, monitoring your site’s admin panel monthly and after WordPress updates is a prudent practice. This ensures you’re promptly informed about available updates for each plugin. The simplest way to check is by clicking on “Plugins” in the left-side dashboard menu to reach the Plugins page.

10. Manage Your Comments

Fostering dialogue with your visitors involves valuing comments as a pivotal element. Comment systems stand as a stronghold for retaining control as an admin, especially as forums wane with the rise of social media.

New WordPress setups allow default comments, granting you authority over the content displayed on your page.

Even if you don’t directly engage with customer feedback, comment management underscores your audience’s significance. It showcases your commitment to reviewing and updating your website’s information—a facet that’s SEO advantageous.

Furthermore, regular contributors enhance your posts by aiding visitors. Valuable comments endure and offer fresh viewpoints on pertinent matters, enriching discussions. Disagreements among users often lead to mutual understanding within comments.

While auto-approving everything is ill-advised due to spam risks, WordPress provides robust filtering tools. Automating moderation through these tools saves considerable time and safeguards the comment environment.

By thoughtfully handling comments, you establish an open, constructive, and time-efficient interaction with your audience.

11. Declutter WordPress Content

A cluttered website results from an excess of pages and overly intricate design components. This may entail distracting visuals or an overabundance of advertisements.

Such clutter can undoubtedly lead to an unfavorable user experience (UX). Overwhelmed users might not return, ultimately elevating bounce rates and hindering conversions.

Contrastingly, a sleek and swift presentation can make a positive impact. A site with minimal distractions often fosters enhanced user interaction. Simplified navigation facilitates content exploration, guides users through your sales funnel, and prompts clicks on your call to action (CTA). Streamlining your website could even amplify your conversion rates.

This segment has explored four tactics for decluttering your website:

1. Perform a bit of spring cleaning.
2. Implement a well-defined linking strategy.
3. Elevate your content and enhance site readability.
4. Leverage negative space for improved visual balance.

12. Edit Your WordPress Permalinks

A WordPress permalink serves as a fixed URL, allowing visitors to access specific sections of your website directly from their browsers. Every component of a WordPress site possesses its own distinct permalink, encompassing:

• E-commerce products
• Pages
• Posts
• Archive pages (e.g., categories, tags)
• 404 pages
• Custom post types

The default setting, labeled “Plain,” assigns numeric identifiers to pages, which isn’t optimal for search engine optimization (SEO).

To rectify this, access the WordPress dashboard, and locate Settings → Permalinks. Then, shift from “Plain” to “Custom Structure.” The field should already display /%postname%. Save the updated settings.

Consequently, URLs for pages and blog posts will now feature the post name instead of numbers. This enhancement fosters improved search engine connectivity, linking your content to potential customers during searches.

13. Prioritize Your WordPress Safety

WordPress SSL Certification

Getting an SSL certificate is like adding a protective shield to your website. It encrypts the data shared between your visitors and your site, making it useless to hackers. This is so important that even Google insists on it, and it can even affect how high your site appears in search results.

Moreover, browsers like Chrome now warn users before they enter sites without SSL, which makes non-SSL sites seem less safe.

When you buy a domain, it often comes with an SSL certificate automatically. Sometimes, you can add it separately or even use a WordPress plugin. Many hosting plans give you free SSL certificates for all your domains.

Usually, the certificate links to your domain without any effort, but you might need to make a small adjustment in your domain settings.

If you want to add an SSL certificate using WordPress, a plugin like “Really Simple SSL” can help. If you get your SSL certificate separately, you just need to connect it to your domain and update your WordPress settings. You can always check with your hosting provider to understand the SSL options they offer and how to set them up for your website.

Regular WordPress Backups

Your web host might handle automatic backups, but that might not be enough to cover all your bases in case something goes wrong with your site. It’s a good practice to manually back up your site regularly, especially when you update plugins or WordPress. Doing this requires using a special tool, so choose wisely.

Free plugins designed to help you back up your WordPress site might not capture all your information. Also, many free plugins don’t offer automatic backups. When you pick a backup plugin, make sure the file it creates is stored in a secure offline format, like on a backup drive or a USB stick. This way, you’ll always have a recent copy of your site handy if your server faces any issues.

Security Plugins for WordPress

The next step in ensuring your site’s security is setting up a WordPress security plugin. While there are free choices, opting for a paid plugin can offer extra layers of security to fortify your website.

Take, for instance, Wordfence. It comes with a firewall and other security tools designed to shield your site from data breaches. The free version offers a dependable level of defense, priced affordably at $99 per year. However, the paid version comes packed with even more features, providing your site with the tools it needs to remain safeguarded. 

14. Use Title Tags and Alt Text

Images play a vital role in conveying information, and optimizing them for various purposes is crucial. Alt tags, also known as alt text, serve as descriptions that benefit screen reader users and aid search engines like Google in comprehending the image’s content and purpose.

Including alt text isn’t just an SEO tactic; it’s a step towards accessibility, ensuring that individuals using screen readers can grasp the image’s significance.

Title tags offer a distinct advantage by allowing you to display a different title in search engine results compared to the one on your actual post. This versatility can be particularly helpful when you need to condense a title or create a more fitting version.

Employing title tags can elevate your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) efforts, enhance Click-Through Rates (CTRs), and contribute to an overall improved user experience.

15. Set Featured Images

In the realm of WordPress, the featured image takes center stage, gracing the top of every page and post. Typically accompanied by a website title and a menu lineup below, it’s a visual anchor. While companies often opt for their logo as the featured image, blogs often embrace captivating photos.

Featured images hold significant value for these reasons:

• Representing Your Entire Blog: The WordPress featured image occupies a prime spot, serving as a visual ambassador for your entire blog. If your blog revolves around travel, an alluring landscape image sets the tone perfectly.
• Capturing Attention: In the sea of social media and search results, your WordPress-featured image is the hook that grabs attention and entices clicks. It’s what draws eyes and interest, often referred to as post thumbnails.
• Setting the Mood for Your Post: The featured image can establish the vibe of your post. For instance, a serious current events article warrants a relevant and thought-provoking featured image.

As you draft a new post in WordPress, glance at the right sidebar. You’ll spot a section with a link saying, “Set featured image.” Click, upload your desired image, and you’re set. Don’t forget to provide a title and alt text for your featured image to enhance its accessibility and overall impact.

WordPress Tips: FAQs

WordPress Tips: Bottom Line

By implementing these WordPress tips, beginners can establish a strong foundation for their websites. With a focus on hosting, themes, plugins, and optimization, this guide equips you with essential strategies for a successful online presence.