Over 40% of the Internet is built off of WordPress. And that’s not a coincidence.
WordPress offers a world full of everything at your fingertips: SEO, plugins, responsive design, coding done for you, and easy ways to post articles.
Yet it can be quite overwhelming if you’re new to using WordPress. If that’s the case, here are a few WordPress tips for beginners to help you ease into the platform and get started right away!
Invest in the Right Theme
When using WordPress, the only thing that actually makes your website have a unique “look” is the theme that you choose. Depending on your niche, you’ll want to display different things on your website.
For instance, if you’re a travel blogger, you may want a theme that has a widget to show your current location, a sliding bar showing your Instagram photos, and a photography-heavy blog post showcase.
If your website has to do with coding, you wouldn’t need much about photography at all. Your theme may be more technical or word-based. Be sure to pick a theme that has responsive design – this is a fancy way of saying your site will look great on any device.
Choose the Right Plugins
A plugin is a component of software that brings you a user-friendly feature without having to code or do your own building.
When starting out, you want plugins for WordPress security. This will help you keep your website secure from any hackers. You’ll also want a plugin for SEO, which will help you determine if you will be getting views from search engines once you go live.
When looking for the best plugins, pay attention to how many active users there are as well as the rating for each plugin.
Optimize Your Site Speed
Internet users simply do not have much patience. If your site takes more than 3 seconds to load, it’s almost guaranteed they’ll leave your site.
Ways to increase your website’s load time include:
- Compressing images
- Using a lightweight, responsive theme
- Utilize browser caching
- Reducing redirects
- Limiting plugins
- Choose a fast hosting server
Connect Contact Forms to Your Email Marketing
Chances are that if you have your own WordPress website, you are probably also using an email marketing platform. If that’s the case, you will want your contact forms to connect to your email. You will also want to add sign-up forms around your website for people to sign-up to receive emails or marketing from you.
Get Help From a Professional
Although there are free resources on the Internet, these are not always comprehensive enough to get you where you need to be. If you need help or want to get a head start, using a team that knows all there is to know about website design will help you more than you can imagine.
From design tips, SEO strategies, advertising, social media management, and so much more, they have an entire array of knowledge that you may not have about using WordPress or designing a responsive website.
Use These WordPress Tips for Beginners
It’s not easy starting off using WordPress for the first time. Although it’s pretty user-friendly, there are so many WordPress hacks that you may not know right from the get-go.
Follow these WordPress tips for beginners to get started. Once you feel like you’re in a good place, you can start to expand your brand strategy to build your website even further.
WordPress offers an almost endless amount of opportunities to improve not only your website but your business operations. From cornerstone content to e-commerce to analytics, the advanced features available on WordPress can raise your game. Need a hand? Drop us a line.