Tips And Tricks For Improving Your WordPress Skills

Do you want to be a blogger? Does the thought of starting your own blog sound like a lot of fun? Or perhaps you already have a blog, but you are not happy with the software you are using. If this is the case, you need to learn more about WordPress.

Be sure to add an author biography to each blog post on boards where many bloggers are posting. In this way, each blogger gets proper credit and it is easier for readers to know who posted what at a glance. Furthermore, readers will tend to stay on your page if they can get all the information they need in one place.

Be sure to stay on top of updates! Many updates to add-ons or WordPress itself are security-based, meaning your site could be compromised if you don’t update the software. If it’s telling you a new update is available, install it as soon as possible to protect your site from harm.

Create smart URLs! Don’t use a lot of keywords in the URL, and keep the whole thing simple and straightforward. Avoid excessive verbiage. You want to create smart permalinks that are easy to look at and easy to understand. This helps make your blog more user friendly and comprehensible.

Make sure that all of the information on your site is current. This is very important as viewers will tend to veer away from your site if it is outdated or pointing out very old information. Spend time each week getting rid of the antiquated material on your website to improve how it looks.

Allow all of the users that visit your site the ability to comment using Facebook. This is a very important tool that will get your name across to hundreds of thousands of people. The Simple Facebook Connect plugin can be used if you want to install this feature on your site.

Clean up comments and content that don’t add anything to your website. This makes your website more user-friendly. You can use a plugin called Akismet to filter spam on your website.

If you are new to WordPress, make sure to keep your sidebar simple. Make sure that it only has the essentials. Your visitors shouldn’t have to weed through a ton of ads and banners to find the links they want to click on. Try removing the items in Appearance & Widgets that don’t contribute anything to your cause or business.

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.

Let your users easily share your content via email. This allows your readers to share an articles with their friends and also to save a copy for themselves. A WP Email plugin can make this possible.

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.

Keep your WordPress password safe and to yourself. Also, only use plugins from sites of good repute. You can lose everything on your page if it gets hacked or is affected by malware.

Titles and targeted descriptions are important. These will be the first things your audience sees when discovering your blog via a search engine. This makes them critically important. Check out Scribe, which is an SEO software that gives you power on your site. You can edit such items to boost visitor counts.

Make sure that all your media is in order. It’s tempting to upload pictures into the library directly, however, things can easily get disorganized. Set up folders right at the outset, and put images into the correct folders. If you’d like to use an image again, you can find it easily.

Use images properly on your WordPress site. They can add everything from beauty to interest to your pages. Use their alternative text tags and title tags properly. Don’t settle for generic descriptions. You need to make them specific so that your visitors know exactly what they are. This also helps them figure out what your site is about.

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.

Does your WordPress dashboard look like a cluttered mess? Want to clean it up? Use the Screen Options link on that page to choose which boxes you want to appear and remove those which aren’t helpful to you. This will ensure that your dashboard experience is streamlined in the future.

Want to create a new link in your post? There is no need to click the link icon any longer. Use ctrl-shift-A instead to start the link creation process using the keyboard and not the mouse. When you create many links within your content, this can shave time off the creation process.

WordPress is one of the best blogging platforms out there. It combines ease of use with flexibility and power. Whether you are a novice blogger who is just starting out, or you have been blogging for many years, you can benefit from learning more about the powerful features of WordPress.