Unleash WordPress: Your New Blog Checklist For Success

(Reading time: 4 – 6 minutes)

Creating a brand new personal publishing platform (i.e., a blog) on the World Wide Web has become stupendously easy. Creating a blog that doesn’t suck isn’t that difficult either. In fact, it’s as easy as following this checklist:

1. Install WordPress: It’s simple! Use the Website In A Weekend procedure for 5 minute installation.
2. Choose an appropriate theme: 2 columns? 3 columns? What makes a good theme anyway? As you probably know already, I use Thesis theme, but there’s many others. Whichever theme you use, ensure it’s well-maintained and works with the current version of WordPress. Look for more on choosing themes in the future.
3. Install and configure required plugins: There’s only a few plugins that fall into the required category… everyone has their short list… but what they do is all the same: get registered with search engines, block spam, etc. Here’s the Website In A Weekend for “Your Top 4 Plugins for Wordpress — Critical infrastructure for your WordPress blog”
4. Handle initial security: Install the WP-Security plugin, follow it’s recommendations and you will be protected from a vast number of dumb mistakes. See, dumb mistakes are exploited by dumb hackers… and dumb hackers will destroy your site accidently! Smart hackers prefer to use your site, not destroy it. Keep the dummies out with simple security precautions.
   Check out “More WordPress Simple Security: 5 Plugins to help you lock out unwanted visitors.”
5. Add required pages, editorial policy: Every blog needs a certain collection of pages: About, Terms and Conditions, Sitemap, and possibly more. Every blog needs “Web Site Infrastructure — Required posts and pages for your WordPress blog“
6. Ensure correct copyright: Technically, your work is copyrighted as soon as you write it. Declaring your copyright in a visible location helps establish your claim on infringement. For example, here’s “How To Add A Copyright Notice To A WordPress Theme.”

   If you’re really concerned, register important material with Library of Congress, which may allow you to seek damages on infringement. Talk to an attorney if copyright is a critical concern.

7. Add favicon: Having an appropriate and professional favicon really helps your blog look good. Read more about Adding favicon.ico to WordPress For Professional Appearance.
8. Create categories: Choose 3 to 7 Posting Categories to More Effectively Focus Your Writing. Categories really help you focus your writing to stay on target, and it’s worth spending the time to create effective category names.
9. Add pillar content: Every website needs a main theme, established in 4 or 5 “flagship” pages of timeless material. Learn “How To Rapidly And Easily Create Pillar And Flagship Content For Your Blog.”
10. Blog sitemap: Sitemaps make it easy for visitors to see your whole website at a glance and visit pages whose titles capture their interest. For example, check out Website In A Weekend’s sitemap… make sure you’re not missing anything important.
11. Google Analytics: get your gmail account, sign up for
    analytics, follow the directions carefully, then paste the tracking code number into the correct field using Joost de Valk’s Google Analytics for WordPress plugin.
12. XML sitemap, Google Webmaster tools: I use the “html” verification process, by creating an empty file on my local computer then transferring that file to the server using FTP. After transferring, I manually submit the sitemap.xml and wait about an hour. Once the sitemap is processed, I check for errors.
13. Set up your 404 page: When your web server cannot find a web page as requested by the user it sends a “404 Error”. You can specify a page to be served to the user along with the error. The page can provide more information to the user, and direct them to other interesting parts of your website.
14. Get right with Automattic for your Gravatar, Akismet and blog stats accounts. One registration at wordpress.com, useful for a host of reasons.

If you check off every item in this list… even if you just go through the motions like a mechanical robot… you will end with a blog that doesn’t suck. Really, you will. Do it and see. When you’re finished, compare what you’ve just done with other blogs out there. Remember, search engines don’t care about how your graphics look… blog with fancy graphics and crappy content won’t ever work their way up the search results… not without some serious gaming that is. In contrast, your well-structured blog with accurate and original content will over time accrue permanent authority. Here’s proof: over the last 3 months, Website In A Weekend has moved up from below the top hundred results and on to the first or second page of Google for many search terms related to the intensely competitive WordPress field, including the term “pillar content.” (Note: competitive terms below the top 3 fluctuate in ranking almost daily, being consistently on the first two pages is pretty good!)

Tagged as: Admin user, Categories, Installation, Unleash WordPress