WordPress powers 35% of the internet. As a blogger, this means that it’s a pretty important platform on which you can write, create, and promote your content.
However, if you’re really going to harness the power of WordPress, you need to learn how to take advantage of all of the plugins and tools available to you.
As of right now, there are over 50,000 WordPress plugins available to download. If you’re just getting started out blogging, however, you’re going to want to take it slow.
Here are seven of the best WordPress hacks to elevate your blog game instantly.
1. Install Yoast to Boost Your SEO
We’ll start with what is perhaps one of the most popular SEO plugins that WordPress offers its users.
SEO is crucial when it comes to seeing success with a blog, which makes Yoast SEO a must-have tool for any blogger learning how to use WordPress.
Yoast is a free plugin, so there’s really no reason not to install it! It handles the optimization of your blog content for search engines.
This means that every time you write a new blog, you’re able to set a focus keyword and then Yoast will analyze your content and tell you where you can improve.
This means that all of your blogs are going to be 100% SEO-ready without you having to do pretty much anything.
2. Sign Up for Grammarly to Avoid Mistakes
Looking to take your blog game to the next level? Download a browser extension so that every time you write in WordPress, the extension lets you know when you’ve made a mistake.
While Grammarly is free, you can also pay for the premium version that will further enhance your blogging efforts.
With Grammarly Premium, you can gain insight into other aspects of your blog writing, such as whether or not you’re using lots of passive voice or if your sentences are too wordy.
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On top of scanning your blog for spelling and grammar mistakes, if you install the tool on your browser, it will check everything you write. This means that you’ll never misspell something in an email again.
3. Set Up a Virtual Office
When it comes to WordPress tips, few people seem to mention the importance of setting up a virtual office if you plan to expand your blog in the future.
This is especially important if you’re going to leverage your blog following to eventually grow a real business.
You’ll need to have a prime address to look professional, and a virtual office is one way to do this.
Try installing a plugin like The Hoxton Mix that gives you all of the benefits of a registered address without the hassle of actually having to have a physical office.
If your blog grows to be big enough, you can also have your mail sent to the location and forwarded to you, too!
4. Let WordPress Find Your Internal Links
Internal linking is a great way to enhance your on-page SEO while offering up ways for your readers to easily access other related content.
However, if you have lots of blogs, it makes it hard to sift through them all in order to find the right internal links.
So, instead, let WordPress do the work for you! It’s so easy that you don’t need a WordPress tutorial for this.
When you go to insert or edit a link in the WordPress editor, you’ll see a small strip of text at the bottom that says “link to existing content.”
Once you click on it, it’ll expand to show you a search field where you can easily search for related content. All you have to do is click on the post and WordPress will automatically add the URL to the hyperlink.
5. Learn How to Compress Your Images
The loading speed of a website is pretty crucial when it comes to web design.
Not only is it important when it comes to your SEO ranking, but blog readers simply don’t want to visit a site that takes too long to load.
So, to avoid a slow site, you’re going to need to compress your images.
To do this, you simply have to visit one of the many free online image compressors. You’ll upload the photo you want to include in your blog and the software will compress it for you.
This saves you bandwidth and storage, which is great if you’re working off one of the lower-level WordPress plans.
6. Use Titles and Alt Tags
Google browses your blog images as well as your text when it’s looking for sites to show after someone searches for a keyword.
This makes it really important to always use title and alt tags when you upload pictures. While it won’t affect your blog design, it does affect the backend.
An alt title should be short, simple, and descriptive. Let Google know exactly what your photos are about by using keywords that relate to your content and your website.
And alt text tells someone what the image is showing. This is helpful when an image doesn’t load for whatever reason, or if they’re using a screen reader.
7. Manage Your Comments
Google crawls the comments section of your blog along with your actual content.
This means that you’ll want to manage the comments section of your blog regularly.
In general, it’s a good practice to get into as it’ll also ensure that your readers don’t view any spam when they go to read or comment on your blog.
One easy way to do this is to first go to your settings and head over to the discussion section. Set the preferences that you want.
Then, if you realize that you have lots of spam, you can actually go to your comments section and click “Empty Spam” to do it immediately.
Need More WordPress Hacks?
If you’re working hard to grow your blog, then you’re going to need all of the WordPress hacks that you can get!
Head on over to our blog for more tips and tricks on how to make use of all of the unique features that WordPress offers you as a blogger.
If you need a little more direction, then feel free to contact us with any specific blogging questions that you have.
