1.0 Introduction:
WordPress is a free, open-source, and most widely used CMS (content management system) to create blogs, websites, and online stores. It is licensed under the GPLv2 license. WordPress also has the honor of being the most popular CMS in the world with around 60 million websites running on it.
It was originally created by Matt Mullenweg in 2003 but due to some technical problem he had to step down from his project, so he handed over the project to his developer, Mike Little. Since then it has grown leaps and bounds becoming one of the most powerful CMS platforms available on the web today.
Additionally Read: Things To Look For In Your WordPress Theme
2.0 What is WordPress?
WordPress is an open-source application that you can use for creating a blog or website on any web host you choose without having to spend extra money for buying a domain name using WordPress hosting plans provided by some web hosts like Hostgator etc.
It helps you in increasing traffic statistics for your blog or website using SEO strategies explained in this article and also helps your website rank higher among other sites out there in search results when people search using keywords related to your content or niche on search engines like Google, Bing etc..
3.0 WordPress Core features:
WordPress core features are as follows:
Blogs –
Blogging with WordPress (formerly b2/cafelog) allows users to create their own blogs within minutes with no experience required at all.
CMS –
A Content Management System that allows non-technical users do almost everything themselves.
Customizable Themes –
Over 1500 free themes are available online which can be easily customized as per user’s requirements.
Dashboard –
A built-in Dashboard gives user access all important information about their site from one location including administrative tasks such as adding new posts, pages, videos etc., managing comments etc., managing menus and widgets etc.
Plugins & Widgets –
Widgets & plugins act as an extension of core functionality allowing users add new functionalities without modifying theme code.
Additionally Read: 20 Best Membership Plugins For WordPress
Ecommerce –
Many ecommerce plugins are available for WordPress which allow users to create online stores without knowing any technical details about online stores.
Multilingual –
WordPress is translated into over 100 languages and supports UTF-8 character encoding.
4.0 WordPress And SEO:
Hosting Provider:
To begin with, you must have a good hosting provider. I recommend Hostgator as they provide reliable, cheap hosting at an affordable price.
A fully managed WordPress hosting plan will do the job just fine. If you are really tight on budget then go for shared plans as it will cost less and provide pretty much the same features as that of a fully managed plan except that your site speed won’t be that great.
This does not mean that if your site speed is slow it means it’s shared but if you have enough budget then go for a fully managed one.
If you don’t want to spend a single penny then go for wordpress self-hosted plans which cost nothing but require good technical knowhow to setup and maintain your site in the long run.
Use of SEO plugins:
There are many free and premium SEO plugins available on web which makes doing SEO tasks very easy for users who don’t want to do it manually or even hire someone else to do their SEO tasks for them;
Additionally Read: WordPress: How Many Plugins Is Too Many?
Use of social sharing buttons:
It’s always a good idea to add social share buttons like Facebook, Twitter etc.. at appropriate places so visitors can easily share content from your website/blog on their profiles on various social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter etc.
You can also use different types of widgets like AddThis widget or any other similar widget so visitors can easily share content from your website/blog with others using these widgets instead of using only social sharing buttons provided by different social networking sites;
Optimization Of Images:
Images should be optimized before uploading them onto the server so most search engines like Google index them quickly when a user searches relevant images using keywords related to image content uploaded onto the server by the user.
Optimization Of Videos:
Videos should be optimized before uploading them onto the server so most search engines like Google index them quickly when a user searches videos related keywords using video content uploaded onto the server by the user.
Optimization Of Posts & Pages:
Posts & pages should be optimized before publishing or updating posts & pages because this will help search engines index these posts & pages quicker than those which are not optimized before publishing or updating posts & pages;
Image Alt Tags optimization:
Image alt tags should be added in each image uploaded onto the server because this provides additional information about image contents to search engine crawlers helping users rank better in search results when people use words related images while searching through different search engines like Google, Bing etc.
6.0 WordPress And Your Blog:
WordPress is one of the most popular blogging platforms on the web today. The reason for its popularity can be summed up in one word i.e. simplicity.
WordPress is very simple to use and you don’t need any special knowledge or coding skills to create a blog with it.
Just point, click and type is all that you need to do for creating your first blog post with WordPress using your favorite browser on any computer or mobile device connected to the internet like desktop, laptop, tablet PC etc.
No matter where you are located in the world because of its cloud storage feature (called Automatic WordPress Backup Plugin), backups of all your blogs will be stored online at Amazon S3 servers so that if anything happens to your blog due to some technical reasons then you can restore it from cloud storage anytime anywhere without worrying about the technical details like login credentials etc.
7.0 WordPress And Your Website:
“One site for every purpose” is what Matt Mullenweg once said about websites created using WordPress CMS and this statement couldn’t be more true than this because there’s no limit on how many sites you can create using one installation of WordPress i.e., installation where all files are installed along with database inside it; which means if someone wants multiple websites he/she should install separate installations of wordpress and not multiple copies of wordpress CMS in one website hosting account which would ultimately lead to loss or other unwanted issues.
Additionally Read: What is a Child Theme In WordPress
8.0 WordPress And Your Store:
WordPress is the most popular CMS for creating ecommerce websites. There are many plugins available both free and paid for setting up an online store using WordPress.
Woocommerce is the most popular ecommerce plugin and is also provided by WordPress.com free of cost to all their users.
9.0 Conclusion:
WordPress is all in one package for those people who want to start blogging or creating websites or online stores without having to spend extra money. Everything is free and you can create as many blogs/sites/online stores as you want using WordPress that contains everything from a blog, content management system, and e-commerce.