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Since I’ve started putting a serious effort into blogging I have created a checklist to make my new WordPress blogs more pimped out and optimized than the default install gives. These steps will improve search engine optimization, looks, and help you better monitize your Wordpress Blog.

If anyone would like to add to this list, please do! I would love to hear more tips on how anyone else out there “pimps out” their WordPress blog. If you send me your tip, I’ll include a link to your blog on this post. Click here to send in your tips. And now…for the checklist:

Step 1: Install WordPress

For me, this step is a snap. I host with WebHostIsland.com and can have as many domains and blogs as I would like. From my control panel, I enter a few settings and push a button to install.

If you don’t have the one button install feature, you will need to download and install it yourself, or have a third party do it for you. If you would like me to install it for you, contact me and I can give you an estimate.

After you install WordPress, you will probably need to fine tune some settings in the Options menu. From your Dashboard, click Options and that should bring you to the General tab to start. Double check to make sure the Wordpress address and Blog address are how you want them. I usually make sure there is a www in the address.

Adjust your time zone settings so your post times will be correct with where you live. I live in the central time zone in the US, so I have to set my time to a -5 in the field next to where it says “Times in the weblog should differ by:”. The default is 0, based off of UTC time. Click here for info on UTC time. The easiest thing to do is just look at what the UTC time is displaying, then add or subtract what you need to make the time correct.

On the default install there are links in the sidebar that come with the installation. These are presumably links to important people that helped develop WordPress. If you like, leave them there, or delete and start from scratch. To delete, just click on the Links category on your Dashboard.

Finally, you will probably have a default post titled “Hello World.” Delete this post and change your default category as well. These can be done from by clicking on Manage link on the Dashboard.

Step 2: Install Key WordPress Plugins

There are a lot of great plugins available for WordPress, but here is a short list of plugins I use when starting out. This should be sufficient to get you started. If you would like to see more plugins, click here. Anyone recommend any other plugins? Let me know.

Plugin installation is very easy…usually you just download and upload the plugin files to your wp-content/plugins directory, then activate them from the Plugins category on your dashboard. Some plugins require a few extra steps, so be sure to read the documentation of each plugin for details. Here are the plugins I start out with:

• Bsuite - Gives blog stats, shows incoming search terms, tracks top stories, etc. After installing, I edit the single.php file (go to Presentation, Theme Editor, then click on “Single Post” to edit single.php). Click here for instruction on how to get search terms and other options to show up on your blog.
• Google Sitemaps - Helps make your blog more search engine friendly to Google. Download and activate. Once you have added a few posts, go to Options, Sitemap and then click on “Rebuild Sitemap”.
• Sociable - Adds little social bookmarking icons to the bottom of your blog posts. This is useful for promoting your stories later. Only use if you have an article worthy of submitting - like this one :). You might want to adjust your sociable settings after you install as the default install includes over 20 icons.
• WP-ExtremeVideo - Awesome plugin that allows you to embed videos from YouTube and Google Videos.
• WordPress Database Backup - Must have plugin that may come after your default WordPress install. Activate this one and use it. You don’t want to have to re-enter all of your posts should you lose your data.
• WP-Cron - This plugin will make your database backups automatic. I set it up to email my backup to my Gmail account daily so I don’t have to think about it. After you install and activate this plugin, go to the Manage menu, then click on Backup and you will see the option at the bottom for your backup preferences. If you don’t have a Gmail account, I recommend you get one. I believe you still have to have an invite to get one, so if you need an invite, email me and I’ll invite you. The reason I recommend them is because they give you over 2GB of space. If you already have enough email space you may want to use your existing account instead…it’s up to you.
• SimpleTags - Allows you to add Technorati tags to your posts. Makes you look cool.
• Adsense Deluxe - An awesome plugin that allows you to put your Google Adsense code into your blog. If you haven’t signed up for Google Adsense, make sure you have a site that is complete and likely to be approved by Google before you apply. Click the button below to sign up for Google Adsense.

Step 3: Improve Your Blog’s Search Engine Optimization

The default WordPress install isn’t quite as optimized for search engines as it should be. With a few simple tweaks you can fix that. The first thing you can do is edit your header.php file add key words and meta tags. You can edit this by going to the Presentation menu then click Theme Editor, then the Header link on the right. Here is a link that contains examples of what you can include in your meta tags.

Change your title and permalink structure to make them more tasty to Google and other search engines. Here is a great article with details on that subject.

4 - Visual Enhancements

The default WordPress theme (Wordpress Default 1.5) uses a fairly non exciting masthead that you will likely want to modify to make your blog look a lot more lively. I discussed how to change this in an earlier article which you can view here. Do this and your blog will look a lot better. The article also explains how to make this masthead clickable, ad how to remove the header text at the top of your blog.

Adding a favicon can spiff up your blog a bit and is very easy to do with this free online favicon generator. A favicon is the tiny little icon you sometimes see to the left of the web site address in your browser’s address bar. You can create a favicon with the image of your choice. Instructions on how to add the generated favicon to your site are included after you generate it.

The defaul 404 error page is pretty basic. When I say basic I mean that. It simply says “Error 404 - Not Found”. You may want to add additional info other than this. To edit your 404 error page, click on Presentation in the dashboard, then Theme Editor, then click 404 Template on the right.

There are some “Meta Links” in the default install I usually get rid of as they contain links to your admin login. Not that this is top secret stuff, but why make it that much easier for people to get to your admin login screen? Info on how to do that can be found here.

Finally, you should edit your About page and perhaps add some info about the blog and yourself. Include your contact information and a picture of yourself if you like…to give your blog a little more personality. I think a lot of people like to see the person behind the blog unless you’re blogging about something you want to keep anonymous.
5 - Add Content

Ok, now you are almost done pimping out your blog. It’s time for the obvious: adding content. Try to add four or five posts before announcing your blog to the world so they will have other stuff to read besides one solitary post. So…start writing! Darren at Problogger.net has a ton of tips on writing content, getting ideas, etc. Click here to read his Writing Content suggestions.

When you have added a few starter articles, try to come up with an article that could generate a lot of attention/traffic. This is tough and is a hit and miss thing…so you’ll have to use trial and error till you get the feel of it. Again, Darren provides another article on this subject.

Now, just keep blogging and after awhile the search engines will pick up your blog and give you more traffic. The more unique, quality content you create, the more traffic you will attract. I try to blog once a day, but have heard even three times a week is good. Think long term and what you might have if you do just one post a day for a year. 365 posts adds up to quite a bit of content. The more you blog the more momentum you build. You may hate it at first, but if you keep at it you will likely get addicted. Is that a good thing? Uh…I’m not sure.

6 - Promote Your Blog

Now that you’ve pimped your blog and added some content it is time to submit it to the web. I’d first start by adding your URL to Google and MSN. Submit your best articles to the many social bookmarking sites to get instant traffic. Here is a list I compiled not too long ago that includes 55 of them.

If you haven’t do so, sign up for an account at Technorati and claim your blog. You will need to add some code that they provide to your blog, click a button and Technorati will check that your code is on your site. Once it finds it, you will be searchable in their directory.

Add an RSS feed button to your blog so people that use feed readers can easily subscribe to your blog. An example can be found on this blog on the sidebar. It’s the square orange and white icon. I use Feedburner for my feeds. Sign up there for free and add your blog and get your code to put an RSS feed button on your blog.

Sign up for a free SiteMeter counter at SiteMeter.com. This is a very popular, free web site traffic stats service that should provide enough information for you to check how your blog is doing traffic wise. You can see how many visitors you are getting and where they are coming from. You may want to make your stats available for the public to see. If you want advertisers, they will want to see your numbers. Sitemeter is a good solution to give advertisers the info they need to see.

Step 7 - Monetize Your Blog
Hopefully you will want to monetize your blog and get something back for all of the hard work you put into it. One of the most popular ways to monetize your blog is with Google Adsense. It is likely you already know about Google Adsense and also likely you have already signed up. Good… add your code to the Adsense Deluxe plugin you installed earlier and you’re good to go. Experiment around with colors and ad placement to see what works best. Use link units at the top of your blog on every page and see how that works.

There are many other ways to monetize your blog. I suggest you read this section on how to monetize your blog for a ton of other ideas, tips and techniques.

Well, that’s about it. After following these steps your WordPress blog will be much better off than when you started. This is by no means a complete article and I hope anyone else out here will add their tips as well. Remember, send in your tips on how you pimp your WordPress blog and I’ll include your blog link on this post.

[tags]blogging,blogs,weblogs,google,weblog,wordpress[/tags]

This entry was posted on Friday, June 30th, 2006 at 12:22 am and is filed under Tips and Techniques. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.