This guide will help you set up a WordPress blog.

You may not complete all items.

Here are the settings that I recommend making a must-have on the blog:

• Connect attendance meter
• Add a blog to Yandex. Webmaster and Google Console
• Change permalinks
• Create a sitemap and robots.txt
• Set up image caching and compression
• Install an SSL certificate
• Create required pages on the site.
• What will the blog setting give?

Good question.

Approximately the same thing that tuning a musical instrument can give.

For example, guitars.

You can pluck the strings of a store-bought guitar as much as you like, but you will not reproduce the truly live sound that can only be obtained after proper tuning of the instrument.

I’d like to caution you against the “blind publishing” strategy. This is when you create content and hope that someday someone will appreciate you.

Blogging doesn’t work that way.

One of the reasons why some article authors can make money and others can’t is that the former invest time (and money in the later stages!) in the development of their main tool – the WordPress blog.

Let’s start.

Here’s what you’ll learn:

How to login to the blog admin panel

What is the WordPress Blog Admin Panel?

The WP Blog Admin Panel is a special section on the site where you can post articles, change the look of the blog, install plugins, manage menu sections, create pages to advertise products/services, etc.

To set up a WordPress blog, go to the login page.

Open a browser, enter your website domain, and add /wp-admin

Press Enter.

See what it looks like in the screenshot:

 

 

Enter login and password.

Click Login.

This will take you to the blog admin panel:

 

 

Next, go to the blog settings that you need.

Blog Admin Sections You Need

Here are the sections of the admin panel that blog owners use most often:

• Dashboard – > Updates – here you can update the WordPress CMS, blog template, and plugins
• Entries – to create a new article, click the “New Post” button (here you can create a new article)
• Media files – this is where the images you upload to articles are stored
• Pages – usually pages are needed to create a section on the site with an advertisement or a description of goods/services (to create pages with a beautiful design, install the free Elementor plugin)
• Comments – here are all the comments that readers write in articles
• Appearance – > Themes – this section is needed to install and activate the template for the blog (the blog can only work on one template)
• Appearance – > Customize – here are the template settings for the blog (you can change the blog name, menu, widgets, blog appearance, etc.)
• Appearance – > Menu – a menu is a list of articles, pages, categories of articles, or just links that are displayed at the top of the site (header)
• Plugins – If you need a new plugin, install it here.

How to publish a blog post

You have written an article that will get thousands of views.

Great!

Let’s publish it.

To get started, install the Classic Editor plugin, with which a convenient article editor will appear on your blog.

Do so.

Go to Plugins – > Add New – > search for the Classic Editor plugin, install it and activate it.

 

 

Now let’s publish your article.

Go to the All Entries section and click the Add New button.

Yes, you read that right – WordPress posts are articles.

Insert the title and text of the article into the editor.

Click Publish .

Ready.

Preparing an article for publication

Editing blog posts in WordPress is very easy.

Next, you will learn:

• How to add the main image of an article
• How to add an image to text
• How to add headings H1, H2, H3, etc. to an article
• How to add an article to a category
• How to change the link of an article.
• This will allow you to quickly prepare an article for publication.

How to add the main image of an article

The main article image is displayed at the beginning of the article next to the title.

Such an image looks like this:

 

So that there is no hole in the place of this image, we will add a picture through the editor.

Open the article in the blog admin panel.

In the right pane of the editor, click Set post image.

 

Now upload an image to the site, select it from the list, and click Set Entry Image.

 

Click the Update button to save your changes to the article.

How to add an image to the text of an article
Often readers want to take a break from a long text and digest something simpler.

Give them that opportunity by adding an image to the article.

In my articles, I usually add 3-5 images for every 500 words. I do this so as not to bore the reader, I also want him to stay on the site for a couple of minutes.

Here’s how to add an image to an article.

Open the article editor.

Place the cursor on an empty space. Between paragraphs. Wherever you want to place the image. Click Add Media.

Upload a new image to your blog or choose from a gallery.

Click the Insert in Record button at the bottom.

Update the post so the image appears in the article.

Ready.

How to add headings H1, H2, H3, etc. to an article

Headings H1, H2, H3, etc. help to divide the material of the article into semantic parts.

Headings in an article and in a fiction book perform the same role – they briefly retell the content of a text passage.

Write in the editor the text that you want to make the heading.

Select it with the cursor.

In the toolbar above, click on the heading type you want.

Know that there should be only one H1 heading in the article because it is the title of the article.

Therefore, use H2, H3, H4, etc. to create a heading.

How to create a category and add an article to it
Everything is simple.

Article categories are categories in WordPress.

Let’s create the first category.

Go to the Rubrics section.

Fill in the Title and click Add New Category

Return to the article.

Select the rubric you created in the right pane of the editor.

Now update the article.

Ready.

How to change the article link

CMS WordPress automatically creates links for articles and pages.

You can see such a link in the editor under the title of the article.

Weird, right?

Not really.

If your article has a long title, the link will be too long.

Such a link is not convenient to copy.

In addition, a sign of a good link is when it becomes clear to the reader from its name what the article or page that he opened is about.

Create simple short links for your articles.

People will say thank you.

Open the article editor.

Below the title, next to the link, click the Edit button.

 

Insert a new name in Latin.

Update the article.

Ready.

How to add SEO meta tags to an article

I think I know what you need.

You want to add keywords (meta tags) to an article.

Namely, in the title and description?

If I’m right, this chapter will help you.

Or ask a question in the comments of the article. Let’s find a solution together.

So, adding keywords is very easy.

Open the article editor.

Add a keyword to the Title (this is TITLE):

 

Insert a keyword in the Excerpt (this is a DESCRIPTION). Find this field is at the very bottom of the editor:

If suddenly the Excerpt field is not there, activate it in Screen settings, which can be found at the top of the editor.

Also, insert keywords in the Article Body and Subheadings, this will enhance the SEO of the article:

 

Don’t forget about images, where you can (and should!) add keywords.

In the editor, click on the picture that is in the article.

Click the Edit button and paste the keyword in the alt attribute field.

Click Update and save the article.

Ready.

Your WordPress blog is amazing, right?

I add keywords to the main headline, excerpt, text, subheadings, and images. This makes it easier for search robots to understand the content of my article.

And one more thing… do not abuse the number of keywords.

If the choice is to optimize the article for search engines or make it reader friendly, choose the latter option.

Imagine if Stephen King only wrote books for Google. Would anyone read his books? I doubt. Authors write text for people, this rule should not be changed.

And don’t worry, your quality content will be appreciated by search engines.

Change permalinks

By default, WordPress creates the following links for articles:

What’s wrong?

The problem is in the date that is present in the link.

Imagine that a student is searching the Internet for a scientific article for a thesis.

He needs a fresh article.

The student will not read every article. Whether an article is relevant or not, he will most likely determine by looking at its title or link.

Of course it will close links with the old date.

That’s what all people do.

After all, time is valuable to us.

Another problem that can be found in the screenshot above is related to the characters that are present in the link.

Install an SSL certificate, it will improve the SEO of your blog

An SSL certificate is required so that users can visit your site over a secure, encrypted connection. SSL also confirms the authenticity of the site.

You should be aware that an SSL certificate will not protect your site from hackers or viruses. Yes, and blog SEO will improve, but not by much.

So why do you need SSL?
First of all, you need an SSL certificate to protect your readers:

SSL protects the personal information of site visitors (name, address, date of birth, phone number) and authorization data (login, password)
SSL secures card payments and bank account information
SSL verifies that the visitor has landed on a genuine website and not on a scam, phishing page, or clone site.
And further…

Since 2014, Google and Yandex have been reducing the positions of sites without SSL certificates .

Browsers Google Chrome, Yandex.Browser, Edge and others have picked up the search engine “security” trend and have been informing the user since 2017 that he is on an insecure site:

Conclusion. Did you manage to set up a WordPress blog?

So you’ve set up a WordPress blog, what’s next?

Write articles.

Do not stop.

After writing one article, take on another.

Create content consistently.

Learn.

Rest.

This is how you get to monetization, which will require new investments from you.

Do not leave.

Answer another question.

Did you manage to set up a blog (if not, describe the problem in the comments)? What blog template do you have installed? What was difficult to set up? Is there anything you would like to add to this guide?

I’m waiting for you in the comments.