Think – Write – Connect

WordPress has almost become a standard when it comes to blogging.  As of the 2.7 version, it has evolved to become a very strong content management engine appropriate for blogs and has incredible support from both the developer as well as design communities who contribute plugins and themes by the thousands.  If you are considering becoming a “blogger”, the following is my Top 5 Considerations for Using WordPress to Blog:

1)  WordPress.Com or Install WordPress Software in Your Hosting?

WordPress comes in two flavors.  One is a free online service available at WordPress.Com and the other is a free downloadable server side software available at WordPress.Org.  Though the thought of installing software and having responsibility can be considered repulsive to many, there are huge advantages in downloading the software into your own hosting account.  If hosting, installing, and other things of that nature scare you, see my article on Easy WordPress Hosting with GoDaddy as they really make it so simple an inexpensive that it a “no brainer”

Unlike the free online version of WordPress, when you install your own copy you get to take advantage of plugins and themes.  Themes are different look and feel designs that drop onto a WordPress installation.  Though your blog should be about good content, a theme that matches your personality, blog content theme, or that of your organization can really help a blog to stand out.  Plugins, on the other hand, are modules that you can simply install and turn on to unleashe very powerful features in WordPress.  The way I describe plugins is that “anything you normally have to hire a developer to do. . .likely there is a plugin available for WordPress that already does that”.  Do you want your blog accessible from an iPhone?  There is a plugin for that!  Do you want to put a shopping cart on your blog?  There is a plugin for that?  Do you want fancy rotations of your photos in flash?  There is a plugin for that.  See my Top 5 plugins for WordPress article to learn more.

The WordPress theme library can be viewed at http://wordpress.org/extend/themes/ and the plugin directory can be viewed at http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/ .

Take control of your own domain, installation, look and feel, and functionality via your own installation of WordPress.

2)  Your Blog’s URL

If you chose to install your own copy of WordPress, you need to think out your URL.  If you already have a website and are installing WordPress into that existing hosting, then WordPress, by default, is going to give you the suggested URL of www.mywebsite.com/wordpress .  URL is brand in the online world.  Who’s brand are you promoting?  Yours or WordPress?   Using the default “wordpress” directory is a rookie move.  You should consider using anything from a simple and descriptive directory like www.mywebsite.com/blog or something a little more stylish such as www.mywebsite.com/thinking or www.mywebsite.com/considerations  .

If you are installing a copy of WordPress into a new domain, then drop it in the root of the new domain.  YES, you can do this.  So, instead of taking the instalation default of www.mynewdomain.com/wordpress, simply install it at www.mynewdomain.com .  It works just fine and now WorPress is your site!

3)  Installing WordPress on Windows Server

DON’T DO IT!  For those of you who know me, I am a 10 year Microsoft veterin who actually did work in the Windows Base OS group.  I love Windows Server for Exchange, SQL Server, and other “enterprise computing activities”.  Yes, WordPress works on Windows Server but there is no need and in many cases it turns into a train wreck.  I’m sure the comments section will load up on this one but take my advise and DON’T DO IT.

4)  WWW verses NO WWW

By default, WordPress installs and configures itself with a WWW in front of the domain name.  This is fine, but keep in mind that subdomains are considered independent entities by major search engines like Google.  So, if you install WordPress into your existing website of www.mywebsite.com/blog then when you actually get to the blog part of your site, WordPress will flip or “redirect it” to mywebsite.com/blog .  This is a completely separate entity to a search engine meaning that your blog is “starting from scratch” with Google and you aren’t doing your website any favors with all of the new and fresh content in your blog.  Yes, we could get into semantics of 301 redirects, etc but the safest thing to do is going the settings of WordPress and change it to WWW.  This can be done in the General section of settings.  In the following image, you’ll see our own installation of WordPress for this article directory has been change to “www” for both the WordPress admin console as well as the pages served to users on the Internet.  Change both to keep it simple.

5)  Permalinks

By default, WordPress uses its internal page number mechanism to form URLs.  These are fine but a) aren’t descriptive to search engines and b) aren’t easy for humans to read.  Most importantly, if you had to re-install WordPress or move it, these numbers might change and all of your incoming links from all over the Internet would break which is disastrous from a search engine perspective.  The easiest thing to do is go into settings and change this default to either a date/postname based permalink if you are constantly updating your blog or a postname (%POSTNAME%) based custom permalink if you have less but unique content.  The following shows a custom structure using postname only.

Summary – Proof Is In The Pudding

This article directory, ArticleCast, actually uses WordPress.  You can see we installed it into our corporate website enabling WWW, permalinks, a directory of “articles”, and on a Linux Server from GoDaddy!

WordPress is an amazing software application.  Use it as a website, blog, article directory, eCommerce site, social media gathering place, or even an intranet portal!  Enjoy!