Articles

Setting Up SSL with WordPress and What You Should Know

In almost all cases, you ought to use https instead of http for your website. To do this, you’ll need to add an SSL certificate to your website. It’s not a particularly difficult process, but there are a few steps to take, especially if you want to avoid errors and reduce the chance of losing search engine rankings.

In this post, I’ll cover the advantages and disadvantages of SSL, as well as the steps you should follow to properly set up your WordPress site with an SSL certificate.

Speed Up WordPress for Better SEO

Site speed is a ranking factor in Google, and for good reason. Visitors have a short attention span, and will quickly navigate away from a slow website, especially on mobile. This post covers essential tools and techniques for improving your load times and PageSpeed score, such as caching, image optimization, and plugin performance.

The “80/20” Approach to WordPress Security

Securing your WordPress site is essential, especially when your business depends on your website. Hiring someone to fix your site can get expensive. And if your website is unreachable for days, or even weeks, how much will that cost you in lost revenue?

The best approach to security is to start with prevention. It’s much faster and cheaper than having to deal with a hacked website. Although you can never secure your site completely, you can prevent the majority of attacks with a relatively small amount of effort.

The True Cost of WordPress Maintenance

The WordPress software is free, and you can get basic web hosting and a domain name for $5-10/month. So your total cost of ownership should be less than $100 per year, right?

Only if you’re willing to endure slow load times, intermittent downtime, and are willing to devote hundreds, maybe thousands, of hours into learning the ins and outs of WordPress so you can maintain and fix your site. You might think that once you install WordPress, choose a theme and plugins, and add in your content, you’re done. But that’s only the beginning.

What You Need to Know About Web Hosting

There are lots of options for web hosting, so which one do you choose? They’re not all equal, and you shouldn’t look at cost alone. There are different levels of server performance, uptime, security, and level of customer support, for example. If you have a WordPress site, you can consider a managed hosting provider that specializes in WordPress.