In this day and age, having an online presence is vital. It helps you gain more exposure and growth, widen your customer base, and so on. But having an online presence is just a part of the story. Attaining the goals and targets you have in mind is the difficult part.
If you are starting out with a new website or trying to fully revamp an existing one, it is important to know the common WordPress mistakes that can hinder your progress. All it takes is a bit of time and effort to make sure that your WordPress website is optimized and ticks all the right boxes.
We will be exploring the top WordPress mistakes and the most overlooked areas that can affect your website. We will be covering the factors you need to focus on before and after your site goes live to ensure you reach your goal.
Also read: Complete Guide to Creating an Email Newsletter in WordPress
The Basic WordPress Mistakes to Avoid
Opting to go with a cheap web hosting provider
If you decide to take this route, you are already jeopardizing your online presence even before it has gone live. By going with a cheap hosting plan you are limiting yourself. The amount of bandwidth you have will be very low, if you opt for a shared hosting plan the resources will be shared with other websites on the server.
This, in turn, can slow down your website when the server allocates the available resources to other sites when they experience heavy traffic. There will be a lack of security features, CDN, poor customer service and the list goes on.
So never make this WordPress mistake and compromise on the hosting side, as a lot depends on it.
Pick themes carefully
“A visually pleasing theme won’t do it.”
When it comes to themes, you are going to need to invest a bit of time and effort, depending on the approach. Firstly, you have full control if you are developing a theme from scratch. You can minify the script, improve the load times, make it AMP-ready, and include only the features you need and want.
But what about others who will be relying on the repository? In such cases, you have to make sure that the theme that you select is not too heavy or bloated so as to impact the page load times, and make sure that the theme is properly updated from time to time.
Also, always make sure that the websites from where you download themes are safe. If you are not careful, you will end up installing a theme that houses malicious code.
One biggest WordPress mistakes that a portion of users make is not focusing on mobile devices. For this, irrespective of the path you choose, be it developing from scratch or using a premium theme from a trusted source, make sure it is responsive in nature.
Go easy on plugins
You might be wondering how the usage of plugins can be a WordPress mistake. Let me explain.
Plugins are vital to WordPress websites and it can take a bit of trial and error to find the right one. But in the process do not forget to remove the ones that you are not using. This can lead to two main problems. Firstly it can take up website resources and increase the page loading time and also be a security concern.
Therefore always remove the plugins that you are not using and make sure the remaining ones are properly updated to the latest version.
Not optimizing your images
The next WordPress mistake you can make is when it comes to images. Optimizing the images on your website is important as it plays a crucial role when it comes to page load speeds. A website that loads up faster always delivers a better user experience.
The goal is to reduce the file size of every image we upload, without making a compromise on the image quality. There are various compression methods that we can use to achieve this.
Lack of comment moderation
There are two main reasons why you want to moderate comments on your website.
- Firstly, you want the discussion to stay relevant and don’t want the users to cross a specific boundary. By boundary we mean, straying away from the topic and focusing on other aspects.
- Secondly, to prevent spam comments thereby avoiding unnecessary malicious links.
By default, WordPress offers a comment moderation option, that allows the admin to manually approve the comments.
One of the biggest WordPress mistakes is keeping the comment section open and inviting spam comments. The problem with spam comments is that they may contain malicious links and the probability of an unsuspecting user clicking on them is always there. As a website owner, ensuring the safety of the users must be a top priority. Add to this the spam comments fill up the database leading to lengthier response queries.
For spam protection, you can use plugins such as Akismet or Antispam Bee.
Also read: Guide on How to Create a WordPress Membership Website
Missing out on the contact form
Without a contact form, how do you expect website visitors to contact you? From long-term partnership to content collaboration, it all starts with a conversation and for this very reason, you should always include a contact form on your website.
Not tracking the website analytics
Not monitoring your website analytics is a WordPress mistake you want to avoid at any cost. When you keep track of your website analytics data such as how the users found your website, the time users spent on your website, the bounce rate can give you an indication of how well you are doing and indicate the areas that need improvement.
The most common analytics option is from Google, but there are a lot of other analytics alternatives for WordPress.
WordPress Security Mistakes You Want to Avoid
Weak login credentials
The biggest WordPress mistake when it comes to security is using weak login credentials. Using a truly unique username and a strong password which will be a combination of uppercase, lowercase, numbers, and symbols is the best way.
Not updating WordPress
Not all existing website owners update WordPress to the latest version. If it works fine, then why should you update right? Well, WordPress updates are not just about bringing in new features but also include security fixes and improvements.
This closes any security concerns and doesn’t make your website a vulnerable one. Making this grave WordPress mistake of not updating to the latest version can have dire consequences.
Using the default login URL
The next security concern is using the default login URL. The default login pages are websitedomain/wp-admin.php. and websitedomain/wp-login.php. If you still use this, anyone, even your website users knows the way to your dashboard. Therefore we suggest you change the WordPress login URL to a custom one to improve the website’s security.
Not putting a limit on the login attempts
Not restricting the login attempt is a fairly common WordPress mistake. You don’t want an attacker to keep on knocking at the door, do you? To prevent this you need to limit the number of times someone can try to log in to your website.
Not enabling two-factor authentication
You can also enable two-factor authentication on your WordPress website. Even if login credentials get compromised, 2FA can act as the last barrier and prevent entry.
Not installing a security plugin
Finally, also make sure you install a security plugin, as most of them offer additional features that are absolutely necessary. Features such as logging the IP address, the ability to block suspicious login attempts from certain IP addresses, malware scanning, and so on.
Also read: How to Troubleshoot and Fix the White Screen of Death in WordPress
SEO Mistakes in WordPress
Poor permalink structure
Having the right permalink structure is crucial for SEO. Search engine crawlers use permalinks for indexing and learning about what the web page is all about. If you don’t use the targeted keyword, your SEO efforts will be taking a hit.
Suppose your topic is about WordPress development tips and the permalink is like this:
www.yourwebsite.com/p+123
The search engine crawlers will gain no information from the URL. Therefore an optimized permalink is always needed. Now you have an idea why you want to avoid this WordPress mistake.
Changing the Permalink structure in WordPress is a straightforward task. Head over to Settings>Permalinks.
Going with a Custom Structure or Post name is always suggested as it helps your SEO efforts.
Not focusing on sitemap
Keywords alone won’t help, you need to have a proper sitemap that allows the search engine crawlers to gather the information and keep on updating them.
One of the biggest advantages of a sitemap is that every time you publish a new post, it gives the search engine crawlers an option to crawl and index it.
The easiest way to create a sitemap and submit it to search engines is with the help of any of the SEO plugins. We are using RankMath as an example here.
Once you install the plugin head over to the sitemap settings. You can see that the ping search engine option is enabled by default.
You can also view your current Sitemap by clicking on the link provided at the top.
This is how the resultant screen will look.
After this what you can do is submit the sitemaps to the search engines. For Google, you can do it from the Google Search Console, and for Bing from the Webmaster tools.
Lack of schema
Now don’t forget about Schema. Schema markup is also vital for SEO for letting search engine crawlers gather the required information. The more information we can give the crawlers the better it is.
There are different ways to add Schema the easiest one being with the help of a plugin. Install the Schema plugin from the repository.
After installing the plugin, take the help of the Quick Configuration wizard.
Follow the onscreen option and complete the setup. If you want, you can also change the schema types.
You can also use SEO plugins like Yoast or RankMath to enable schema markup
Misconfigured search engine visibility setting
You want the search engines to discover your website and not hide it from them. Make sure your website is visible to them by confirming that the Search engine visibility option is turned off. Head over to Settings>Reading. This is not a common WordPress mistake, but you might have enabled this setting during the development stage, so reconfirm it anyway.
Not adding ALT text to images
When you upload images, adding ALT text to them is important. ALT text is vital for both accessibility and SEO. When you upload an image, head over to the right-hand side toolbar and locate the ALT text option.
Here, add the appropriate ALT text, and you are all good.
Lack of meta-description
The majority of users still don’t focus on meta descriptions, and this WordPress mistake can affect your rankings on the SERP. Once you have a meta description in place, you are readily giving the search engines the needed information that is also keyword optimized. This greatly improves your chances of ranking higher on the SERP.
Most of the SEO plugins will warn you if you don’t have a meta description. On the RankMath plugin, the option is available on the right-hand side by selecting Edit snippet.
From here you can add the meta description and meta title with the right keywords.
Also read: Learn How to Recover a Hacked WordPress Website
WordPress Website Maintenance Mistakes
Not scheduling automatic backups
This is a common WordPress mistake that can be easily avoided and requires the least amount of time. Irregular backup patterns can lead to data loss. But more importantly, having a recent backup always helps in situations where your site was hacked or infected with malware. Backing up a WordPress website is not a daunting task. Many web shots offer automatic backups and the simplest way to do this is with the help of a backup plugin.
We are taking UpdraftPlus as an example here:
Once the plugin is installed, you can configure the backup interval, so as to ensure the least amount of data loss.
Lack of database optimization
As your website grows so does the data. But there will be certain data that is no longer needed (post revisions, spam comments) and can be safely removed. The more clutter in the database, the longer time is needed to complete each request to fetch the needed data
Always take a backup of the database before attempting any modifications. Install the WP-Optimize plugin to start the optimization process.
After this, all you have to do is select the optimizations needed and run them and you are done.
Wrapping Up
A lot of WordPress mistakes happen due to negligence. All of them can be avoided if are willing to invest the time and effort.