How to Build a WordPress Website From Scratch

Are you searching for how to build a WordPress website from scratch?

Easy to build, support and maintain a website is the key to your online success. A self-hosted WordPress website is one of the biggest business assets along with your email list on the internet. 

However, building a website is a complicated and time-consuming affair. 

• Difficult to choose the right technology
• A lot of decision making is involved in the process
• Hard to find trustworthy website developers
• Time-consuming to manage website
• Costly to get support

Building and managing a website should not be a mystery.

In this detailed guide, you’ll learn all about WordPress and everything there is to know about building a WordPress website from scratch, including:

• Why use WordPress
• What do you need to build a website from scratch
• How to build a WordPress website
• How to install the genesis framework
• How to install WordPress plugins
• How to configure WordPress settings
• What is WordPress Gutenberg 
• How to create website pages 
• WordPress technical SEO optimization 
• Pre-launch website checklist

If you are ready to start, grab a cup of your favorite coffee, and let’s jump right in. 

Chapter 1: Why Use WordPress

WordPress is now the world’s most popular tool for creating the website.

According to usage statistics of content management systems, WordPress powers over 60 million websites, or 39.6% of all websites on the internet and 64.1% of all websites whose content management systems are known. It means WordPress powers over one-third of the web.

Moreover, WordPress can help you build any website from a simple blog to a full-featured business website.

Capgemini is a multi-billion dollar international consultancy focused on leader technology services and digital transformation. Also, it comprises 200,000 team members in over 40 countries with 38 websites. They observed that their system was no longer supporting their roadmap. Moreover, their old platform made its website increasingly unstable.

Capgemini decided to migrate all 38 websites on the WordPress platform. Further, the challenge was to publish and provide a workflow and communication framework to increase visibility into the production process. After the successful migration, they observed immediately increased productivity.

As a result, WordPress helped Capgemini leap into a new digital culture of creation with a robust, usable, and intuitive CMS. WordPress supports them for not only delivering their business objectives but also empowers their global network of teams to do their jobs effectively.

Benefits and key features for choosing WordPress are:

• Open-source & free: WordPress’s open-source software allows you to use freely, edit, modify, collaborate, and redistribute the code.

• Reliable: WordPress core software is competent to handle any website from a simple small business to a fully functional e-commerce store. 

• Unlimited customization & flexibility: You can add extra features to your website using plugins with few clicks instead of hiring a developer as your site grows.

• Huge selection of themes: You can choose your website design from thousands of amazing designs having a wide variety of features and customization options.

• Support all types of media: You can use any media such as image, audio or video on your site. However, we do not recommend uploading videos directly to WordPress. 

• User friendly: Once your WordPress website is all set up, it is as easy to publish content as creating a word document. 

• Secure: WordPress is quite safe as long as the site owner follow good WordPress security practices. 

• Responsive: We are in a mobile-first world now. Also, luckily, most of the premium WordPress themes are responsive out of the box. 

• Easy to manage: You can manage your whole website from the WordPress admin dashboard with very little to no training. 

• SEO friendly: Google loves WordPress because most of the themes are highly optimized for SEO. Likewise, Yoast SEO plugin makes it even easier to do on-page SEO of your site.

• Simple integrations: Services like Zapier allows you to connect WordPress with 2,000+ apps to automate your workflow instantly.

• Rest API: You can install WordPress Rest API plugin and start sending and receiving data as JSON for your application.

• E-commerce: Woo-commerce plugin offers a full range of E-Commerce options from one‑click payment buttons to a fully customizable online store.

• Regular updates: WordPress core is being tested and updated regularly for the best possible performance and to avoid any security loopholes.

• Low maintenance: It is quite cost-effective to maintain a WordPress website than a custom website. 

• WordPress hosting: WordPress is so popular that many hosting companies specialize in WordPress hosting only and offer one-click WordPress installs. 

• Multilingual: WordPress multilingual plugin makes it easy for you to translate website pages, posts, tags, categories and themes.

• Follows accessibility standards: The Accessibility Team provides accessibility expertise across the project to improve the accessibility of WordPress core and resources. Likewise, the WordPress Accessibility Coding Standards state that “All new or updated code released in WordPress must conform with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0 at level AA.”

• Huge WordPress community: WordPress has a vibrant and supportive community which provides a variety of resources should you need it.

Above all, using self-hosted WordPress is one of the best ways to build your websites. 

Chapter 2: What Do You Need to Build a Website 

Using WordPress, anyone can build and design a website without knowing not much about development or web designing.

Mashable is a global multi-platform media founded by Pete Cashmore in 2005. He started his website at 19 with just a simple WordPress blog. In his interview, he mentioned that he worked 18 hours a day on it before it became successful, and it took six months for him to get his first advertiser.

Now, Mashable receives over 50 million page views a month and is one of the most visited sites in the world. Moreover, recently, it has even been speculated that CNN would like to acquire Mashable for $200 million. Not bad for a website that started as nothing but a simple WordPress blog just a few years ago.

Here is the list of things you need to build your website: 

Domain Name

A domain name is the identity of your website on the internet and its a thoughtful task. Do you know, the world’s most visited web sites have domain names in between 6 – 10 characters. 

Your online success starts with a great domain name, so keep it simple, short and relevant to your website content. So, to learn more about it, you can read What is a Domain Name? A Complete Overview for Beginners.

WordPress Hosting

Hosting is the land that you need to build your online empire. WordPress hosting is a land, which is particularly optimized for WordPress performance and security needs. 

It also includes one-click WordPress installs to speed up your website creation process. WordPress hosting is 4 X faster and easy to install than other hosting services.

Selecting the best WordPress hosting service is one of the critical components of a successful website, choose it wisely. 

WordPress Installation 

WordPress is well-known for its ease of installation. It’s a straightforward process and takes less than five minutes to complete. You can also install WordPress free through your WordPress hosting provider or can install WordPress manually. 

Website Wire Frame 

You can create a blueprint of your website to have the 10,000-foot view of the layout and behavior of web pages with a website wireframe tool. It helps you significantly refine the user interface and design of interactive web elements. 

A website wireframe is a visual prototype of your website, and this prototype is worth 1000 meetings because it saves your time as well as money. Moreover, choose the best wireframe tool and starting mapping out your website wireframe to save time and money in building your ideal website. 

Some essential elements of website wire frame are:

• Header: You can set the tone of your whole site in the header section. Also, it will make your website easier to navigate and creates a consistent browsing experience throughout your website.

• Banner: You can capture your audience and display relevant information by using this graphic image depending on how it’s used; it can be added as a simple banner image or an email banner or banner ads.

• Above the fold section:  It is visible in a browser window when the page first loads, you can customize this section according to your website structure like by adding banner, images, content etc. Make this section eye-catchy. Around 84% of visitors spend their time above the fold.

• Sliders: You can display products, photos, relevant content, professional portfolios, and many more in section. Also, it is a slideshow for displaying well-organized pieces of information one by one in a cycle.

• Content: Write your website content to target your audience, engage them and persuade them to take action. Likewise, around 8 in 10 customers stop engaging with content that doesn’t display well on their device. 

• Call To Actions: You can persuade a visitor to perform a specific action immediately by using a call to action. Also, it gives an idea to your website visitors of what step they should take next like sign up, buy now, etc.

• Footer:  You can add valuable information about your website here like a copyright notice, disclaimer, menu links, etc. Likewise, you can even get up to a 50% increase in conversions by optimizing the footer design with a specific goal.

• Sidebars: Highlight the main elements of your website content in short blurbs, lists, or images. You can add categories, post titles, locations, forms, indexes in this section. 

• Trust Icons: You can ensure your visitor that the page is legitimate and that all their data is collected through secure third-party service providers by adding trust icons. They can also increase the conversion rate by 40%.

• Testimonials: You can make your website more valuable and believable by adding testimonials because they come across in an unbiased voice and establish trust. On average, testimonials on the sales page increase conversions by 34% and can generate approximately 62% more revenue. 

Wireframes can give you a clear path to complete your website project because it clarifies the direction and objectives of the site build and allows for better decision-making to achieve excellent results.

List of Essential Pages

Every page on your website add value to your entire website and have its own worth, but there are some must-have pages which should be on your website no matter what your site is about. 

It’s essential to consider two things about these crucial pages i-e: what action you want from your audience to take when they are on these pages? And what the target audience wants from these pages?

Here is the list of these must-have pages:

• Home: This page is vital for the website’s success having many functionalities. Also, you can add your company logo, call to action, main menu, text content, photos, and many more. 

• Contact: You can allow visitors of your website to contact the owner to share their experience and give feedback. You can also add phone no., email, address, and other company contact details here. Likewise, do you know, 44% of website visitors will leave a company’s website if there’s no contact information or phone number? 

• About us: You have an opportunity to tell your visitors about your company. Moreover, you can share your values, tell about your journey, let visitors know where you are and many more things related to your website.

• Customer Reviews: You can make your business image more transparent and trustworthy by adding customer reviews to your website. Likewise, 93% of people say online reviews impact their buying decisions.

• Services: You can add details of what your company offers? Write brief, digestible, and transparent information about what you provide to your clients.

• Blog: You can drive the traffic back to your website by adding blogs. Also, it allows you to create relevant content for your customers and to show thought leadership and expertise on a topic. Likewise, companies who blog get 97% more links on their websites, and around 77%  of internet users read blogs.

• Portfolio: By adding portfolio on your website, you can give a sense to website visitors about who you are, what you can do and whether you are the right fit they should hire to execute their project or not.

• Privacy Policy: You can add a statement contained on a website that details how the operators of the site will collect, store, protect, and utilize personal data provided by its users. Above all, it’s a legal document. Also, 70% of organizations saying they receive significant business benefits from privacy policy. 

• Terms of Usage: You can set up rules and regulations for your website visitors here. Moreover, it protects your business by limiting liability if a customer were to take you to court.

• Cookies Policy: You can set out information about the user’s data which is being tracked, its purpose, and where it is being transferred/sent. 

Content

Your website content is the key to traffic generation. Good quality content is crucial to the success to retain visitors and for having a high ranking on search engines for any website. 

Around 50% of sales are lost because consumers can’t find the content they’re looking for, so write the relevant content on your website. Above all, identify your target audience, write clear and concise content. Likewise, 38% of consumers will stop engaging if the content is too long. 

Some common content types are:

• Blogging: You can add blogs to share your expertise, establish trust with a targeted audience and attract people to your business.

• Infographics: You can pack a ton of information into one image in a way that is visually interesting and easily digestible. Infographics can increase web traffic by 12%.

• Longform content: You can build thought leadership and increase subscribers by adding long-form content.

• Case studies: You can provide both knowledge and actionable information to the website visitors by case studies. These are the in-depth examinations covering a specific scenario or example.

• Videos: You can record few videos for your website and social media marketing campaigns. As per Animoto online and social video marketing study, four times more users would rather watch a video about a product than reading about it.

Website Functionalities 

You can encompass everything from the functionality that users can perform to dynamic content and interactivity. It is essentially what your website can do and how it works.

Moreover, you can add different website functionalities in your websites like clear navigation, blog, video library, chat, search, forms, location map, and many more. Likewise, 75% of website credibility judgments are based on aesthetics, like the design and functionality of your website.

These are the few essential things that you will need to build your WordPress website from scratch. Above all, a good website is always a work in progress, and as you grow your website, needs evolve as well. 

In the next chapter, we will see how you can build a WordPress website using these things.

Chapter 3: Building a WordPress Site

WordPress is an excellent tool that has allowed many organizations to design their websites without any endeavor. It makes up 14.7% of the top 100 sites in the world. People also make money with WordPress. 

Tim Sykes, at the age of 13, got $12,415 in Bar gift Mitzvah money and turned into an inspirational success story of more than $5 million in trading profits. He started the site, TimothySykes.com – a WordPress site, to share the knowledge that he has gained making money on the stock markets.

He sells through the site, DVDs, premium memberships, and products that help people make money through stocks. According to this last interview, his site made $3.5 million.

In the previous chapter, we have already discussed the things which you need to build a website. Now, let’s see how you can create a WordPress site from scratch step by step using these things. 

Get a Domain Name

A domain name is a critical part of your online brand. There are several companies you can choose from to register a new domain name. 

Namecheap is one of the top 3 cheapest domain name registrars. Also, you can get a .com for as low as $8.88 and has sold over 4 million domain names throughout the world.

You can follow the steps below to get your domain registered with Namecheap.

Step 1: Search for your preferred domain name

Having the right domain name can make a positive and lasting impression while a bad domain name can send visitors running. It can also affect your SEO efforts.

Essential factors in choosing a domain name are: 

• Use keywords 
• Keep your domain name short
• Make it easy to pronounce and spell
• Keep it unique and brandable
• Avoid hyphens

Moreover, on average, 63% of top-performing domains have keywords in their URL.

So, choose the domain name wisely. 

You will get the suggested results, choose the domain name according to your website, and click on add to cart.

Step 2: Register your domain name

Next, you need to select the domain registration period before you can add it to the cart.

Now, you are ready to order the product. If you have any Promo Codes, add them to get a discount and click on the Confirm Order button.

Step 3: Confirm your order

On the shopping cart page, click on the toggle button to enable or disable the services like auto-renewal, WhoisGuard, and PremiumDNS. 

Now, you are ready to order the product. If you have any Promo Codes, add them to get a discount and click on the Confirm Order button.

Step 4: Domain configuration

You can log in if you already had an account with Namecheap; otherwise, you need to create a new one. 

You will be redirected to your Namecheap account. Here, specify your payment method and complete the payment process.

That’s it! When your order is complete, you can see the printed order summary on the screen, and it will also be sent to your primary email address.

You may check it, resend or download it as a PDF file in the order history section.

You can check out How to Transfer Domain Name? A Step by Step Guide if you already have a domain name and would like to transfer to your preferred registrar. 

Purchase a Hosting account

You need a faster, better, and smarter hosting account because it’s responsible for things like server maintenance, keeping the software and hardware up to date, troubleshooting, and many more. 

SiteGround starts strong with 99.99% uptime with tons of extra features that are perfect for both beginners and power users.

You can follow the steps below to purchase hosting for your website.

Step 1: Select your plan

First, you need to choose your hosting type.

Then, select your plan according to your website requirements. You will find Hosting plans with details – what will you have in that package.  

Once you have selected your hosting plan, then click on the get plan button.

Step 2: Add your domain name

Here, you’ll be asked for your domain name. Choose I already have a domain option as you have already registered your domain and enter it in the box.

Click on the PROCEED button. 

If your domain name is correct, you will be redirected to the next page. Otherwise, you will see an error popup on your screen.

Step 3: Purchase information 

Choose the period for your account billing and fill out all the other necessary information.

For the trial period option, you’ll be billed for one month plus a setup fee, and then near the end of the month, you’ll be contacted to renew your account.

Next, pay your billing charges and complete the payment method. You will be redirected to your SiteGround Cpanel.

Install WordPress on Web Host

All the best WordPress web hosting companies allow you to install WordPress with just a few clicks.

Siteground allows you to install WordPress, which is the CMS that you’ll be using to build your websites.

Follow these steps and install WordPress on your web host.

Step 1: SiteGround wizard

First, you need to signup with your SiteGround hosting and then log in to your SiteGround customer area.

You will see a popup window asking you if you want to start a new website. Click on the WordPress button.

Step 2: Enter the login information

After selecting WordPress, a new section will appear on the same page.

Enter the login information (Email, Username, and Password) for your new WordPress website and click on the confirm button.

Step 3: Select the enhancements

You wish to add and click on the complete setup button.

That’s it! Go to your website and check out the newly installed WordPress software application.

Setting up DNS

The Domain Name System (DNS) connects the URL of your website with its IP address.

Computers communicate with each other using IP addresses, not domain names; every web server requires a DNS server to translate the domain names into IP addresses.

Follow these simple steps and get your website URL connected to your IP address.

To do so, first, you need to log in to your domain registrar and web hosting account.

Step 1: Log in to SiteGround account

Login to your SiteGround account. 

Go to My Accounts > Manage Account > Information & Settings tab.

In the Account DNS section, you’ll find two nameservers and their corresponding IP. Copy the two nameservers.

Step 2: Log in to NameCheap account

Login to your NameCheap account.

Go to the Domain List, choose the domain, and click Manage. Then, navigate on the Nameservers section, click the drop-down, and select custom DNS.

Paste in the nameservers you copied from SiteGround and clicked the check-mark.

That’s it; you’re done with your domain and hosting setup.

You have to wait for a few hours for the DNS settings to get updated so that your site becomes visible (i-e: 48 hours)

Creating Email Using Your New Domain Name

Probably you have Gmail, Yahoo, or any other email account already although that’s fine but does not look very good when used for any sort of professional purpose.

Likewise, 75% of consumers say professional Email addresses are key to trust. So, creating an email using your domain name is a better option.

With any SiteGround hosting plan, you can create an unlimited number of free email accounts with your domain name.

Log in to your User Area. Go to My Accounts > cPanel >MAIL > Email Accounts.

Enter the information needed in the text fields – your email address, a strong password, and the mailbox quota (the disk space you’d like to dedicate to this mailbox). 

Next, click the create button and you will have your new email ready in seconds.

All done! You have successfully created your WordPress website.

In the next chapter, you will learn how to customize your site.

Chapter 4: How to Install Genesis Framework

A WordPress theme framework is an underlying well-coded parent theme, and a child theme is an add-on for your existing WordPress parent theme. 

A WordPress theme framework takes care of functionality and stores the base code but requires a child theme for further styling.

Moreover, Genesis Framework is one of the best examples of WordPress Theme Frameworks. Also, it is the second topmost framework used worldwide. It is considered one of the best WordPress themes for blog and ecommerce websites.

Genesis is a minimal WordPress framework that makes it easy for developers to create custom WordPress themes. Also, you can build incredible websites with this framework quickly and easily.

Rebecca Gill, is an SEO consultant, who is building websites for 20 years. One of her clients requested an SEO audit for a site in late 2019. Rebecca noticed that their website infrastructure was so outdated, and a complete refresh was required.

Rebecca Gill moved the client to a new hosting provider, used the Genesis-built Mai Law theme as the foundation for a new site, and performed some additional minor maintenance. So, she launched a new site in December 2019 and the results were outstanding. The traffic boost was so significant, the site saw a 1000% increase in page views. Also, the underlying reason, Rebecca said, was the strong code base found in Genesis-built themes like Mai Law. 

Genesis framework website takes very little time to load. Likewise, Pingdom tool gave 96/100 to this framework with a minimum load time of 1.11 seconds.

Genesis framework is: 

• Well coded: You can quickly implement the code with the latest HTML and CSS capabilities. Also, making any changes to the underlying code is relatively straightforward.

• Well supported: From one-time purchase, you can get unlimited access to the support for an unlimited number of sites you choose to use the framework on. Moreover, you can always contact their support at any time with any issues.

• Inexpensive:  You can make a one-time purchase of all of their themes for a reasonable price. Also, the framework can be purchased at $60 a one-time cost. Similarly, framework plus most child themes costs are around $99-$129 range.

• Secure and regularly updated: You will have regular updates to improve and update on the codebase; also, it keeps your site running efficiently in a hassle-free manner, along with being secure.

• Flexible: You can make extensive changes to the Appearance of the chosen theme. Above all, it is highly flexible and vastly customizable for developers.

• Utilizes child themes efficiently: You can get extra functionality and style from the child themes. Also, Genesis Framework uses child themes for design and keeps your site’s design safe and secure.

• Design Options: By picking the All-Theme package, you will have 42 Genesis child themes by StudioPress, and it’s a vast collection of child themes for different types of business websites like photographers, writers, designers, etc.

• SEO friendly: With Genesis Framework, you will have an SEO friendly website. The way it is built ensures that the content will be easy to find and understand. It also utilizes microdata for making your site more relevant and even convinces search engines and users too.

Moreover, the Genesis framework is professional and has high quality. Also, it is one of the best choices for designing a WordPress website.

Installing the Genesis Framework and Child Theme

Installing a Genesis Framework is very simple and similar to installing any other theme on WordPress. Only the difference is – the Genesis Framework and Child Theme needed to be uploaded and stored within the WordPress theme directory.

There are two methods to manage the installation process of this framework and the child theme:

Method 1: By uploading the feature of the WordPress Dashboard.

Method 2: FTP Client.

Don’t forget, if your website is hosted on WordPress.com you cannot install the Genesis Framework or new themes. Above all, this is a restriction on WordPress.com-hosted sites.

Method 1: By uploading feature of the WordPress Dashboard

This method is quite easy and also recommended. Follow the following steps for the process of uploading using the option of WordPress Dashboard:

Step 1: Install the Genesis zip file.

Step 2: Navigate to your WordPress dashboard. Open Appearance> Themes.

Step 3:  Click on the Add New button. 

Step 4: Click the Upload Theme button and then click Choose File button.

Step 5: Select the Genesis zip file from your local computer

Step 6: Click on the Install Now button and then click Activate

All done! For installing a child theme, the process is the same. All you need is to choose a child theme zip file instead of the Genesis Framework zip file.

Method 2: Using an FTP Client

You can install Genesis Framework and child theme manually using the FTP client also. Follow the following steps for the process of uploading the theme.

Step 1: Install the Genesis zip file.

Step 2: Unzip the Genesis Framework and the child theme to separate folders on the computer’s desktop.  

Step 3:  Connect to your site via FTP

Step 4 : Open WP-content > themes folder

Step 5: Upload the unzipped Genesis folder to the themes folder on the server.

Step 6: Activate it. 

Important points: 

• The folder must be named Genesis
• It cannot be nested inside another folder
• Don’t activate the Genesis theme as it runs silently in the background
• Don’t upload child theme before parent theme; it will create a huge mess

That’s it! Now the theme is activated and can be customized as per your requirements.

Chapter 5: Installing WordPress Plugins 

Plugins are the building blocks of WordPress websites. They allow you to add new features and functionality to your website. You can also handle the problems of your website by adding respective plugins.

The WordPress Plugin Repository has over 56,000 plugins at the time of writing this post. Below is the list of 10 must-have plugins for every WordPress website. 

WP Forms

WPForms is the most friendly WordPress contact form plugin. You can create smart online forms with just a few clicks. With their pre-built form templates and the drag & drop builder, you can create a new form in less than 2 minutes without writing a single line of code.

• Form Notification: You will get instant notification after the form submission and for any form related query. 

• Form Templates: You can use your pre-built templates to create forms, which will save you time. 

• Mobile-Friendly: You can get 100% responsive form. No need to add extra code to make your form responsive.

• Spam Protection: By using WP Forms plugin, you can also get spam protection because it utilizes CAPTCHA and Honeypot method to protect your website from spam form submissions.

• Form Confirmation: You can add a custom success message or redirect to a custom thank you page after form submission.

You can easily install and activate the WP Forms plugin. Follow these steps for the process of installing and activating the plugin.

Step 1: Navigate to WP Forms’ official website and log in to your account.

Step 2: Click on the Downloads tab.

Step 3: Click on the Download WPForms button and download the zipped file of the WPForms plugin on your computer.

Step 4: Navigate to your WordPress Dashboard. Go to Plugins > Add New > Click Upload Plugin.

Step 5: Click on the Choose File button and select your WPForms zip file.

Step 6: After your file is uploaded, click on the Install Now button. It will start installing the plugin for your WordPress website.

Step 7: Once the plugin is installed, click on the Activate Plugin button.

Step 8: Next, You need to add the license key. For that navigate back to your WP Forms Plugin account.

Step 9: Click the Download tab and copy the License Key.

Step 10: Copy it and add it into the License Key field in your WPForms plugin settings from WordPress admin Dashboard.

Step 11: After that, click on the Verify Key button, and your license will be added.

You will see a notice – your site is receiving automatic updates. That’s it! Now you can add forms to your website.

Akismet

Akismet is a WordPress plugin, which prevents spam from website forms. It filters spam from comments, trackbacks, and contact form messages. 
Akismet blocks millions of spam comments every hour. 

Features of Akismet are: 

• Automatic spam filter: You will get automatic checks on comments, no need to add extra code lines. It filters out the ones that look like spam.

• Comment History: You can quickly review the status history of comments and see which comments were caught spammed by Akismet.

• Misleading links: You can find URLs in the comment body to reveal hidden or misleading links.

Follow these steps for the process of installing and activating the Akismet plugin.

Step 1: Navigate to your WordPress Admin Dashboard.

Step 2: Click Plugins > Add new.

Step 3: Type Akismet in the search box and click install now.

Step 4: Wait for the Install to finish, then click on the Activate button.

Step 5: After the plugin has been activated, go to Settings > Akismet Anti-Spam and If you have Jetpack installed, you’ll find the Akismet under Jetpack > Akismet Anti-Spam.

Step 6: If you have an API key, click the Manually enter an API key section link, enter your API key and click save changes. Otherwise, click on the Set up your Akismet Account button and follow the guide.

That’s all! Now just leave it to do its thing. If Akismet thinks the comment is spam it will be put in the spam folder otherwise the comment will be published to your website as usual.

Yoast SEO

Yoast SEO is one of the best WordPress SEO plugins. It helps you with your website optimization. This plugin is easy-to-use, flexible, and provides a good base for SEO. Until now, Yoast SEO has helped more than 7 million websites worldwide to rank higher in search engines.

Features of Yoast SEO:

• Keyword Optimization: You can analyze and optimize your website pages for your focused keywords, which helps you drive qualified traffic from search engines to your website using this plugin.

• Meta Descriptions: You can tell Google exactly what your page is about adding metadata using the Yoast SEO plugin easily. 

• Indexable: You can efficiently gather information about all linked and related pages to best optimize your page. Indexable is a custom data type that represents anything that could be indexed on your site.

• No outdated content: You can update the old content of your website without changing its date using the Yoast SEO plugin. It keeps your data clean, fresh and up-to-date.

• Readability check: You can check the current readability of your website content pages like transition words, paragraph length, sentence length, subheading distribution, sentence beginning and Flesch reading ease using this plugin.

• Breadcrumbs: You can enable the breadcrumbs to feature for your website using the Yoast SEO plugin. Breadcrumbs are a way to help your users better navigate your site and its structure. You can also customize the breadcrumbs title using this plugin. 

And many more like protecting your website from duplicate content, mark your links as no-follow or sponsored, works in the block editor and classic editor, Internal linking suggestions, focus keyword export, content insights etc. A free version is full of powerful features; however, if you are after more power, you can go premium to unlock more power. 

Follow these steps for the process of installing and activating the Yoast SEO plugin.

Step 1: Navigate to your WordPress Admin Dashboard.

Step 2: Click Plugins > Add new.

Step 3: Type Yoast SEO in the search box and click install now.

Step 4:  Wait for the install to finish, then click on the Activate button.

Step 5: Navigate to the SEO tab and update the settings according to your website requirement – That’s all!

Shared Counts 

Shared Counts is a WordPress social media share buttons plugin. The buttons look great and load fast. The website visitors can easily share your posts and pages with their friends on social media using this plugin. The Shared Counts plugin also helps to increase the traffic on your website.

Features of Shared Counts plugin are: 

• Share button: You can add the social media icons on your pages and posts using shared counts plugin. It is an easy way to market yourself and grab more traffic to your website. 

• Link button: You can directly link your business profile on social platforms by configuring this plugin like clicking on Facebook icon redirects the User on your official Facebook page. These buttons aren’t specific to a post; you can add them in header, footer, sidebar too.

• User friendly: All the things are customizable so that you can make endless adjustments. Also, you can easily access all the data; this is because the counts are stored and cached in post meta.

• Popular content: You can also view the popular content or the content with the most traffic by month or category using this plugin. 

Follow these steps for the process of installing and activating the Shared Counts plugin.

Step 1: Navigate to your WordPress Admin Dashboard.

Step 2: Click Plugins > Add new.

Step 3: Type Shared Counts in the search box and click install now.

Step 4: Wait for the Install to finish, then click on the Activate button.

Step 5: Navigate to Settings > Shared Counts tab and update the settings according to your website requirement – That’s it.

Sucuri

Sucuri is one of the best WordPress security plugins. It automatically checks your WordPress files and alerts you if any files have been added, modified, or removed. It offers a set of security features, each of them designed to have a positive effect on the security posture.

According to the survey, the average website is attacked 44 times every day. So, you must have a security plugin installed on your website. 

Features of Sucuri are: 

• WordPress Hardening: You can increase security in areas of your website that could become avenues for attack. You can do this by adding a set of rules to the website .htaccess file and verifying secure configurations.

• Email Alerts: You can customize the email and recipients for any alerts generated by the plugin. These alerts will keep you informed of any suspicious activity observed on your website.

• Malware Scanning: You can protect your website from malware.SiteCheck remote scanners are constantly updated to address the spread of malicious content, blacklisted status, website errors and out-of-date software.

• Core Integrity Check: You can check the integrity of the core WordPress files like PHP, JavaScript, CSS and other files that come with your original WordPress version.

Follow these steps for the process of installing and activating the Sucuri plugin.

Step 1: Navigate to your WordPress Admin Dashboard.

Step 2 : Click Plugins > Add new.

Step 3: Type Sucuri in the search box and click install now.

Step 4: Wait for the Install to finish, then click on the Activate button.

Step 5: Navigate to Sucuri Security > Dashboard and click the button that says Generate API Key to activate Sucuri’s event monitoring feature.

Step 6: Click the submit button.

That’s it.

Once the Sucuri plugin is active, you will start receiving email notifications which include user authenticating or failing to authenticate, when a file is uploaded, a post or page published, and so on.

UpdraftPlus 

UpdraftPlus is one of the most popular free WordPress backup plugins with over two million active installations. You can set up automatic backup schedules. It is also useful to restore and migrate websites. 

Features of UpdraftPlus are:

• Backup: You can perform complete, manual or even scheduled backups quickly and easily.

• Website Migration: You can easily migrate your WordPress site with the Migrator addon of this plugin. It performs a direct site-to-site migration and has several useful functions which you’ll need during a site migration, including search and replace.

• Remote Location: You can secure your data from server-wide risks using this plugin. This plugin is best known for a remote backup option rather than merely storing your backups on your website hosting.

•  Restore Backup: You can quickly restore your WordPress site with the Importer addon of this plugin. It helps you restore your website from any other backup plugins.

Follow these steps for the process of installing and activating the UpdraftPlus plugin.

Step 1: Navigate to your WordPress Admin Dashboard.

Step 2: Click Plugins > Add new.

Step 3: Type UpdraftPlus in search box and click install now.

Step 4: Wait for the Install to finish, then click on the Activate button.

Step 5: Navigate to Settings >UpdraftPlus Backups tab. Step 6: Click the Settings tab.

Step 7: By default, UpdraftPlus stores backups locally on the server. To use a remote storage location, in the Choose your remote storage list box, select where you want to store your backup files.

Step 8: Click Save Changes. 

That’s it! 

To create a backup immediately, click the Current Status tab, and then click Backup Now.

WP Rocket

WP Rocket is one of the best WordPress caching plugins. It helps to speed up your WordPress website, drag more traffic, and increase conversions—it is the most user-friendly caching plugin around, with the most straightforward setup.

Features of WP Rocket are: 

• Reduce loading time: You can reduce the HTTPS requests to reduce the loading time of your website using this plugin.

• Bandwidth: You can decrease the bandwidth with GZIP compression.

• Cache: You can have to cache of all the pages for quick viewing for all logged in users and for mobile visitors too.

• Other features: Database optimization, DNS prefetch, CDN integration, Minification and concatenation of JS and CSS files and many more.

Follow these steps for the process of installing and activating the WP Rocket plugin.

Step 1: Visit the WP Rocket site and click Buy It Now.

Step 2: Choose the plan that works for you and is best for your website requirement.

Step 3: Complete all the necessary steps to place your order. 

Step 4: On the confirmation screen, click Download WP Rocket & Install It to download the ZIP folder. Make sure you do not extract the files.

Step 5: Navigate to your WordPress Dashboard. Go to Plugins > Add New > Click Upload Plugin.

Step 6: Click on the Choose File button and select your WP Rocket zip file.

Step 7: After your file is uploaded, click on the Install Now button. It will start installing the plugin for your WordPress website. You’ll receive an email confirming a new domain has been added to your WP Rocket account.

Step 8: Once the plugin is installed, click on the Activate Plugin button. You will be redirected to the settings menu.

As soon as you activate the plugin on your WordPress app, WP Rocket will begin caching your pages. However, there are numerous settings you can configure to suit your site.

Like: 

• Enable the lazy loading of images, especially if you have a lot of images on your site.

• You can enable mobile caching as long as you are using a regular or responsive theme without any mobile plugins. 

• Enable caching for logged in users if you have users who log in to access your site.

• If you have an SSL certificate for your site, then you must enable SSL caching in WP Rocket and so on.

Smush

WP Smush optimizes your WordPress website images for faster loading pages and a better user experience without losing quality. With over 1+ million active installations, Smush has optimized billions of images. It can optimize up to 50 images at once. 

Features of Smush are: 

• Lossless compression: You can strip unused data without affecting image quality. Smush plugin helps for lossless compression of images for your website.

• Incorrect size image detection: You don’t need to detect wrong size images manually. Smush quickly locate images that are slowing down your site, automatically.

• Image resizing: You can set a max-width, height, and large images will scale down as they are being compressed. 

• Process all image types: Smush plugin process all types of images like PNG, JPEG and GIF for optimum results.

• Multisite compatible: You can have both global and individual multisite settings in this plugin.

Follow these steps for the process of installing and activating the Smush plugin.

Step 1: Navigate to your WordPress Admin Dashboard.

Step 2: Click Plugins > Add new.

Step 3: Type Smush in the search box and click Install now.

Step 4: Wait for the install to finish, then click on the Activate button.

Step 5: Navigate to Media > WP Smush tab. From here, configure the settings according to your website requirement.

That’s all! You can enable or disable automatic compression and select which size of images Smush works on.

WP Mail SMTP

WP Mail SMTP allows you to send WordPress emails using an SMTP server. You can make email deliverability easy and reliable. It also fixes your email deliverability by reconfiguring WordPress to use a proper SMTP provider when sending emails. 

Features of WP Mail SMTP are: 

• Manage notifications: You can control which email notifications your WordPress site sends by using the WP Mail SMTP plugin.

• Email log: No need to track the email manually. It automatically keeps track of every email sent from your WordPress site.

• Authenticate the accounts: You can check the authenticity of every user account by this plugin. WP Mail SMTP uses OAuth to authenticate your account, keeping your login info secure.

Follow these steps for the process of installing and activating the WP Mail SMTP plugin.

Step 1: Navigate to your WordPress Admin Dashboard.

Step 2: Click Plugins > Add new.

Step 3: Type WP Mail SMTP in the search box and click install now.

Step 4:  Wait for the install to finish, then click on the Activate button.

Step 5: Navigate to Settings of WP Mail SMTP plugin tab and configure the plugin according to your website.

Step 6: Scroll down to the ‘Other SMTP’ section. Make sure to toggle the ‘Authentication’ button. Click save changes.

Your form will now send FROM the email you entered above, but you should add the code below to further secure your credentials in the wp-config.php file. Please do this step with care or seek help from professionals if you don’t know how to code. A wrong code can break your site. 

define( 'WPMS_ON', true );define( 'WPMS_SMTP_PASS', 'your_password' );

That’s all! All done. 

MonsterInsights 

MonsterInsightsis the most popular Google Analytics plugin for WordPress, with almost 15 million downloads and over 2 million active installs. It allows you to easily add, customize and manage the Google Analytics website tracking services on your WordPress site.

Features of MonsterInsights are: 

• Google analytics: You can have a quick and easy Google Analytics setup by the MonsterInsights plugin. 

• Tracking code: No matter you are switching themes, you can always keep your tracking code with the help of this plugin.

• Real-time stats: No need to search or find the stats, you can find it on your website dashboard. MonsterInsights plugin displays real-time stats in your WordPress dashboard.

• Popular sources: You can easily view the popular posts, pages and referral sources of your WordPress website using this plugin. 

Follow these steps for the process of installing and activating the MonsterInsights plugin.

Step 1: Log in to your MonsterInsights account by clicking the Login link at the top of the page.

Step 2: Navigate to MonsterInsights Downloads area.

Step 3: Click the Download link on the right next to the MonsterInsights Pro or Plus plugin according to your website requirement.

Step 4: Navigate to your WordPress Dashboard. Go to Plugins > Add New > Click Upload Plugin.

Step 5: Click on the Choose File button and select your MonsterInsights zip file.

Step 6: After your file is uploaded, click on the Install Now button. It will start installing the plugin for your WordPress website.

Step 7: Once the plugin is installed, click on the Activate Plugin button.

Step 8: Next, click on Insights > Settings in your WordPress dashboard menu.

Step 9: click the Authenticate with your Google account button to start the process.

Step 10: Select your profile.

Step 11: Click the Allow button to give MonsterInsights access to your Google Analytics data.

Step 12: Select the website profile you want to Authenticate with the MonsterInsights plugin. Then, click Complete Authentication.

That’s all! It can take up to 24 hours for the MonsterInsights dashboard to display your data.

Chapter 6: WordPress Settings

The basic structure of your WordPress website is ready. Now, it’s time to configure the settings of your website. Check out these default WordPress settings that every website owner needs to change.

Navigate to your WordPress admin dashboard > Settings tab.

Let’s get started with General Settings!

General Settings

In this section, you can view and edit the necessary information about your site. It includes:

• Site Title: Add the name of your website here. Your site title will be the primary brand identifier for your site.

• Tagline: Include a short and descriptive phrase that describes your website, here. By default, the tagline is “Just another WordPress site,” so don’t forget to customize it. 

• WordPress Address(URL):Add the preferred URL (with or without www) of your website. 

• Site Address(URL):Add your site URL here, If you want to have your homepage address different than your WordPress URL. For example; yoursite.com/home. 

• Administration Email Address: Add the email address, which you want to use to receive emails from WordPress related to administration and maintenance tasks. 

• Membership: If you want to allow visitors to register for an account on your site, check this box. It is unchecked by default.

• New User Default Role: Choose it according to your website requirement. By default, the role is subscriber which allows members only to have access to their profile. Additional roles are available to allow more access to your site for team members and guest authors.

• Site Language: Select the language which you want for your WordPress admin dashboard from this dropdown.

• Timezone: Choose a timezone relative to UTC or choose from the extensive list of cities organized by continent. If your specific city is not listed, simply select a city in your timezone that is listed. 

• Date Format: By default, the date format is “Month/Day/Year”. You have other options to choose, as well. If needed, there’s also an option to customize.

• Time Format: By default, the time format is “Hour: Min“. You have other options to choose, as well. If needed, there’s also an option to customize.

• Week Starts On: By default, Week starts on is Monday but you can customize it like select Sunday or Friday. 

All done for General Settings. Click, Save Changes button.

Let’s configure the writing settings now.  

Writing Settings

Writing Settings section contains the settings related to the post formatting and category options. It includes:

• Default Post Category: You can specify a default post category for any new post you write. By default, the post category for new posts is selected as uncategorized, but you can choose a specific one from the dropdown.

• Default Post Format: Post Formats are used by WordPress themes to create different visual styles for different types of posts. By default, selected Post Format is standard. However, you can choose the most frequent one from the dropdown.

Post Via Email

First, you need to create an email id with SMTP and POP3 Support. This feature is optional, but if you want to use it, then it is highly recommended that you create a secret arbitrary email address for WordPress to use. It’s settings includes:

• Mail Server: Enter the email address where all the emails will be received and stored for future retrieval. Your mail server will have a URI address i-e: mail.yourdomain.com.

• Port: Generally, WordPress uses TCP port 110(POP3 address) to receive requests related to emails. If your mail server is configured to use a different port, enter that port number here.

• Login Name: This is the “Email ID” which you have created. Enter it here.

• Password: Enter the password you have given while creating the above-mentioned email address. 

• Default Mail Category: Select your desired category from the dropdown, which is the default category WordPress will assign to all of the posts published via the post by email feature. 

Update Services

Update service is the post ping service for WordPress. When you publish a new post, WordPress automatically notifies all of the update services listed in this box.

All done for writing settings! Don’t forget to click on the save changes button to save your settings. 

Next, let’s navigate to reading settings and configure those.

Reading Settings

The reading settings control how your blog appears to visitors. 
Reading settings includes:

• Your homepage displays: This section helps you control the home page of your website in any of the following formats:
  • Your latest posts: It displays the newest blog posts on the homepage.
  • A static page: You can choose any page as your home page using this option.  
  • Posts Page: You can choose on which page of your website you want to display your blog posts. 

• Blog pages show at most: Choose the number of posts to be displayed per page. 

• Syndication feeds show the most recent: Choose the number of posts user can view when they download one of the sites feeds. 

• For each post in a feed, include:  You can use this section to control excerpts of your posts:
  • Full Text: It displays the entire post.
  • Summary: It shows just the summary of the post.

• Search Engine Visibility: Don’t forget to untick this option after launching your website. Otherwise, your website will not be searchable in the search engines. 

All done for reading settings! Don’t forget to click the save changes button before moving ahead.

Next, let’s configure the discussion settings! 

Discussion Settings

The discussion settings are there to control how visitors and other blogs interact with your site. 

• Default post settings: Default settings to the all-new pages or posts you create are:
  • Attempt to notify any blogs linked to from the post: It sends a notification to other blogs when you publish any post.
  • Allow link notifications from other blogs (pingbacks and trackbacks) on new posts: It accepts pings from other blogs.
  • Allow people to post comments on new posts: You can allow or disallow your blog visitors to comment on your articles using this option.

Other Comment Settings:

• Comment author must fill out name and email: Visitors must fill their name and email address if you check this.

• Users must be registered and logged in to comment: Only registered visitors can leave comments if you check this. Otherwise, anyone can leave comments.

• Automatically close comments on articles older than – day: You can choose to accept comments only for a particular period on your posts.

• Show comments cookies opt-in checkbox, allowing comment author cookies to be set: It will create a checkbox in your comments area of a GDPR-type.

• Enable threaded(nested) comments: Visitors can reply or have a discussion and get responses.

• Break comments into pages with top-level comments per page and the page displayed by default: If your pages are getting a lot of comments, then you can split them into different pages by checking this box.

• Comments should be displayed with the comments at the top of each page: You can arrange the comments in the form of ascending or descending order.

Email me whenever:

• Anyone posts a comment: The author gets an email for every single comment that is posted.

• A comment is held for moderation: Using this option, you can choose to moderate all comments before going live on your site. 

• Before a comment appears − This option allows you:
  • A comment must be manually approved: Only approved comments by the admin can go live.
  • Comment author must have a previously approved comment: You want to allow a comment of an author who has commented and his email address matches the email address of the already posted comment. Otherwise, the comment will be held for moderation.

• Comment Moderation: Contain only a specific number of links that are allowed into a comment.

• Comment Blacklist: You can input your own spam words which you do not want your visitors to enter into the comments, URL, email, etc.; later, it would filter the comments.

• Avatars: Avatar is a small image that displays at the top-right-hand corner of the dashboard screen beside your name. It is like your profile picture. It includes:
  • Avatar Display: It displays your avatar beside your name when it is checked.
  • Maximum rating: You have four other options of avatars you can use. They are G, PG, R and X. This is the age section where you select according to which type of audience you want to display your posts.
  • Default Avatar: In this option, there are few more types of avatars with images; you can keep these avatars according to your visitor’s email address.

All done for Discussion Settings! Click the save changes button.

Media Settings

Media settings help you to set the height and width of the images which you’re going to use on your website. 

It includes:

• Thumbnail size: Set the size of the thumbnail. Checking the checkbox will crop thumbnail to exact mentioned dimensions.

• Medium size: Set the height and width of medium size images.

• Large size: Set width and height of larger images.

• Uploading files: The uploaded image will be arranged into year and month based folder.

All done for Media Settings! Click the save changes button.

Next, let’s navigate to Permalink Settings and configure it.

Permalink Settings

A permalink is the web address for your individual pages and posts and should be permanent for each page. 

Permalink settings allow you to set the default permalink structure. 

Permalink setting options are:

• Common settings: Check any of the radio buttons to choose your permalink structure for your blogs
  • Plain: It sets the default URL structure in WordPress.
  • Day and name: It sets the URL structure according to the date and name in your posts.
  • Month and name: It sets the URL structure according to the month and name in your post.
  • Numeric: It sets numbers in the URL structure in your post.
  • Post name: It sets post name in the URL structure in your post.
  • Custom Structure: It sets the URL structure of your choice by writing the desired name in the given text box.

Optional: These are optional. You can add a custom structure for the main category or tag URL.

• Category Base: Add a custom prefix for your category URL.

• Tag Base: Add a custom prefix to your Tags URL.

All done for permalink settings! Click save changes button.

Chapter 7: What is WordPress Gutenberg

Gutenberg is the codename for the new WordPress editor. It’s fast, flexible, and opens up a new world of possibilities for writing posts. The most popular Gutenberg block is the paragraph block, which is used 60% of the time when people use Gutenberg. 

WordPress Gutenberg is all about saving you time and making the content creation hassle-free. Some exciting features of WordPress Gutenberg are:

• Slash command: You can quickly add blocks in your WordPress word editor using forward slash command. You can also type the name of the block after the slash to find the block more easily.

• Add links: You can add links to your content by just pasting it. Select the text to which you want to add your link and then paste it. No need to click on the ‘Add link icon’. 

• HTML anchor: To add an anchor simply just click on a heading and in its block settings, you’ll find advanced settings. In the advanced settings, add your anchor text. 

• Reusable blocks: You can create blocks using Gutenberg, which you can save to reuse it. 

• Document outline: The Document Outline serves as a handy table of contents, and you can even click on the headings to instantly navigate to each block and edit it. 

• Blocks: Every individual piece of content in Gutenberg has its own block. It includes text paragraphs, images, embedded files, headers, featured images, and so on. You can add a block to a post or page by clicking on the button marked with a plus sign, and select the required block. 

Gutenberg is the most significant change to the WordPress visual editor since the birth of WordPress.

News UK is the proud owner of a stable of news and media brands that span the most popular to the most respected, cover the highbrow to the lowdown, provide the first flash and the last word. For a long-time, they were waiting for an opportunity to accelerate their content production and improve speed. 

Gutenberg introduced a JavaScript-based drag-and-drop editor to WordPress, along with a customizable building block structure that streamlines content creation. After adopting the Gutenberg, an initial pilot program resulted in a 60% improvement in speed to publish. They achieved a 30% reduction in the number of clicks to publish an article and created an internal community of shared resources that can be leveraged across sister publications. 

Best Gutenberg Blocks Plugins

There are mainly two types of Gutenberg blocks plugins :

1. Single-purpose blocks plugins
2. Gutenberg blocks libraries

Single-purpose block plugins add only one feature with the most comprehensive set of options, integrations, etc. Whereas, the block library plugins include a collection of blocks for different purposes, but those blocks are not so fine-tuned as Single purpose blocks plugins.

Below is the list of best Gutenberg blocks plugins:

Stackable 

The stackable plugin adds a beautiful collection of ready-to-use blocks for the Gutenberg Editor. It is a robust all-purpose tool that provides you with the functionality that is useful for bloggers, e-commerce site owner,s or even small businesses. 

It has 50+ Block Layouts and 70+ Pre-set Section / Block Designs that can be switched with just one click. Also, the stackable plugin has 20,000+ active installations. Moreover, this plugin provides 27 different blocks. Most frequent ones are: 

• Advanced Text Block: You can add easily and quickly add the native text block using this plugin. Moreover, it gives you access to different layouts, columns, design, and typography controls. 

• Posts Block: The posts block enables you to present your latest blog articles using great layouts. You can also choose the different details and information to be displayed.

• Separator Block: You can add attractive transitions between the sections on your page. Also, you can choose from different shape dividers to draw attention to important sections.

• Feature Grid Block: The Feature Grid block allows you to showcase several features in a stylized layout. Also, use the grid to highlight your growing portfolio, products, and more.

• Advanced Heading Block: You can add a powerful and flexible version of the native heading block. Moreover, it gives you access to more design and typography controls.

And many more. The stackable plugin adds essential custom blocks to give you a real page builder experience inside the Block Editor in your website. Moreover, you can get a built-in section or background controls for the easiest way to build page sections using only a single block. 

Ultimate Blocks

Ultimate blocks is a Gutenberg blocks plugin for bloggers and marketers. It helps you to create better and engaging contents with Gutenberg Editor. This plugin lets you enable or disable individual blocks to keep your site faster. 

Ultimate Blocks plugin has 10,000+ active installations with a 4.9 rating score. This plugin provides 29 different blocks. The most frequent ones are: 

• Call to Action Block: You can add a nice call to action box with a just a single button click. It encourages users to take action, engage more. You can customize everything in the block. 

• Styled Box Block: You can add any styled box-like Notification box, Number box, Feature box etc. in your content using this plugin. You can also add a styled list in your post or pages. Instead of bullets, you can use various icons as your list style type. 

• Testimonial Block: You can add beautiful, simple testimonial box with an option to add image, name, the role of the testimonial author in your website.

• Social Share Block: You can add social share buttons in your posts and pages with these blocks. It comes with lots of customization options too.

• Content Filter: Content Filter lets your visitors filter the content based on different filters. You can help your users go through your content more easily.

And many more. The goal behind Ultimate Blocks is to provide everything in one place. It enables you to cut down the need to install separate plugins for tasks like tables of content, schema reviews, adding FAQs, and more.

Atomic Blocks

Atomic Blocks plugin is a collection of page building blocks. It includes pre-designed sections and layouts to help you to shape your pages. The layout selector can be chosen from the block list or the layouts button at the top of each page, and, at the moment, there are eight sections and four layouts.

Atomic Blocks plugin has 50,000+ active installations. This plugin provides 22 different blocks. Most frequent ones are: 

• Newsletter Block: You can add quickly and easily add Mailchimp email subscription forms to your website using this plugin. You can also customize the style of the email form with our easy customization tools!

• Pricing Block: You can build beautiful, dynamic pricing tables right inside the WordPress editor. Each pricing block comes equipped with Schema markup to ensure your products shine in search engines!

• Section & Layout Block: It gives you quick access to a growing collection of page sections and full-page layouts. With a few clicks, you can insert a fully-editable page section and edit to fit your needs.

• Advanced Columns Block: You can create a powerful, flexible column system to build custom, full-page layouts for your posts and page. We’ve also added options to customize the colors, margins, paddings, responsiveness, and more!

• Post Grid Block: It gives you quick access to a beautiful post grid and post list that can be added to any post or page on your site. The post grid can be configured to toggle on and off the post’s featured image, author name, etc. 

And many more. Atomic Blocks plugin provides you everything like a complete package i-e: from customizable buttons to beautifully-designed page sections and full-page layout designs via the Section & Layout block.

You should try a couple of options to select the best Gutenberg plugin for your website. Mostly, the Gutenberg plugins offer the same content blocks, but each of them comes with different options to customize each block. So you need to check what works for you!

How to use Gutenberg Blocks

Gutenberg enables WordPress to build content layouts, not just write articles. Moreover, you can make the content creation process more intuitive and easier using Gutenberg and even get more options for customizing your content, through a variety of discrete elements.

Follow the process of How to use Gutenberg Blocks and avail of these awesome functionalities.

First, you need to choose the plugin according to your website requirement, install it, and configure its settings.

Step 1: Navigate to your WordPress Admin Dashboard.

Step 2: Click Plugins > Add new.

Step 3: Type Stackable in the search box and click install now.

Step 4:  Wait for the install to finish, then click on the Activate button.

Step 5: Click on Stackable from WP admin Dashboard menu and configure it settings.

Step 6: Create a new page or blog post using block editor. For that, navigate to Pages > Add new or Post > Add new.

Step 7: Add Title.

Step 8: By default, the next block is a paragraph block. You can start writing right away but if you want to add anything else, then you can click on the add new block button on the top left corner of the editor.

Step 9: Customize your blog post/page. Like by: 

Adding Gallery

Adding Cover 

You can also add the block to reusable blocks and use it later after modifying that block, and you can even remove that block from reusable blocks too.

And many more blocks. Moreover, you can add any one of them in your website according to your website requirement by just clicking a single button. 

Chapter 8: Creating WordPress Site Pages 

All the foundation of your website is ready now, and you can finally start adding content to your website. 

WordPress comes with two main default content publishing types: posts and pages. You can create blog posts using posts and static content for the website using pages. 

Let’s see how you can create your website pages using WordPress and add them to your website’s navigation menu: 

Step 1: Navigate to your WordPress Admin Dashboard > Click Pages > Add New.

Step 2: Add Page Title, choose Permalink and start adding content for your website.

Step 3: After adding the content, click the Publish button. You can also save it as a draft and publish it later, click the Save Draft button to do so.

All done! Now, click the Preview button and visualize your website page.

So, you can create all the required pages using the same steps. Below, is the list of essential pages which most websites usually have.  

Don’t forget to add relevant pages to website navigation.

Essential pages are usually linked from the following places to help your website visitors and search engines navigate the site easily. 

• Top Navigation
• Sidebar 
• Footer

To create a navigation menu, go to your WordPress Admin Dashboard > Appearance > Menus page. 

Create a new menu, enter the Menu Name and click Create Menu.

You will have a list of pages, posts, custom links, and categories in the left column. From here, choose the pages you want to add to the menu. Also, you can automatically add all new top-level pages to the menu or can select specific pages and add them to the menu. 

Click the View All tab to see all your site’s pages, click the box next to each of the pages you want to add to your menu, and then click on the Add to Menu button.

Similarly, you can create a new menu for the website footer as well. 

All done! Your website is ready to launch, finally. 

Chapter 9: WordPress Technical SEO Optimization

Search engine optimization is a set of guidelines for optimizing your website so that your website can achieve higher rankings in search results. 
WordPress technical SEO optimization helps your site to deliver better information to search engines so that your content can be appropriately indexed and displayed within search results.

Maldive Traveller is a tourism company in the Maldives that enables travelers to plan and have a great time in the Maldives and offers trusted advice to those who travel to the Maldives. Moreover, it is an award-winning brand name that won the national award for promoting Maldives tourism. Also, they faced a problem with their online strategy. Above all, it was evident that digital marketing was not working for them the way they wanted. They hired an SEO company. 

The strategies they followed were: they research Maldive Traveller’s background and ventures, they did link building by placing links on the sites which are relevant and respected by search engines, and also improve the website content and with extensive keyword research. 

After the successful execution of the new strategies, their website traffic increased by over 40%. Moreover, lead generation went up by 153%, and their bounce rate decreased by 64%. 

61% of marketers say improving SEO and growing their organic presence is their top inbound marketing priority. It is a good idea to review technical SEO before launching your website, even you have done it before. Following are the essential technical SEO points:

• Google Analytics: They say what gets measured gets improved. Don’t forget to set up Google Analytics on your website. Also, Google Analytics will provide you with all the information about the traffic and users on your website. 

• Optimize Images: You must optimize all images for fast loading of your website. Likewise, do you know, images appear in 28.9% of search queries on Google? 

• Specify a preferred domain: You need to set preferred domain for your website, known to search engines to avoid any duplicate content-related issues. If search engines crawl and index both versions of your domain ( with www and without www), then they may find identical content, which may cause your site to face duplicate content issues.

• Add breadcrumb menus to your posts and pages: Breadcrumbs reflect the structure of your site and provide logical access to all the inner and outer pages of your website. Also, Make sure to enable it. Moreover, you can use Yoast SEO plugin for this too. Breadcrumbs also appear in Google search results.

• Check and optimize your robots.txt: Optimize your robots.txt file so that if there are particular pages on your website that you don’t want bots to crawl and index, you can control this through robots.text file. 

• Quality traffic: You can boost the traffic of your site by starting a blog. Updating and republishing old blog posts with new content and images can increase organic traffic by as much as 106%.

• Add schema markup for breadcrumbs: You can also use schema markup to describe breadcrumbs. Also, it makes search engine bots to understand that they are looking at a breadcrumb. Thus, the breadcrumb has chances of appearing in the SERPs to facilitate users more.

• Add structured data to your homepage: Add the structured data in your website, this markup is important for SEO because it’ll make it easier for Google to understand what your website is about like add website name, its URL, logo, tagline etc.

• Check your canonical URLs: Canonical tag tells search engines that the enclosed URL is the original and definitive version of the page. Also, add Self-referencing, accessible, and absolute canonical URLs to your website. Moreover, you can use any plugin like Yoast SEO to add canonical URLs and test them with any tool like URL Canonicalization Test.

<link rel=”canonical” href=”https://www.example.com”>

• Check and optimize your URL Structure:  Optimize URL structure for your website. Above all, keep the URL structure shorter, and your target keyword must be in the URL. 

• Optimize your 404 Page: Optimize the 404 pages of your website results in a good user experience and also have a high impact on SEO. Likewise, 73.72% of people who reach a 404 page will leave your site and will not return. 

• Optimize and submit your XML sitemap to Google: Submit your sitemap to Google, from your Google Search Console dashboard, click Crawl > Sitemaps > Add Test Sitemap. Before you click Submit Sitemap, make sure to test your sitemap and view the results to check for errors. 

• Review website load speed: Page speed is a ranking factor, and it does affect SEO. Likewise, 70% of customers say site speed impacts their purchasing decisions which means One-Second delay results in a 7% drop in conversions. Make sure your website page speed is less than 3s or in the green zone. 

• Review website navigation: Make your website navigation clear, consistent, and straightforward. Moreover, avoid using format-based navigation. Also, use image carousels, mega menus if you have a lot of content, and fixed scrolling bars.

• Check the mobile-friendliness of your website: Mobile friendliness is vital for SEO because 52.2% of all website traffic comes from mobile devices. Also, test your mobile-friendliness score and layout using tools different like PageSpeed Insights and responsive-design checker. 

• Optimize Accelerated Mobile Pages(AMP): AMP affects the clicks, impressions, and user experience of your website, which in turn affects SEO. Also, optimize AMP Pages With AMP-experiment and AMP-analytics. Moreover, you can use AMP Plug Validator to test the validity of AMP pages. 

• Use HTTPS: Use of HTTPs will add privacy and security to your website, which helps with the SEO.

• Pagination of your website: In your site, use rel=”next” and rel=”prev” links to avoid duplicate content issues. Also, it will tell search engines that the subsequent pages are a continuation of the main page and understand which is the main page and it will use that for indexing purposes.

• Optimize Title Tag: Put your keyword is your page’s title tag; it will match your organic result headline and tell search engines what the page is about. In general 55-60 characters length of a title tag is a good rule of thumb here. 36% of SEO experts think the headline/title tag is the most important SEO element. 

• Write the Meta Descriptions: You can write your meta description by taking the audience in mind and include the main keywords of the page, as the meta description does show up in search results. 

• Check Image Alt Texts: Search engines can’t read the content of the image, but they can read the alt text that describes the content of the image. Moreover, check all the images of your website, they should have ALT text, and it should be relevant to the image. 

WordPress SEO optimization is vital for the success of your website in search results.

Chapter 10: Pre Launch Checklist

A successful website launch is not that easy, its critical. You can easily miss out on essential steps when you are ready to launch your website, which may be harmful to your website security, SEO, and brand reputation.

Following the pre-launch WordPress website checklist will help you tick off the essential parts of your new website.

Particular	Details	Status
Website Content	All website content (posts/pages/images/data) has been imported/updated.	Check
Proof Read	You have reviewed your website content, and errors are corrected.	Check
Website Pages	All the required pages have been created and checked. For example:   Home  About  Services  Testimonials  Contact   Blog Page  Single post page  Custom 404 page  Legals	Check Check Check Check Check Check Check Check Check
WordPress Security	As a website owner, website security should be your top priority. If your site is not secured, hackers can attack and can use your website to infect your site visitors with malware and even steal the data your site holds. According to the 2020 Cyber-security Report by ISACA, 46% of enterprises experienced more attacks this year than the prior year.  Have you secured your website to at least a minimum security recommended?	Check
Website Hierarchy	People navigate a website using a hierarchy through the site’s navigation. The better your website is structured, the better are your chances of ranking higher in search engines.  Check all the URL structure conventions on your website and verify the hierarchical breadcrumbs on all pages of your website.	Check
HTML, CSS, JS files	HTML, CSS, JS are an integral part of the modern web development process. Minify your HTML, CSS, and JavaScript resources. Check your all code files and verify that you have used generic CSS classes. Avoid duplicate CSS classes. Minifying files can save up to 30-40%, or even 50% of file size in some cases.	Check
Headings	Headings: Headings help in defining the hierarchy and the structure of the web page content. Have you used H1, H2, H3 tags properly on your pages?	Check
Links	Review internal & external links to ensure they are working as you would like to.	Check
Website Images	Your website visual content must be optimized for your customers and search engines. Image Alt tags are useful for users viewing a webpage on screen readers or browsers that can’t process images.  39% of people will stop engaging with a website if images won’t load or take too long to load. Verify that every image for your website is compressed and must have proper ALT tags.	Check
Website Buttons	Buttons are the most effective way to encourage user interaction. Globally styled buttons create a consistent theme on your website and also save your time. Check the buttons in your whole website. Make sure they are working fine and are globally styled i-e: button color, font type, text color, styling and hover color should be consistent.	Check
Website Navigation	All the pages of your website should be included in navigation. 50% of visitors will use the navigation menu to orient themselves.	Check
Mobile Navigation	The navigation of your website should be responsive and globally styled. Use an intuitive symbol like +/- sign or an arrow (>/<)  to open or close the submenu options.	Check
Console Errors	Find and remove all console errors or your website. Use Google Search Console tool to verify all the errors are removed.	Check
Input Fields	All the input fields on your website should be globally styled like a search field, form fields etc.	Check
CAPTCHA	Check and verify that the CAPTCHA is working properly. Check the CAPTCHA response too, it should be valid.	Check
Website Forms	The forms of your website should be globally styled. Make sure every form is linked with respective thank you page.	Check
Form Functionality	Test the functionality of each form by passing correct and wrong parameters. Form validation should be working properly. Proper notifications and error popups should be displayed.	Check
Plugins Configuration	Check and verify that the required plugins are installed and configured properly	Check
Updated Website Plugins	All the website plugins should be updated.	Check
Remove Unnecessary plugins.	Remove all the useless deactivated plugins from your website to increase your WordPress site health.	Check
Google Analytics code	Check and verify that the Google Analytics code is added and working properly	Check
Responsive Layout	Each element of every page should be responsive in your website i-e: content, media etc. You can use different tools to check the website responsiveness like Responsive web design checker tool. 74% of users are more likely to return to mobile-friendly websites.	Check
Remove Extra Stuff	Remove all the useless extra stuff from your website, which is not the part of website requirement i-e: Extra Forms, Extra CPT’s, Extra Pages/Posts, Extra Themes etc	Check
Permalinks	Correct permalink structure has been selected.	Check
XML Sitemap	Make sure that you have created an XML Sitemap and submit it to Google. Enable the Advanced settings in the SEO plugin to generate a sitemap for your website.	Check
Search Engine Visibility	Make sure that you have unchecked the box for Search Engine Visibility so that the search engine will not skip indexing.	Check
SSL Configuration	Check and verify that you have configured SSL on your website before you go live.	Check
Website Speed	Check and verify the speed of your website using different tools like GTmetrix, Website Grader, etc. It should be in green zone and ideally load under 3 seconds.  If not, then improve your website loading speed. Slow-loading websites lead to a $2.6 billion revenue loss each year.	Check

All of the above will also help you in your WordPress website audit in future ad comprehensive WordPress maintenance.

Congratulations on building a website you can be proud of!

Conclusion

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Hope you have found this detailed guide on how to build a WordPress website from scratch useful. If you need any WP support, please feel free to ask in the comments below.

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