Update 2020: Originally this post had 17 things to do, but 3 of those things are outdated, so there are only 14 things to do now! 🙂
So, you’ve got a brand new wordpress blog!
Now what?
This post will tell you what you need to do after you start your wordpress blog.
If you already have a wordpress blog, you can still do these things if you haven’t done them yet 😉 .
So, here is my checklist of the 17 important things to do after starting your wordpress blog! Enjoy! 🙂
(Psst…If you’re thinking about why you should start a blog, >> 22 Reasons for You to Blog
And if you don’t use wordpress, click here to read about why you should use wordpress).
1. Decide whether you want to ‘www’ or not
If you have noticed, some blogs, like http://mashable.com/, don’t use the ‘www’ in their address. And some blogs, like http://www.techcrunch.com/, use the ‘www’.
So if you type http://www.mashable.com, it will redirect to http://mashable.com, and vice versa.
One advantage of having a www is your blog address will look more formal.
And if you don’t use the ‘www’, your address would be shorter.
To decide, go to yourblog.com/wp-admin/options-general.php and change both the ‘WordPress address’ and ‘Blog address’ to http://www.yourblog.com, or vice versa.
WWW Image by bull3t
2. Set up a feed so people can subscribe to your blog
If you are wondering what a blog feed is, it is a slimmed-down version of a blog that is created to be easily syndicated. You can subscribe to it using email or an RSS reader. A feed is represented by the orange RSS icon.
Many people prefer to get updates of your new blog posts through this easy way.
You can set one up at feedburner (Here’s how mine looks like). It’s free and easy! Just type in your blog address and click Burn Feed 😉 .
After that, set up email subscriptions, which enables your readers to subscribe by email. Go to Publicize >> Email Subscriptions in order to activate it and get the form.
Not setting up email subscriptions is a big mistake when it comes to getting subscribers to your blog because most people don’t know about RSS readers. Also, about 50% of my blog subscribers subscribe by email, so email subscriptions is a must!
After that, put the form and the RSS icon on your blog and link it to your feed at feedburner so people can subscribe.
3. Install Feedburner Feedsmith
Feedburner Feedsmith is a plugin that detects all ways to access your original wordpress feed and redirects them to http://feeds2.feedburner.com/yourfeed.
This plugin is needed for feedburner to track every possible subscriber to your blog by redirecting those who access http://www.yourblog.com/feed to feedburner. So, click here to install this plugin!
4. Subscribe to your own feed via RSS and email
It’s important to subscribe to your own feed, because it lets you see what your subscribers see, and when something is not right with your feed, you’ll notice. Besides, it boosts your subscriber count by 1 too 😉 . Hehe.
You can either use an RSS reader or email to subscribe to your feed, but it is best if you subscribe to both of them.
If you have a google account (which you most probably do – if you use Gmail, you have one), you can go to Google Reader. After logging in, click ‘Add a subscription’ and type in your blog address there.
5. Get your blog a favicon
A favicon is the icon you see next to your browser address bar and in your browser bookmarks. Gloson Blog’s favicon is .
It helps you brand your blog and also helps people locate your site more easily in their bookmarks.
To do this,
1. Create a square image and upload it to http://www.html-kit.com/favicon/ to generate a favicon.
2. Download it and upload the .ico file it using an FTP client to /wp-content/themes/yourthemefilename.
3. Go to the wordpress administration area and then go to Appearance >> Editor.
4. Click on “header.php” to edit it.
5. Add this code on the line just before </head>:
<link rel=”shortcut icon” href=”wp-content/themes/yourthemefilename/favicon.ico” type=”image/ico” />
(Be sure to replace ‘yourthemefilename’ with your theme file name 😉 )
6. Press Ctrl + F5 (Clear cache and reload) on your homepage. You should see it now! 😉
6. Change the permalink structure
A permalink is the address of a blog post. This post’s permalink is https://glosonblog.com/17-important-things-to-do-after-starting-your-wordpress-blog/.
By default, the permalink structure is like this: http://yourblog.com/?p=123.
Instead of the post ID, I suggest changing it to http://yourblog.com/your-post-title in order to gain SEO benefits. Also, if a visitor looks at it, he will know what the post is about before clicking it.
To do this, go to yourblog.com/wp-admin/options-permalink.php and then, type in “/%postname%/” in Custom Structure.
Don’t worry about broken links because the default structure will redirect itself to the new structure 😉 .
For example, this post’s old permalink structure is https://glosonblog.com/?p=1833. Click it and see what happens 😉 .
Link photo by cindy47452
7. Write Your About Me page
An ‘About Me’ page is essential for every blog. When your readers are interested in your content, they want to know who wrote it. That’s when they go to the ‘About Me’ page.
Basically, it is just a page that tells who you are, what is your blog about, interesting things about you, and of course, a picture of yourself.
It really helps your readers to know you and your blog better! (Here’s my ‘About Me’ page by the way.)
8. Set up a contact form
A contact form is an professional and easy way for your readers to contact you. It also protects your email address from spammers.
There are some wordpress plugins that allow you to put up a contact form. I recommend Contact Form 7, a very popular contact form plugin.
After installing it, make a new page called ‘Contact’ and insert the form into it. (Here’s how it looks like on this blog 😉 )
9. and don’t forget the archive page too!
An archive page (here’s mine) is where people can find all the posts on your blog, from the first post to the latest post.
An archive page is important because it lets people discover your older content easily (and generate more pageviews).
To make an archive page, I recommend SRG Clean Archives, the one I’m using now. It’s clean and displays all your posts neatly.
If you are looking for a more creative and fun archive plugin, you should try Snazzy Archives, and here’s how it looks like.
10. Find a free theme and tweak it to make it unique
or hire someone to design it or design one yourself 😉 .
A theme (design) is really important to a blog because it represents the blog’s brand. Because if content is king, the design is the shiny robe and crown.
So I recommend you to find a not-so-common theme that you like. Then tweak it and make it a little (or better, a lot) different than the original.
One way is to change the structure of the theme by going to the Theme Editor (yourblog.com/wp-admin/theme-editor.php) in wordpress.
Another easier way is to change the images of the theme. The images are located in the theme’s folder.
After editing the images (like changing its color or texture), you can overwrite them to your blog using an FTP client like Filezilla.
(In the directory /wp-content/themes/yourthemefilename/images)
Be sure to press Ctrl + F5 to clear the cache to see the new design.
11. Set up your ping list
A ping list is a list of services that will be pinged each time you post. The services will notify sites and directories that you have posted a new post, thus giving you more exposure.
To set up your pinglist, go to the Update Services section in yourblog.com/wp-admin/options-writing.php.
And paste the sites you want to send a ping to. Note that the more pings you list, the more server resources your host has to use. So you might get suspended on a shared hosting if you use too much server resources.
This is a short recommended list of pings.
http://api.moreover.com/RPC2http://bblog.com/ping.phphttp://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2http://ping.weblogalot.com/rpc.phphttp://ping.feedburner.comhttp://ping.syndic8.com/xmlrpc.phphttp://ping.bloggers.jp/rpc/http://rpc.pingomatic.com/http://rpc.weblogs.com/RPC2http://topicexchange.com/RPC2http://www.blogpeople.net/servlet/weblogUpdateshttp://xping.pubsub.com/ping
12. Install Google Analytics (or any site stats counter you want)
Site statistics counters are important for you to monitor, analyze and study your blog’s traffic, so you can get to know your visitors better
I recommend Google Analytics, because it’s quite advanced and has lots of features. It’s free and all you need is a Google Account.
Google Analyticator, a wordpress plugin, allows you to easily add a Google Analytics tracking code.
Note: And please don’t become a stataholic! Write more posts!
13. Install WordPress DB Backup to schedule blog backups
WordPress Database Backup, a wordpress plugin, allows you to schedule blog backups (hourly, twice daily, daily, weekly) easily and have them automatically sent to you by email or stored in the server.
Backups are really important because if anything ever happens to your blog, you have the backup, your best defense.
14. Change the admin username
Most of the login usernames of wordpress blogs is ‘admin’. If your wordpress blog’s login username is ‘admin’, too, you should really change it to something that can’t be guessed easily because the default name makes hackers’ lives so much easier.
Changing it is super duper easy. Here are the steps to do it:
1. Go to the wordpress admin area.
2. Go to Users >> Add new
3. Fill in the details with a different username and give it administrator privileges.
4. Log out and log in with the new username.
5. Delete the ‘admin’ user.
6. When you do so, it will ask you whether you want to move the posts and links of ‘admin’ to another user or delete them. Attribute the posts to the new username you have just created.
Photo by Darwin Bell
15. Install the All-in-One-SEO Pack Plugin
All-in-One-SEO-Pack is a really popular wordpress plugin to do all the basic SEO things on your blog like page titles, post titles, meta tags, descriptions and those kinds of stuff. By default, the browser title of a wordpress blog post is:
Blog Title >> Blog Archive >> Post Title.
If you install All in One SEO, the structure will be changed to (or you can customize it):
Post Title | Blog Title
Which looks simply much better and shorter.
It also noindexes the date and category archives so that it won’t appear in search engine results pages and won’t receive duplicate content penalty.
16. Create your own 404 page
A 404 page is what your readers see when they go to a non-existing page on your blog. Like this: https://glosonblog.com/thispagedoesntexist.
By default, the page is just a ‘404 error – Page not Found’ 404 page that isn’t much help to your readers. Why not make it more helpful instead?
To do this, go to the wordpress admin area and then Appearance >> Editor. Click on 404.php to edit it.
Find the part of the code where it says <h2>404 Page Not Found</h2> or something like that. Then overwrite that line with this code (My version of a 404 page).
Be sure to make a backup of your old code before overwriting. It will probably work on most themes, but in some cases, it won’t, then you need to have a little bit of HTML knowledge in order to make it work.
<h2>404 Page Not Found</h2>
<p>Oopsie! The page you are looking for cannot be found! It might be renamed or removed. Please check your spelling or return to the homepage.</p><p>Or, you can also view our latest posts below. Hope you’ll enjoy them. Thanks! ;-)</p>
<p>
<h2>Latest Posts</h2></p>
<ul>
<?php
query_posts(‘posts_per_page=10’);
if (have_posts()) : while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>
<li><a href=”<?php the_permalink() ?>” title=”Permalink for : <?php the_title(); ?>”><?php the_title(); ?></a>
<?php endwhile; endif; ?>
</ul>
Feel free to edit and customize the code! 🙂 Do tell me if this code doesn’t work!
17. Write a post!
Still, without any content, a blog won’t be a blog.
So go on and write a post! Write a unique high-quality thought provoking post on a topic you are passionate about!
After that, promote it on twitter, facebook, stumbleupon, and so on and on. Ask your friends to read it too! 🙂
Photo by KatieKrueger
_______________
So here are my 17 things to do after starting a wordpress blog checklist. Be sure to bookmark this post and read it when you start a new wordpress blog! 😉
If you know of another thing to do after starting a wordpress blog, please tell me in the comments!
And if you have any questions, please drop me a comment and I’ll be very glad to answer it! 🙂
What a perfect time.
I just got my blog up and this is what i needed.
Thanks buddy!
.-= Aaron´s last blog ..Birth of Foreign Language Trending Topics =-.
You’re welcome Aaron! 🙂 By the way, your blog is really great and interesting!
That’s great advice, I never really thought about many of those steps 🙂 Thanks!
Wonderful article or should I say it tutorial. I think, I need to follow the No. 16 point as I yet not customize it.
.-= Arafat Hossain Piyada´s last blog ..Uptime Robot – Get Website Uptime Report Via Email & SMS Free =-.
I have to admit I am a reformed stataholic. lol But that was a long time ago and I have control of my stat addiction now. 😉
Regarding #1 www or no www. It’s a good idea to login to Google webmaster tools and set your preferred domain once you have decided which version of the domain you are going to use.
Excellent list of important things to do with a new wordpress blog. As usual great job Gloson! 🙂
.-= Gerald Weber´s last blog ..Breaking: All New Google Search Results? Hello Caffeine! =-.
Hi Gerald. Thank you very much!
I too admit that I was also a stataholic, but I got rid of my addiction. 😛 Thanks for the Google Webmaster Tools tip by the way! I’ve forgotten about it. Will change it now!
Thanks for the great post.
Can you tell me the plugin name thats shown above? .. the one for Subscribe to comments via email.
Your Comment (smaller size | larger size)
Thanks!
Oh! That wordpress plugin is called “Subscribe to comments”. It lets your commentators to be able to subscribe to future comments.
You can download it here 😉 – http://txfx.net/wordpress-plugins/subscribe-to-comments/
You mentioned to find a free theme and tweak it. What are your thoughts on the thesis theme? It seems like it would get you going pretty quickly.
.-= Justin´s last blog ..Experience More Challenge Ends January 13! =-.
Well, I’ve never tried Thesis before, but I’ve heard of it before and that it’s known for being very customizable. Well, maybe I should try it soon 😉 .
Great checklist of things to do for your new wordpress blog! I had just asked the question on Twitter about Ping directories and how many to use – found the answer here.
I’ll probably write something about this at MollerMarketing.com and will definitely source this sweet article. Thanks Gloson!
.-= Nate Moller´s last blog ..Is There Ever an End to SEO? =-.
You’re welcome, Nate! I’m glad I’ve helped you solve your problem! 😉
Excellent suggestions! I already do several of these for my clients, but I’ll be adding a few of these to my bag of tricks.
Thank you for the detailed info.
Happy 2010!
.-= Todd´s last blog ..Demo Post =-.
I am considering starting a WordPress Blog! The post is awsome! But i have some questions:
1.For a WordPress Blog you need a domain and a hosting. Can you suggest some companies that provide such services on a good price 🙂
2.Isn’t it nice to put a ReTweet” Button or “Share in Facebook” Button to increase traffic in some way? Are there any good plugins to do so?
Thanks in advance!!!
1. I recommend HostGator because it is a great hosting with very rare downtimes and a reasonable price. There are other cheaper hostings but are usually of lower quality.
2. I advice you to put the buttons when you’ve got a decent number of shares/retweets because it will give visitors a good impression and will influence them to sahre/retweet your blog post too.
The plugins can be download at
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/tweetmeme/
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/facebook-share-new/
You can also insert the buttons individually on each post using code instead of using the plugins to insert the buttons on all of your blog posts. 😉
Cheers!
These are great tips. I wish that Feedburner could automatically connect any original feed to its Feedburner link for tracking purposes. Changing the permalink structure seems to be one of the most forgotten things when setting up WordPress sites. I see really popular blogs that still have the ?p=54, meaning they are missing out on the SEO benefits of the URL structure.
.-= Kikolani´s last blog ..Best of #SMAZ – Blogging Tips, Social Media ROI, & SEO =-.
Kristi,
That’s exactly what #3 on the list does.
feed smith
.-= Gerald Weber´s last blog ..Google Chrome Extensions 24 New SEO Plugins =-.
Hi Kristi. I guess that’s the reason the Feedburner Feedsmith plugin was created 😉 . Also, I’m surprised to hear that some popular blogs haven’t updated their permalink structures too. 😐
Excellent post on what to do when first starting a wordpress blog! You’re only 12, but already know more than so many adults do about blogging and social media.
.-= Perth Tehcalite´s last blog ..Twitter and the Perth Police =-.
Hi there! Thank you very much for your compliment and encouragement! It all comes from experience 😉 .
dont forget to add spam protection! Akismet’s decent.
really good post- looking forward to more
Wow! This is fantastic! Thank you. 😉
Thanks to post number one (www or no www) I won’t be conflicting with my host settings. Dreamhost allows me to choose which one I prefer. Insignificant as it may be, it would be dumb to conflict between host and WordPress.
Great WordPress post!
.-= Phelan´s last blog ..Remove Connection on LinkedIn =-.
No problem, Phelan. I’m glad to help! I didn’t know dreamhost lets you choose your preferred URL. That means websites not powered by wordpress automatically redirects to the right one.
Very well thought out and helpful! I hadn’t heard of SRG Clean Archives…will be sure to install it this weekend 🙂
.-= Pixelrage´s last blog ..Domain Names in 3D =-.
🙂 Glad to hear that! I really love SRG Clean Archives! Looking forward to see the archive page on your blog!
Ben Lang – No problem!
Arafat Hossain Piyada – Glad to hear that! Be sure to tell me if the code doesn’t work on your site and I’ll help you out 😉 .
pavlicko – Hi! I think wordpress automatically comes with Askimet. So that’s why I didn’t include it in this list.
Diana Adams – Hey there Diana! I’m really glad you like my post! 🙂
Good job Gloson! Another great article.
Very comprehensive guideline for beginner. I have setup most of the features listed above. In referring to the ping list, we should put more precaution if our hosting is provided limited bandwidth.
.-= Simon Liew´s last blog ..7 Google Search Techniques to Help You Find Information More Easily =-.
Hi Simon! Thank you very much! I agree that we must pay precaution when hosting on a host that has limited bandwidth otherwise your blog will be down. It happened to me once. Since then I bought a hosting with unlimited bandwidth. 😉
Nice Post Gloson I really liked this post.
Thank you very much Shivendu! 🙂 I’m glad you like it.
Hi Gloson, great tips. There is another important thing to do: block all the spam comments from bots, as even newly setup site is vulnerable to spam comments everyday.
I am using Wp-SpamFree plugin to block spams 🙂
Hi. Thanks for the tip and telling me about Wp-SpamFree! I’ve never heard of that plugin before! I’ll consider using it on my blog 😉 .
Point 5, adding a favicon, is just what I did a few days ago. Besides the link above, I can recommend you http://www.favicon.cc. It allows you to modify your 16×16 favicon in the browser. And you can search for free favicons if you don’t want to design it by yourself.
Hi. Thank you very much for telling me about favicon.cc. It is really a nifty favicon tool! 🙂
Wow. Thanks for all the information for my blog. It is a long list, but very necessary. Great Job!!
Another excellent post, Gloson! Keep up the great work.
.-= Coty´s last blog ..LadyUmbrella =-.
An About page is one very crucial thing in the life of a blog and sometimes I wonder why people actually leave that out of their blog from the start for a very long. How can somebody actually know what you and your blog are about if you don’t tell them.
Great guide for the starters, Gloson, and I think even some of us who are already into blogging could do with some of the tips in this article :). Great job :).
.-= Shirley´s last blog ..Google Buzz – Google’s New Move Into Social Media =-.
Hi Shirley. Thank you! I also wonder why some bloggers who has been blogging for some time do not have an About page, which is crucially important. Hmmm… 😐 Maybe we need to remind them because perhaps they have forgotten about it.
Danabeth & Coty – Thank you very much!
Hiya
Wow! I thought I’d done most of what I needed to do, but clearly I needed to discover you, Gloson, via a follower on Twitter.
Thanks for helping me get there!
Gwen McCauley
Thank you Gwen, I’m glad I’ve helped! Looking forward to see the changes on your blog!
Cheers!
Gloson
Need a plugin to do all this steps 🙂 – great list. Like that tip with the ping list – will try it out.
Great – bookmarked
thx
Heiko
.-= Tikoim´s last blog ..Google von A bis Z =-.
Thank you for the tips again Gloson,
I think I finally got all 17 things you said done!
It sure is hard work getting all of them done but its harder for you getting this done. Congrats and thank you my friend
You’re most welcome Aaron. Glad to see that you’ve got everything done! 🙂 Yeah it was hard work writing this post but it was indeed worth the effort 😉 .
“if content is king, the design is the shiny robe and crown”
very true!
.-= kenwooi´s last blog ..Supporting Earth Hour: The Hidden Purposes =-.
Yeah! I really agree with that concept 🙂 .
Nice written article! Can be packed as a free report. It sure will be helpful for those who just started a wordpress blog
Yeah… perhaps I would include this article if I come out with an eBook. Thanks for the suggestion!
Already done these 17 things.
Anyways thanks for sharing ;P
Keep up the good work bro !!
.-= Dev | Technshare´s last blog ..30+ Inspirational Social Bookmarking Sites =-.
Haha! Glad to hear that! You’re welcome, Dev!
Hey Gloson,
i searched for some information about “how to” handle a blog and found your blog. i read some of your posts and liked them 🙂 altough they are in englisch 😀 you have to know i am from germany and always trying to improve my englisch and it works, buuut if its to specialized like some smo blogs or blog blogs i understand only words like “and” 😀 but your englisch is very good to understand, so thanks for that and thats because i subscribed your blog already 😉
Hi Andy!
Thank you very much for being my reader and my subscriber! I’m really glad you liked my blog posts and found them easy to understand! 😀
And don’t worry, because I’m from Malaysia and my English is also not perfect. But I have improved my English a lot when I started blogging, because blogging requires reading and writing. 🙂
~Gloson
Some More Must have Plugins which we should install:
* Google XML Sitemap Generator
* WP-Super Cache
* Subscribe to Comments
* WP Security Scan
* Yet Another Related Posts Plugin
🙂
.-= Mrinmay Bhattacharjee´s last blog ..Purchase Cheap Storage for your Google Account =-.
Cool! I already have 4 of them! I’ll consider installing the XML Sitemap Generator. Thanks for the suggestion! 🙂
Yeah! After that don’t forget to Submit your blog Sitemap to Google Webmasters Tool, Yahoo! Site Explorer and Bing Webmasters
By submitting Sitemap, bots will more effectively discover links and crawl content in your blog 🙂
.-= Mrinmay Bhattacharjee´s last blog ..Purchase Cheap Storage for your Google Account =-.
Really? Wow! Thanks for telling me that! I’ll do it! 🙂
These are really great and very helpful. Will they work on the wordpress.com blogs or just the wordpress.org ones? And,if you have one on wordpress.com can you migrate it?
Thanks,
Jack
Hello Jack! I am talking about wordpress.org here, but most of them can also work on wordpress.com.
Though, anyway, wordpress.org is way better than .com for a lot of reasons – it looks professional, you have full control, and it is very flexible; you can tweak almost anything. You can also install plugins, which you can’t on .com. 🙂
And, you CAN migrate to wordpress.org. Here’s an article that shows exactly how to do that.
> http://www.problogger.net/archives/2009/01/03/how-to-move-from-wordpresscom-to-wordpressorg/
Hope this helps! 🙂
Gloson
Thank you Gloson. I had neglected to set the automatic backup and reading your post made me remember. Thanks, Paul
You’re welcome! Glad you have set that up! 🙂
Gloson,
Thank you very much for this post. I did most of your suggestions awhile ago since I launch my new blog a few days ago.
By the way, the below code in the 404 page won’t work in my blog. I guess we use the same theme UBT 3.0.
Thanks again.
Regards,
Felix Albutra
.-= Blogging Access´s last blog ..How I made 550 US Dollars in One Day =-.
Thank you Felix! I’m very glad my post helped you on your new blog!
Yes, I have upgraded to UBT recently and hmmmmm.. it’s not working here too. Looks like the recent posts code doesn’t work on UBT.
Hey! Nice post Gloson.
Hi Sean! Thanks for dropping by! 🙂
I will migrate to wordpress next month. This tutorial will be of use to me…
Great to hear that! You’ll love wordpress! Feel free to ask me questions if you have any 🙂
I did all things when i started my blog before reading this post except adding more ping services.Its a nice list for wordpress beginners.
Hi Asad! Great to hear that! I agree, if I were to start a new wordpress blog, I would read this list too LOL 😛
very nice post dude
but i wasn’t able to setup the contact form…..how to do it?
Hi Vinayak!
Here’s how
1. Go to /wp-admin/plugin-install.php
2. Search for Contact Form 7.
3. Install and activate it.
4. Then go to its option page at /wp-admin/admin.php?page=wpcf7 – You can customize it.
5. Next, copy the code that looks like this: [contact-form 1 “Contact form 1”]
6. Create a new page on your blog.
7. In the HTML section, paste the code.
8. Publish it, and see your new contact form! 🙂
Hope this helps! 🙂
Thank you very much 😀
You’re most welcome, Vinayak! Glad to see that your contact form is up! The only thing you need to do is the remove the comment form below it…lol! 🙂
done 🙂 thanx for making me remember that
Thank you for the tips. Going to test my new blog.
You’re welcome! I’m glad it helped you!
Gloson, I am so impressed by you.:) Thank you for sharing so much wonderful information all in one place. I’ve been thinking about moving my blog to WordPress and this will be very helpful!
Hi Roni! So glad to see you here 🙂 . Thank you very much for the kind words! Looking forward to see your new blog! =)
Hello Gloson,
I didn’t understood how to get the archives,how to get it?
Well.. I recently found out there’s another plugin like SRG Clean Archives in the wordpress plugin directory. So, go to /wp-admin/plugin-install.php?tab=search. Type in “WP-Archives”. Then on the first result, click on “Install now”.
Next, create a new page on your blog called “Archives” and paste this in:
Hope this helps! 🙂
What do I have to paste in it?
Hmmm… I think the comments doesn’t show the code… but don’t worry. You can find the code at http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wp-archives/. Hope this helps! Looking forward to see your archive page!
Yeah, i found it. Thanks
Great tips. I will check this 17 important thing one by one on my blogs for I use the same wordpress theme as you. I will follow your suggestion.
Cool advice as always, Gloson.
In my opinion, WordPress built in RSS feed is already enough. =D
Well, it might look OK in firefox (cause it has a feature that displays RSS codes nicely), but in other browsers (like chrome), it’s just some code that might confuse your readers. Besides, using feedburner allows you to view statistics of your subscribers and email subscriptions too! 🙂
I see! Thanks for the great tip! =D
Hi Gloson,
Its an excellent article. You have covered almost all the to-do list immediately after starting a blog. I like the 16th point because I have not customized my blog with 404 page not found. You should also include installing Akismet plugin which is also very useful for checking spam comments. Whats your opinion?
Pritam Nagrale
Hi Pritam! Thank you very much! Yeah, I should have included that. I remembered one time when I turned off Askimet, and I got like 1 spam comment every 5 minutes. LOL 😛
Yes, very true. Its the most effective plugin to prevent spam. I don’t how would we handle the comment spam if there was no Akismet.
Truly awesome article! I have been blogging for almost four years and have done almost everything on your list. The one thing you wrote that I don’t think is necessary is blog pinging. If you have a well indexed site that you post to often there should be no need to do this.
Thank you very much Bill! Yes, I agree. Although blog pinging is not fully necessary for popular blog, it may help in new blogs. 🙂
Hi Gloson,
Finding your wordpress is a HUGE help for me! I just started a wordpress blog and now I see that I have to implement 2,3,4, and 5. Thanks for such a detailed article 🙂
Hi Peggy!
You’re most welcome! I’m really glad you like my blog! 🙂