Setting up your first website can be a daunting task: there’s hosting, themes, design, plug ins, coding, etc….
It can make a girl’s head spin.
Your first website should be exciting, fun, and you should feel confident when throwing yourself that launch party inside your office with your fuzzy slippers and champagne.
If you don’t have the budget to hire a designer, or don’t have the time to sit and try and “figure it all out” by piecing together little bits of the puzzle, then keep reading because this list of 8 essential website elements is going to make your life so much easier!
When I set up my first website inside of WordPress, there was definitely a learning curve. After designing and developing several more websites, I have learned some pretty key elements that every site needs in order to be secure, safe, and successful for site owner and site visitor.
Here are 8 essential website elements that your new WordPress site needs:
1. Security: SSL Certificate
Make sure your site is secure by purchasing an SSL certificate through your web host provider – especially if you have any type of e-commerce on your site. Then install the “Really Simple SSL” plug in into WordPress and you’re good to go.
2. Privacy Policy & Terms
This tends to get overlooked, but it’s the law to have a privacy policy on your site, so don’t skip over this! Put the link in the footer of your site.
3. Tracking: Google Analytics and/or the FB Pixel
Set up analytics so that you can track website traffic. Inside of Google analytics you can also set up & monitor goals if you have any type of sales funnel in place. If you plan on ever running FB or Instagram ads, then definitely don’t forget to go ahead and install the pixel.
4. SEO: Yoast SEO plugin
The Yoast SEO plugin makes it really easy to add meta data to your pages and blog posts making it super easy for Google to index your site (so you can show up in search more!)
5. Backups: Updraft Plus plugin
You never know when something crazy might happen and your website go bananas, so make sure you have regular backups scheduled. I like the plugin Updraft plus.
6. Security: Wordfence plugin
Keep those pesky spam bots and hackers at bay with a really strong firewall. I use the Wordfence plugin, and it sends me weekly reports of all activity on my website.
7. Site Speed: WP Rocket
Using a cache plugin like WP Rocket will keep your site running at top speed. Check your site speed, here.
8. Page Builder: Elementor plug in
Lastly, if you’re designing your website from the ground up or creating any type of landing pages on your site this drag-and-drop plugin in a LIFESAVER! I’ve tried them all (Thrive Architect, Divi, Beaver Builder, etc) and Elementor is hands down the best due to how use friendly it is. You can easily integrate your contact forms, opt ins, add pop ups, upload custom fonts, and more. It has saved me so much time in working with WordPress!
Download it for FREE, here!