WordPress Management: What You Need to Know 

If you are a website owner but don’t consider yourself tech-savvy, it’s essential to know that what you don’t know can land you in hot water. On top of that, it can cost you considerable time and money – which most of us don’t have.

The whole point of WordPress is to provide people with user-friendly content management, with all the tools needed to run it in one place. Powering more than 455 million websites worldwide, WordPress is the most popular choice of all Content Management Systems available.

WordPress management isn’t rocket science, but mismanagement can lead to general chaos and even result in your website being blacklisted on some search engines.

These are the basic elements to keep in mind when it comes to WordPress management.

WordPress Management Essentials to Know

Know the Difference Between Self-Hosted and Hosted WordPress

A hosted WordPress website is one where someone else handles all the complicated technical components that come with owning a website. The great news about using this type of service is that it makes it much easier to get started and lets you focus solely on content and – if you’re a business owner – communication with your customers.

Hosted services include:

• WordPress
• Squarespace
• Weebly
• Wix
• Shopify

You can go one step further and opt to use a proven management service such as WP Tech Support, so you don’t have to worry about all the security plugins and extras you should be installing.

They take care of things like:

• WordPress fixes
• WordPress updates
• Performance tune-ups
• SEO optimization
• Site security
• 24/7 monitoring
• Offsite backups
• Website improvements
• Spam comment cleansing

Self-hosting, on the other hand, means that you will download your copy of the WordPress CMS, choose a domain provider and also sign up with a hosting service that will host your website on the internet.

Basically, you will have control over everything, including the domain, hosting, and maintenance – and the responsibility that comes along with it.

Ensure Your Site is Backed Up Daily

Backups are crucial to the good health of your website. Without them, you could lose important and sensitive data – such as your customer’s information. What’s worse, you could suffer an intrusion from hackers and find yourself locked out of your own website.

Understanding WordPress Themes

A WordPress theme will establish how your website looks. Just go through to the WordPress admin panel of your site and select Appearance and then Themes in the menu. You will be able to look through thousands of themes and install the ones you like.

Various themes will feature different styles of fonts, layouts, and colors. The best themes should only deal with the presentation of your website and not its functionality.

Keep Your Plugins Updated

Plugins give your site with specific functionality. Here are some of the reasons that you might want to use plugins:

• Add a form to your site
• Add social media integration
• Add a form to your site
• Add e-commerce features
• Add a page builder

Just as there are thousands of themes to choose from, there are a plethora of plugins that promise to make your site better. The truth is they both vary in quality, so if you aren’t sure which to choose, go with something that has plenty of users. Also, ensure that you choose a plugin or theme that has regular updates. If the last update was a few years back, it means that nobody is maintaining it.

Most importantly, to ensure that your site continues to run smoothly, it is essential to update your themes and plugins whenever you have the chance. Keep in mind that these updates could negatively affect your site, so be sure to test them after an update.

Know When to go Premium

Many WordPress themes and plugins are available for free and also in premium versions. A lot of the time, free plugins means that your site will bread as it isn’t well-built – costing you time and money in its downtime.

Choosing to purchase a premium plugin means that you are supporting the continued development of that plugin and active customer support.

Final Word

WordPress is truly an excellent platform for setting up a website; however, its quality largely depends on how it is managed. The above-mentioned elements are the basics of what you need to know when it comes to great WordPress management.

Knowing whether you will self-host or have a hosted site is imperative, and much depends on your tech knowledge plus the time you wish to spend on managing your site. Other things to keep in mind include choosing the right themes and plugins and keeping them updated.