5 Major WordPress Mistakes Newbies Should Avoid At All Costs

It’s easy to launch a new WordPress site and write content for it.

But here’s the thing. Most new bloggers make a lot of WordPress mistakes which cost them a lot of traffic and sales in the long run.

If you are a new WordPress user and don’t know which major WordPress mistakes you are making that are leaking website traffic and money, have a look at this post.

Avoid them and I’m sure that you will be running a profitable WordPress blog that helps you make more money online.

Top 5 WordPress mistakes to avoid as a new blogger

Are you ready to discover the dumbest WordPress mistakes most beginners make? Let’s find out.

major-wordpress-mistakes

1. Using a poorly coded WordPress theme

One of the biggest WordPress mistakes most beginners make is using a poorly coded theme on their sites. I know it’s really easy for you to search for a free theme to install on your WordPress blogs.

But remember the fact that most free WordPress themes are poorly coded and few of them might even contain malicious code.

Free WordPress theme developers do this all the time by injecting hidden code in theme core files to get backlinks from your sites without your notice. So be aware of such things before using a free theme.

Another reason to stay away from poorly coded themes is that they really affect your website’s loading times. Whether you know it or not, Google considers website speed as one of their crucial ranking factors.

I highly recommend you to install free themes ONLY from WordPress theme directory as all of them come from trusted sources.

It’s even better to use a premium WordPress theme on your sites. If you are wondering why you need to opt for a premium theme over a free WordPress theme, have a look at the following reasons.

  • Premium themes are researched and coded really well. Usually, expert designers create premium WordPress themes, and they always make sure to create stunning themes.
  • They load faster because of the smooth coding.
  • They usually are better optimized both for search engines and mobiles.
  • They frequently get updated, so you get the best performance.
  • Above all, you can have access to the support team if you buy premium themes.

2. Not optimizing your content

One of the primary reasons most bloggers struggles to increase their overall website search traffic is they don’t optimize their content for specific keywords.

How on earth it is possible for anyone to discover your content from Google search results if you don’t optimize your website content correctly? So avoid this major WordPress mistake by using the two incredible tools mentioned below.

WordPress SEO by Yoast: If you are a WordPress user, install this plugin right now. It’s not only free but is used worldwide by over 1 million users. That says you the importance of using this plugin. It helps you easily optimize your content for any keyword and also helps you where to put those keywords to rank higher in search results.

Long Tail Pro: Using long tail keywords is the fastest way to increase your overall search traffic. But finding long tail keywords usually takes a lot of time, and it’s really hard to find low competitive keywords. Here’s where Long Tail Pro tools come into play which helps you quickly find better keywords that increase your organic traffic.

Although Long Tail Pro is a paid tool it’s worth every single penny. If you want more search traffic, try this tool free for 10 days and decide yourself whether to buy it or not afterward.

Pro Tip: Most bloggers don’t optimize their images. If you are one among them, stop doing right away. Optimize your images for a specific keyword you want to rank for and use it in the alt tag for better results.

3. Ignoring Basic SEO Settings

Another biggest WordPress mistake most newbies make is they ignore the most basic SEO settings. Immediately after launching a WordPress blog, I highly recommend you to do the following things.

Install Google XML Sitemaps plugin: To increase your search traffic, you first need to index your whole content on Google. To do that, you need an XML sitemap. This plugin helps you quickly index all your newly published content so you can rank faster in Google search results.

Add Google Analytics to your sites: Make sure to have access to Google Analytics. It allows you to find where your visitors are coming from and what your top pages are. That way you can easily find out which keywords to focus on to build a successful blog.

4. Not creating a Site Backup Is the Biggest WordPress Mistake!

Not taking the regular backups come under the list of major WordPress mistakes as the WordPress is more vulnerable to the security threats. 

Several years ago, I launched a WordPress site and started creating content around it. I started attracting more traffic and blog comments in the initial weeks, and all of a sudden, something went wrong. I made some changes in my WordPress theme’s core file, and the blog went down!

A Caveat: Never play with your theme files unless you know what you are doing.

Then, I immediately contacted my hosting provider’s support staff and all they asked me was the backup files. As you guessed it right, I never realized the importance of creating a backup of my site, and I had to pay extra money to get the full backup of my site and get my blog running.

That’s the reason you need to take always make sure to backup your whole websites.

Take regular backups of your site: You can use either BackUpWordPress or BackWPup (both are free WordPress plugins) to take a full backup of your WordPress sites. They are both easy to use and have automated backup options to fully backup your sites from files to databases.

Also, make sure to update regularly all your WordPress plugins if you want to secure your WordPress sites from hackers.

5. Ignoring Google Algorithm Updates

Did you know that Google makes nearly 500 changes to their search algorithms every single year? I know it’s hard to make changes to your site whenever Google changes its algorithms.

But if you don’t give importance to their major Google algorithm updates like Hummingbird, Panda and Penguin, you will hate yourself later.

If your site traffic suddenly goes down, it might be majorly because you hit by any Google algorithm update. By making certain changes, you can quickly gain your search rankings and get your traffic back. This is the major reason

why you need always to focus on Google algorithm changes.

So how can you do that?

Fortunately, Moz keeps a general log information page whenever Google makes any major algorithm changes. By keeping track of those algorithms, you will know what caused your website traffic to go down or up.

Conclusion on major WordPress mistakes to avoid as a newbie

If you are new to WordPress, you will probably make some dumbest mistakes that would lead to several problems down the road and affect your site in the long run. 

So there you go! Those are the five major WordPress mistakes you should avoid while building a better blog that makes money. Remember, every professional is once an amateur.

Everyone makes mistakes. But the quicker you find and learn from your WordPress mistakes the faster you can build a successful site.

So what are your thoughts? What are the major WordPress mistakes you are making that are mentioned in this post? Share your views in the comments.

by Nirmala
Nirmala is an avid blogger, WordPress enthusiast who has been blogging since 2010. She loves to write useful WP tips & tricks on this active blog.

19 thoughts on “5 Major WordPress Mistakes Newbies Should Avoid At All Costs”

  1. Hi Nirmala,
    Informative post indeed!
    Thanks for sharing these mistakes. As you know am new to wordpress, si these are gonna help me alot 🙂
    Thanks again!
    ~ Ahmad
    P.S. Did you check my blog? I am still waiting for your feedback about the blog design!

    Reply
    • Hi Muhammad,

      Thanks for checking the post, glad it will help you as you are a WordPress newbie.

      Using a good theme, content optimization and taking backup are the key things to be done in WordPress site so as to yield the better results. You are welcome!

      Yes, I have just visited your blog and the design looks fine. Keep one thing in mind – we should not distract the visitors much with other elements. We should put good efforts to nudge them to read our content without any disturbance, then they would come back for sure (Which is essential for blog success). Don’t add any more elements in the sidebar. Other things look cool, keep your good work.

      Reply
    • We make mistakes, but we should learn from them. These mistakes never let us grow further and thus we should avoid them fully.

      Thanks Robin for getting time to check my post, great to know that you have enjoyed reading the post. Stay tuned!

      Reply
  2. Welcome to my blog Richard!

    I’m delighted that I could help you in learning the unknown, essential WordPress stuff.

    More WP info are on the way, keep coming!

    Reply
  3. Hello Nirmala Mam !! I am completely agree on each and every point of this article because i also made some mistakes Like Choosing a Free Wp Theme and then Avoiding Basic seo so i think a newbie should not make these mistakes if he wants to make his blogging career long lasting !!

    Reply
    • Hi Jaidayal,

      Welcome to my blog, and thanks for reading the post.

      Not only you, everyone makes mistakes, but we should consider the roadblocks as the good opportunities to learn something new.

      Yes, I would always suggest the Bloggers/WordPress users use the premium themes as it has several benefits like boosting SEO, getting a brand name and much more.

      If you need any help in getting a good WordPress paid theme, please let me know, I’ll help you.

      Thanks for the visit, you are welcome to leave your thoughts here, stay tuned!

      Reply
  4. This is an eye-opening post Nirmala. You will not grow in blogging if you do not have a paid WordPress themes. I totally agreed. I also think backup of WordPress is very important. I love this new blog and already a fan of it.

    Reply
    • Nice to see you again, Ravi. Great to know that you’re the loyal reader of WPGlossy.

      I take good efforts to publish the useful piece of content, glad you liked it.

      Yeah, getting a premium theme and taking regular backups are the WordPress essentials that would help us a lot to perform well.

      Thanks for being regular here, more awesome stuff to come. Keep coming!

      Reply
  5. Hi Nirmala,

    These points make lot of sense. I am trying to improve my WordPress experience day by day as well. I am trying to use less of codes but one mistake I have been doing is not backing my site up so I will go and install a backup plugin right away. Thanks for reminding me of this.

    Reply
    • Hi Pankaj,

      I appreciate your visit, thanks for reading the post.

      I feel good with your kind praising words. Good to hear that you’re using the fewer codes.

      Most of the WordPress users are not taking sincere efforts in backup their content as they might unaware that the WordPress is more vulnerable to hackers. Thus, we need to protect our valuable content to stay safe.

      Great that you’re going to install the backup plugin, let me know after installing it. Keep visiting.

      Reply
    • Welcome to my blog, Sandeep. Glad you like my style of writing and yes, it helps me to stand out from the crowd.

      Blogosphere is getting crowded and we need to implement a unique strategy to win readers’ heart.

      Thus, I spend quality time to craft the helpful posts.

      Thanks for your time, stay tuned!

      Reply
  6. Hi Nirmala,

    There is no doubt that almost every new blogger do these WordPress mistakes once in their life.

    These mistakes help them to learn something new again and again with time.

    Thanks for sharing it.

    Reply
    • Warm welcome Tuhin, thanks for sharing your thoughts.

      Yes, I agree that every newbie makes mistakes and yes, it is good to learn from the faults that we do.

      Keep visiting, have a good day ahead!

      Reply
  7. Totally agree. Earlier even I was the victim who was doing some of these mistakes. Every new blogger should take care of theme mistakes and avoid them, before starting blogging.
    Thanks a lot for compiling such an previous article. 🙂

    Reply
    • Glad that you’re accepting my viewpoints on WordPress mistakes that need to be avoided.

      Not only you, even I have done the mistakes and learning the new WP stuff with it.

      Thanks for spending time to read my post and leaving your opinion, stay tuned!

      Reply

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