Blogger vs WordPress Blog

This is part of our "Learn WordPress" series.  In this post, you will find out how to properly set up WordPress after creating a WordPress website. Continue applying what you have learned so far:

(Step by Step) How To Start A Blog On WordPress

Now you simply need to set up your WordPress blog correctly.

8 Important Things To Do:

Delete defaults Posts/Plugins/Comments.

Setup a WordPress permalink structure setting.

Set time zone settings.

Set user registration settings.

Threaded comments.

WordPress ping list.

WordPress media settings.

Disable directory browsing.

When you install WordPress, you beat a stock installation with a few things like a dummy post, a dummy page, and a dummy comment. All you need to do just deletes all the dummy data. And then the first thing to do…

1- Delete Default Dummy Post, Page, and Comment

First of all Logs in to your WordPress dashboard and go to Posts on the left panel > Select All Posts and then delete the default dummy "Hello world" post.

Similarly, go to Pages > then click on All Pages and delete the default dummy page "Sample Page".

And finally, click on "Comments" option on the left panel and then erase the default comments here by selecting "All".

2- Set Up WordPress Permalinks (URL's Structure)

The default WordPress permalink setting is – "http://yourdomain.com/p=123″.

This permalink is very short, but not SEO friendly for search engines. If you don't change your site's permalink setting, It is bad for SEO.

Now Move to Settings >> Permalink and select "Post name".

Click "Save".

Now, when you URLs appear in search engines result, some of the keywords will be visible. This will help you to rank higher and receive more organic traffic.

3- Set Your Timezone to your local time:

The following two settings are found in Settings >> General. Make sure to set your Timezone to your local time so that when you schedule posts, they will go live according to your time. When you installed WordPress, you added a website title as "Site Title" & "Tagline".

For example: Here's CDT, I write CreativeDreamTech as a site title and "Blog For Blogger's" as a tagline.

You can change this anytime from this settings page. These two things are very important with SEO point of view, because this is what shows up in Google Search.

4- Enable/Disable User Registration:

You need to decide if you are starting to have a multi-author blog, or if you are going to be the sole author. If you are extending to allow guest posting, then be prepared to get a lot of spam registrations. However, you can fix that with the help of a plugin.

To leave this, tick off the "Anyone can register" box, and set the "New User Default Role" as "Contributor". If you don't want people to register, don't make the "Anyone can register" box.

5- Set WordPress Discussion/Comments Settings:

Right away, go to Settings > Discussion. This can become confusing if you don't know what to do here. But you don't worry, just follow the above screenshot carefully and you'll be good.

6- Update WordPress Ping List:

Move to Settings > Writing and add in more updated ping services to the ping list.

By default, WordPress only pings only one service. But you can notify many other ping services by drawing out the ping list.

What to read next? 

WordPress Ping List for Faster Indexing

7- Disable Directory Browsing:

In this context, you will need to edit your WordPress .htaccess file.  Don't be panic; it's actually pretty comfortable. This will disable directory browsing which is really significant step for maintaining the security of your blog.

8- WordPress Media Settings:

Right now move to Settings > Media, and use the below screenshot to configure the proper settings: I would also highly commend that you add a plugin which compresses HQ images into best optimus format as they're uploaded.

This medium setting will greatly improve the way WordPress handles HQ images. By default, WordPress creates multiple sizes for every uploaded picture. This is really not a good practice. This will load up your blog with unnecessary files and your blog speed will quickly become bloated.

If you just installed your new WordPress site/blog, make sure that all these 8 Important settings are properly configured or not. Anytime you install fresh WordPress, you should make sure to do these 8 settings before doing anything else. I'd recommend you bookmark this place so you can refer back every time you make a WordPress installation.

Source: 8 Important Things To Do After Creating A WordPress Website