1. Tips for a Great
Website Foundation
Corey Freeman
WordCamp Raleigh 2013

2. About Corey
Freeman (ME!)
Working with WordPress since 2004
Specialize in Headway Themes
Fan of website optimization
Owner of World’s most frustrating dog.
authenticcorey.com / @coreyfreeman

3. Olive the Puppy
Director of Operations

4. What Makes a Great Website?
A Breakdown of Our Goals

5. A Successful
Website…
Loads quickly
Looks amazing
Is easy to find
Gets users coming back

6. The Stages of
Website Creation
Development
Design
Optimization
Content/Promotion/Etc

7. “Terminal
Optimization”
Similar to “terminal velocity.”
Do the most amount of work right
now so you can focus on content/
promotion/money forever and ever.

8. Random Puppy Break

9. Development
Building Your Website

10. Setting Up Your
Hosting
Your ideal host has three major
factors:
Great Customer Support
Affordable Pricing
Excellent Service

11. Suggestions
Media Temple ($20/month Grid
Service)
Digital Ocean ($5/month droplets)
DreamHost/BlueHost/HostGator

12. Use WordPress.org
Ease of Customization
Plugins & Theme Frameworks
Pick Your Own Hosting Package
Easier to Work with Freelancers
Less Expensive in the Long-Run

13. Essential Plugins
*Only* install plugins you absolutely need! Do your
research.
Pick plugins that have been updated recently (in the
last 6 months)
Go with repository or premium plugins. No back-alley
websites!
WordPress SEO by Yoast, Akismet, Limit Login Attempts,
Redirection, Gravity Forms, BackUp Buddy, Subscribe
to Comments Reloaded, Clean Archives Reloaded

14. [Detour] JetPack
If you’re using Jetpack, make sure
you DISABLE features you’re not
using (e.g. math, spelling/grammar,
subscriptions, Json, gravatar
hovercards, etc…)
My favorite is sharing, stats,
publicize, and the image CDN

15. Design
Tips for Scalability

16. Theme Frameworks
Eg. Headway Themes, Genesis, Thesis, PageLines, etc.
Take a giant chunk of work out of design
development.
Are continuously developed and have a large
community for support and expert services.
Typically mobile responsive and ready for
extensions.
Are fun to use :)

17. Headway Themes
(headway101.com/go/headway)
Visual oriented
WordPress design tool.
Built to customize any
and all layouts and
elements of WordPress
sites.
Mobile Responsive
My personal favorite :)

18. Puppy Break pt 2

19. Argument for
Custom Design
Build your design around your
content so you don’t have to do
multiple redesigns.
Easier to brand when you brand from
the ground up.
Easier optimization and conversion
tweaks later. (Less “Hacking”)

20. Things to Keep in
Mind When Designing
MOBILE. Go responsive. Avoid apps unless
you have a really good reason and a LOT
of money for updates.
Limit the amount of images that the
design needs to work for faster loading
times.
Make sure every color has a function.
Copy, callout, background, emphasis, etc.

21. PS. Child Themes
Child themes are good if you want
to do a LOT of custom code
customization. But it’s not necessary
for Headway Themes :)
They’re uploaded like themes, but
require the parent theme installed.

22. Outsourcing Design
& Development
Pay more now or you’ll have to pay
again later for someone like me to
fix an “affordable” design.
Don’t be afraid to shop around and
ask for what you want. Ask questions!
Do not fear the idea of code.

23. Tips for Optimization
Speed & SEO

24. Heavy Lifting
Start development once your design is
FINISHED. DONE. No more colors. Pencils
down.
W3 Total Cache with CloudFlare
JetPack’s CDN for Images or another CDN to
supercharge.
WP Optimize on occasion (database cleanup)

25. Reduce the Clutter
Remove deactivated plugins & themes,
except WP default theme.
Remove “Unattached” images and files that
aren’t part of the design.
Remove spam and empty auto-drafts, empty
your trash.
Assess the plugins you’re using and reduce
them whenever possible.

26. Regular
Maintenance
Create back-ups using a plugin like
BackUp Buddy and store them locally
or on Amazon S3
Enable scheduled back-ups from your
host.
Regularly update or use an update/
concierge service.

27. Are Your Plugins
Awful?
Try “P3” Plugin Performance Profiler
if something weird is happening to
see if a new plugin is seriously
messed up.
Deactivate plugins one-by-one for
more precise changes.

28. Security
Just. Keep. Updating.
BackUps Are Your Friend.
Don’t freak out if you’re not a giant ecommerce website. Limit Login Attempts,
disable registration, move on.
Change “admin” to anything else. Passwords:
auto generate and keep it in a sticky note
OR use “pass phrases” with spaces n’ stuff.

29. Other Tips
Remove social media buttons & comments
from the blog index and individual pages.
Posts only!
Permalinks Matter. Use /%postname%/ if
you’re not sure what you want.
Move archives to their own page instead of
the sidebar. Plugin: Clean Archives
Reloaded

30. Things to
Remember about WP
Use the “featured images” option for
lead images!
Don’t link post images to their
attachment files, or at all if you don’t
have to.
Pages for static/unchanging content.
Posts for fresh, updating content.

31. Puppy Break pt 3

32. SEO the Easy Way
Make optimization a habit! Write content, go
back and optimize.
Install and configure just ONE SEO plugin,
eg. WordPress SEO by Yoast
Write titles people are searching for, eg. “how
to change a tire”
Only spend money if you have a lot and
find a provider you love.

33. [Detour] Scribe
Meh, I’m not a fan. I’d say use
WordPress SEO unless you need a lot
of hand-holding.
Read up on SEO tips from major
blogs like searchenginejournal.com
and copyblogger.com and
problogger.net, etc.

34. About Title Tags
<h1> Should be your post/page title.
<h2> is important stuff
<h3> is for sections related to the
important stuff
<h4 - h6> Basically whatever you
want, but treat like titles.

35. About Categories &
Tags
Limit the number of categories to main
topics on your website.
Remove the /category/ part of your URLs if
you’re a new site.
Create as many tags as you want, avoid
duplicates.
Use the plugin “Relevanssi” to make search
better and take advantage of these.

36. Comment
Moderation
Moderate your comments to avoid
spam content and crappy links.
Use plugins like “Conditional Captcha
for WordPress” and “Akisment”
together to prevent spam.
Turn OFF comments if you’re not
blogging/interested in them.

37. Not Just SEO
Add share buttons to posts to make it
easy for people to spread naturally.
Auto-update social networks and
email lists on new posts to minimize
work and maximize exposure.
Respond to comments and let people
get to know you.

38. My Favorite Social
Plugins
Digg-Digg (for floating)
Tweet Old Posts (for continuously
promoting older content automatically)
Subscribe to Comments Reloaded for
connecting with others.
WordPress Popular Posts (sidebar
widget)

39. Q&A
What Tips Do You Want to Hear?

40. How Much Does a Website Cost?
hosting - $5-$20
framework - $100
gravity - $100
back-up buddy - $80
stock photos - $50
Total Upstart: ~$350
Upkeep: ~$20/month

41. NEED MOAR?!
Head over to
headway101.com/
wordcamp/ for more
information!
twitter: @coreyfreeman
@headway101
facebooK:
fb.com/authenticcorey
fb.com/headway101