Why Migrate to WordPress? SEO and Ease of Use for Any Size Business
Numerous Content Management Systems (CMS) are available in today’s digital market. These make the online-business life much easier – especially for small- and mid-sized businesses that lack huge budgets.
But one CMS is a clear leader by reputation – WordPress.
According to W3Techs, WordPress is the chosen CMS for 33 percent of all websites. The closest competitor is Joomla, which accounts for around three percent of all websites.
Overall, WordPress owns 60 percent of the CMS market share.
When market share is that high, technology advances quicker and costs become cheaper. The advantage is obvious; businesses achieve a healthier bottom line.
And this is one of the many reasons why migrating to a WordPress environment is the main focus of our SEO Redesign service.
ContentMender migrates websites from other existing platforms such as Wix (read the latest Search Engine Journal story about the Wix Superbowl ad that was “Fumble” for SEOs) into a WordPress environment.
ContentMender also completes all the necessary SEO elements needed for a fully optimized and technically sound website, including keyword research (we find keywords that will drive quality traffic and rewrite all content and meta tags using that keyword research), and the technical stuff you shouldn’t worry about.
For more on the technical bits, you can visit our SEO Redesign page.
Before we begin, though, please understand that we are not discussing a free website build using the WordPress.com platform. That’s where you can go create a free blog within minutes, but the website is listed as a subdomain of WordPress.
For example – our website would be https//:contentmender.wordpress.com.
You’re basically renting hosting space from WordPress, and it doesn’t look professional. Though a great platform for smaller bloggers, it’s best to build a website through WordPress.org, which provides you with a self-hosted website (yourbusinessurl.com). We will also help you pick an SEO-friendly web host, which is vital for success for any site that’s going for long-term success.
Thousands of design themes are available, and optimization is impressive out of the box – though like anything there is MUCH more you can do to truly optimize a WordPress website.
Let’s discuss how migration to WordPress from other content management systems can benefit your business.
1. Mobile Friendly
This is first because it’s vital for 21st Century searching. This is one of the largest issues with many other CMSs – the mobile design is simply not optimized for a 21st-Century user experience.
Mobile usage is on the rise. According to EduBirdie, mobile usage was up to 63% vs 57% in 2016. This number is expected to continue rising.
WordPress websites are mobile friendly from day one. Sure, some themes will be a bit more mobile responsive than others, and others will offer a stronger user experience.
Creating your website in a WordPress environment will help your business truly engage with the larger demographic of mobile users, creating yo
2. WordPress SEO: Fairly Optimized Out of the Box
WordPress websites feature some search-friendly optimization from day one. Of course, for a truly optimized website, there are many technical elements that need to be set up correctly such as permalink structures to canonical tags. But again – we’re talking about the benefits here for a business, not the technical bits.
A good agency will complete all this work for you and explain in detail how to optimize each blog post or page going forward. We have clients that have us do all the work and others that do the uploading themselves. Again – it’s all based on a business’s needs.
As professional SEOs and content creators, we prefer to do the actual uploading because we may catch something last minute that can make a substantial difference in search results or reader engagement; our trained uploaders sometimes find more optimal internal linking structures or optimal use of other on-page SEO elements such as headline tags. For little money, there is less work on the business’s part, and another layer of eyes to make sure no mistakes occur before going live.
3. User-Friendly
I was first introduced to WordPress back in 2009 when the motorcycle publication I provide services for (still Online Editor), Ultimate Motorcycling, was moved from Drupal to WordPress. The migration was a horror story due to a particular New York-based agency. That experience – and additional engagement with other “hack” agencies – pushed me into learning SEO. But that’s another story for another time.
Once the website was migrated, I couldn’t believe the straight-forward simplicity of uploading content and editing posts/pages.
Things only got easier as the years went by, and with little guidance business owners can easily edit a page or blog post, or tweak a page headline or meta description within seconds. I tell clients if they can send an email, they can edit a WordPress page/blog post. Of course, this is for the basics – there are theme-related and design tweaks that are best held for the web-dev professionals.
4. Thousands of WordPress Themes & Plugins Available
In most basic terms, a theme is a pre-designed template that you can customize for your business.
And literally thousands are available to match whatever design you want to your taste. The goal is to find the theme that fits your style but still has functionality and is simple to navigate/use. The same with plugins. For the WordPress Plugin, less is more. I’ve witnessed sites with loads of plugins. Use only what is necessary; think of them of assets to enhance your SEO, and invest in those assets wisely.
As for pricing, many plugins are free and offer enhancements for little costs. Others require a one-time investment – again, typically cheap.
And never choose a questionable plugin. This can cause some security issues, which are discussed below.
5. Built-In Blog
Blogging is one of our most popular services. We call it “home-base content marketing,” and basically home base a website’s blog. Each blog not only builds your website’s authority, but each blog post can be used for social media and newsletters, and all other content marketing needs.
WordPress platforms have blogs built into its platform, and creating a blog post is as simple as clicking a “new post.” To be truly effective with your overall marketing and search efforts more energy must be put into each blog. WordPress makes this all simple, especially when paired with the Yoast plugin that assists in optimizing a post.
6. Multiple Users
You can set up admin accounts for whomever. Only have a blogger? You can set up an author or contributor login for them. WordPress allows you to add users for the following roles:
- SEO Editor
- SEO Manager
- Subscriber
- Contributor
- Author
- Editor
- Administrator
Watch who you turn into an admin because they will have full control over your website and can destroy it quickly. Thankfully hosting services have backups.
7. Social Media Integration
It’s simple. There are plugins that easily allow you to attach your social media profiles directly to your WordPress website, and allow others to share your content.
Shared content is key to brand awareness and strong SEO due to the link backs to your website. WordPress makes social media integration super simple so readers can quickly share your valuable content with their network.
8. Switching Designers/Web Developers? No Problem
Since WordPress is an open-source platform, you don’t have to worry about sticking with the same developer/designer to make changes. There are 1000s of designers and developers available that can complete any work needed on a WordPress platform. Sadly only small percent are capable of producing results that look good, are technically error-free, and are actually fully optimized for search. Spend energy here finding the right designer/developer.
9. Security
There is no such thing as a 100-percent secure content management system, but if set up properly, WordPress will provide unlimited security. They also have a security team working around the clock to keep WordPress websites from being hacked.
But to remain secure the business must complete their due diligence by using best practices to prevent hacking.
To combat security threats, WordPress site users must:
- Keep WordPress software, themes and plugins updated
- Use plugins from reputable sources
- Use strong usernames and passwords
- Use HTTPS
- Choose a secure host that is up to date on the technical front
10. Unlimited Support
Something baffling you? WordPress has a super knowledgeable support staff that can answer most questions within minutes. Again, when your this big you have more resources, so this support should be expected.
11. And Finally…You’ll Save Money
Finally, there is a price. You pay once for your theme (starting at $20 and up) and whatever cost it takes to build the website, and your only fees afterward are hosting and domain renewal. There are some paid plugins that offer better performance/analysis of your WordPress website, but again that’s up to the business and positioning/ROI.
We have many clients that do it all free with no paid plugins, and a few that have all the premium plugin packages available.
Regardless, besides the hosting/domain fees, there are no other re-occurring fees. And once you have your WordPress website live, the only thing needed is updates, although many continually tweak their designs for a greater user experience.
