5 Blog Protection Precautions You Should Take Immediately
Make sure nothing bad happens to your WordPress site by implementing these blog protection measures and protect it from hackers and spammers
You spend a lot of time writing and publishing content on your blog, but did you know there are things you might and might not be doing that could be putting all of that work at risk? How would you feel if you logged onto your computer one day, navigated to your WordPress site, and found that it was gone? What if one day you stopped getting any and all traffic from Google searches?
These scenarios could happen to you if you aren’t taking the necessary precautions to protect your site. Below are five actions you can take to reduce common risks and disasters that bloggers could face if they’re not diligent.
1. Do Regular Backups
This is the 1st WordPress security protection advice, all the time.
Do you backup your blog on a regular basis? If not, you’re at risk of losing your entire blog. Any number of factors could cause irreparable harm to your blog, but if your blog is backed up on a daily or weekly basis, then the damage won’t be hard to fix. You can restore your blog to exactly (or near exactly) how it was before the catastrophe occurred. Use a blog backup tool to set up automatic backups of your blog right now.
There are many reasons why it’s essential to do regular WordPress backups. Perhaps the most important reason is that it can help you recover your site if something goes wrong. If you make a change to your site that breaks it, or if your site is hacked, you can restore it to a previous working version with a backup.
Backing up your WordPress site is also an excellent way to protect yourself from data loss. Things can still go wrong even if your site isn’t hacked or broken. For example, your hosting provider could have a technical issue that causes data loss. You can restore your site from that if you have a recent backup.
Finally, regular backups can give you peace of mind. It’s one less thing to worry about, and it’s good to know that you have a safety net if something goes wrong.
2. Maintain WordPress Site Security
If your WordPress site isn’t secure, then at anytime, it could be hacked, infected with a virus or malware, or covered with spam. There are individuals, organizations, and bots that crawl the web looking for websites and blogs to take over and corrupt. This is particularly important for self-hosted blogs. For example, if you use WordPress.org as your blogging application, you should make sure your WordPress security measures are always up-to-date to reduce your blog’s hacking risk.
As a WordPress website owner, staying up-to-date on the latest security threats and how to protect your site is essential. Here are some tips to help keep your WordPress site secure:
- Keep WordPress and all plugins and themes up to date. WordPress releases security updates regularly, so it’s essential to keep your site updated to the latest version.
- Use a strong password and never reuse passwords. Choose a password at least eight characters long and includes a mix of upper and lowercase letters, numbers, and symbols.
- Use a security plugin. Many security plugins are available for WordPress, so choose one that fits your needs.
- Don’t give away too much information. When creating your WordPress account, only provide the minimum amount of data required.
- Limit login attempts. Many WordPress plugins allow you to limit the number of login attempts, so consider using one of these plugins.
- Keep backups of your WordPress site. In case of a security breach, you’ll want a backup of your site to restore it.
- Use a secure hosting provider. When choosing a WordPress hosting provider, ensure they offer security features such as malware scanning and firewalls. By following these tips, you can help keep your WordPress site secure.
Read more: The Benefits of WordPress Maintenance
3. Using Black Hat to increase your website traffic
For most bloggers, the majority of their blog traffic comes from Google search. What if your blog suddenly stopped getting Google search traffic? It can happen if Google believes that your site is guilty of publishing spam content or participating in spam activities (aka black hat SEO). Be sure you don’t make any SEO mistakes that could get you labelled as a spammer. Once Google blocks your blog from its search results, regardless of whether or not you’re actually guilty of spamming, it can be extremely difficult and time-consuming to get your blog back in.
Not only is Black Hat SEO terrible for your website, but it’s also bad for your business. A penalty from Google can seriously damage your reputation and make it hard for people to find you online. And if you’re caught using Black Hat SEO more than once, you could be permanently banned from Google, which would be devastating for your business.
So why take the risk? Stick to white hat SEO practices, and you’ll be much better off in the long run.
4. Make Blog Maintenance a Priority
As a WordPress user, you likely know how important it is to keep your site up-to-date and running smoothly. After all, an outdated or poorly running website can reflect poorly on your business or organization. Fortunately, WordPress maintenance services can help keep your site in tip-top shape.
Here are four reasons why these services are so important.
- WordPress Maintenance Services Keep Your Site Secure – One of the most important aspects of website maintenance is security. WordPress is a popular target for hackers because it powers so many sites. As such, ensuring your WordPress site is as secure as possible is essential.
- WordPress Maintenance Services can help you secure your site in several ways. They can install security plugins, configure security settings, and keep your WordPress version and plugins up-to-date. These services can also perform regular backups of your site so you can restore it if it’s ever hacked.
- WordPress Maintenance Services Keep Your Site Fast – Another vital aspect of website maintenance is speed. A slow website can frustrate visitors and hurt your search engine rankings. WordPress maintenance services can help speed up your WordPress site in several ways. They can optimize your website’s code, configure caching plugins, and minify your CSS and JavaScript files.
- WordPress Maintenance Services Keep Your Site Up-to-Date – It’s crucial to keep your WordPress site up-to-date for two reasons. First, new WordPress versions often include security fixes. Second, new WordPress versions often have unique features that can improve your site. For example, the recent WordPress 5.0 update included a new editor called Gutenberg.
- WordPress Maintenance Services Can Help You Save Time – If you don’t have the time or expertise to keep your WordPress site up-to-date and running smoothly, WordPress maintenance services can help. These services can take care of all the technical aspects of website maintenance so you can focus on running your business or organization.
WordPress maintenance services are essential because they keep your site secure, fast, and up-to-date. They can also help you save time. If you don’t have the time or expertise to keep your WordPress site up-to-date, consider hiring a WordPress maintenance service.
5. Keep Paying for Your Domain and Hosting
Last blog protection tip is to pay attention to the subscriptions: If you use your own domain name or third-party web host for your blog, then you need to manage your domain name and hosting account renewals to ensure they don’t lapse.
Your domain name is your brand on the internet. The unique address identifies your website and allows customers to find you online. If you don’t renew your domain name, you could lose it, and someone else could snap it up and start using it for their website.
Your domain name needs to be renewed every year, and it’s a good idea to set up automatic renewals, so you don’t have to remember to do it manually.
Your hosting provider is the company that stores your website’s files on their servers and makes them accessible to visitors online. Your hosting service also needs to be renewed every year.
So, renew your domain name and hosting service annually to keep your website online and protect your brand.
