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TOP 5 ADVANTAGE OF THE WORDPRESS CMS PLATFORM

Undoubtedly, it’s a fact that there’s an advantage of WP over other CMS platforms. In this article, we shall be discussing the reasons why we vouch for this statement. Till date, many blogging platforms have come into play, but none of these has proved their effectiveness as WordPress.

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WordPress has been a simple and user-friendly blogging platform that even the beginners can use to publish their blog posts. From businesses to newbies, everyone has been using this platform to manage their content and publish their posts on the website since inception. If you have been planning to build a new website but can’t think of which CMS to use, then read on to know what advantages WordPress offers when compared to the other platforms.

WORDPRESS IS USER-FRIENDLY

One of the major reasons why people stop pursuing their dream of maintaining a website properly is the complexity of CMS. When compared to the other CMS platforms, WordPress is not at all complex and is even preferred by those who offer eCommerce website development services for easy management and easy uploads.

The user-friendly feature of the WP platform makes it easier for the newbies to embark on their journey in the field of blogging.

WORDPRESS CAN BE ACCESSED ANYWHERE

One of the major reasons why there’s an advantage of WP over other CMS is that you can actually access WP platform absolutely anywhere and on any device, provided you have a stable internet connection. Even while traveling, if you prefer to update the WP content, you can actually log on to your mobile device and download the WP tool to log in and edit or upload the content on the website.

In this manner, the dependency to reach your workstation and upload the content would not be there. With this easy-to-login feature, users can access their personal blogs anywhere and edit it without taking any additional help from their developer, who may, in turn, charge very high to maintain and update the website.

WORDPRESS IS SEARCH ENGINE-FRIENDLY

Unlike the other CMS platforms, WP is search engine-friendly due to the presence of a few simple codes, which make the content pages ideal for indexation by Google. This, in turn, can improve the website ranking in the long run. The platform comes equipped with both paid and free SEO tools and plugins that help us in identifying the fixes that are required in the blog posts to make it search engine-friendly.

WORDPRESS PLATFORM HAS A RESPONSIVE WEB DESIGN

The best part about this platform is that it contains both free and paid themes, which can be applied to your website to become responsive. Applying responsive themes to the respective blogs have become mandatory since the past few years as most of the users prefer using mobile to surf through the sites. Hence, it is important to have a responsive design so that the users do not face any difficulty in accessing and reading the blog posts that you have published on the website.

WP themes can easily optimize the website, which can be accessed easily on any device and this advantage of WP over other CMS is tremendous.

EQUIP YOUR SITE WITH MORE FEATURES EASILY

With each passing day, the existing features of any site become obsolete and need immediate updating. The new bloggers become overwhelmed with the updates and tend to mess up in the process of upgrade. With WordPress platform as your CMS platform, you can actually skip the tension and with the help of useful plugins available on the platform you can install and upgrade the look of the site. At any point in time, you can actually update the plugins and enhance the existing features present on the site.

Additionally, WP platforms can help you to be self-dependent in terms of publishing and updating the blog post without being dependent on your developer.

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3 WAYS TO RESET YOUR WORDPRESS SITE

3 WAYS TO RESET YOUR WORDPRESS SITE

WordPress is a powerful CMS, but this also means that there is plenty that can go wrong. Sometimes it just makes sense to start over from scratch. If you’ve thought of just throwing in the towel and walking away from a troublesome website, this might be a better solution. Here is why you might want to reset your WordPress site, and how you can go about this both manually and using a plugin.

WHY YOU MAY NEED TO RESET YOUR WORDPRESS SITE

When you reset a WordPress site, this means that you are putting all databases and files back to the original state at installation. You are effectively taking a new WordPress installation and putting it over what is there right now.

Why would you want to do this? While it’s not common to start from scratch, there are several situations in which you might want to reset your WordPress site:

  • You want to re-purpose or rebuild your website. If you don’t like the direction your site has taken or want to use the domain for something else, you can reset WordPress to begin a new project.
  • To clean up a test installation. Maybe you use WordPress setups to test certain plugins, themes, content, or other site layouts. Once you’ve completed a round of testing, you can reset your site to start again.
  • You can’t access your website and have a backup. There is any number of reasons why you might get locked out of your WordPress site and need to start over. Maybe there was a security breach or a failure in some part of the code after an update that you can’t resolve. You need to access your site to work on it, and you can do this again if you first re-set it and then restore your backup data.

Because of the potential for hacking and making the wrong decision in WordPress, it’s always a good idea to have a backup of your site on hand. Suppose you decide to clean your WordPress site and then change your mind later, or you want to switch to a new web host or want to restore it to a certain date before you started having problems.

Ideally, you’ll have several backups to choose from so that you’ll always have these options.

1. HOW TO RESET YOUR WORDPRESS SITE MANUALLY

The good news is that there are several ways to reset a WordPress site. We’re going to start with the most tedious method first – doing it manually. Even so, this isn’t that difficult. You can get your WordPress site back to factory settings by following just four short steps.

Step 1: Locate Your WordPress Database and Delete It

You can access your WordPress database through your cPanel account. Look for the MySQL Databases option under the Databases section and then find the database that corresponds to your site. Not sure which one matches your site? Go into your File Manager first and “View” the “wp-config” file in the root folder of your WordPress site. This lists your database name, username, and password. (Write all of this information down to use in Step 2).

Now that you know what you’re looking for, head back to that list in MySQL Databases and “Delete” the database.

Now that you’ve deleted this database, your site won’t work anymore until you complete the rest of the steps.

Step 2: Create a New WordPress Database

Still, within the MySQL Databases area in your cPanel, you’re going to create a new database. There should be an option at the top of the screen to do this. When the box comes up asking for the name, use the same name as the database you just deleted (if you don’t do this, your reset won’t work). Click, Create Database.

Since you didn’t delete your user, it should still be on the list. Scroll down to the “Add User to Database” area and choose the original User and the Database you just created. Click Add.

Step 3: Delete Leftover Files from Your WordPress Site

Access your WordPress site’s files through either FTP or the File Manager in cPanel. This is where you can delete unused themes, plugins, and uploads.

Go into the wp-content directory and click on each folder: plugins, themes, and uploads. Delete everything in those folders except in the themes folder. There, you should leave at least one theme.

Step 4: Reinstall WordPress

You can quickly and easily install WordPress with the built-in script. With this, you can install a fresh version of WordPress through your browser. To run this, just type in your site’s URL and /wp-admin/install.php at the end. This will execute the script and prompt you to answer a few simple questions. Once the installation is complete, you can log in to your dashboard once again.

2. RESET YOUR WORDPRESS SITE USING THE COMMAND LINE

Anyone who is a developer will also be familiar with WP-CLI, which is a command line tool that allows Secure Shell (SSH) access to interact with the platform. Through this access, you can use simple commands to complete some complex tasks.

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One thing you can accomplish in WP-CLI is resetting your WordPress site without the manual process we just described. The line to enter is wp DB reset, which prompts a reset. You will still need to clean up your themes and plugins with this method, but it is a good time saver if you have access to this tool.

3. RESET YOUR WORDPRESS SITE USING A PLUGIN

Provided you can still access your WordPress site, you can easily and quickly reset it using a plugin. There are several to choose from, and a few popular ones include

  • Advanced WordPress Reset
  • Advanced Reset WP
  • Reset WP

The most popular one is Advanced WordPress Reset, so we’ll take the closest look at using this plugin to reset your WordPress site. The first thing you’ll want to do is to install and activate the plugin. Once activated, you can find the Advanced WP Reset options under the Tools tab in your WordPress dashboard.

Since resetting your site is a big deal, the plugin requires that you confirm your intentions by typing “reset” in a box and then having you click the button that says “Reset database.” As soon as you do this, you’ll be logged out of your WordPress dashboard since the site has been recreated.

It’s important to note that this plugin will not delete your themes or plugins. If you want to do this, you’ll need to go through those tabs and take care of this manually. Once done, however, your site will be back to the state as a fresh install.

7 ULTIMATE WORDPRESS SECURITY TIPS

7 ULTIMATE WORDPRESS SECURITY TIPS

Ready for some easy to integrate WordPress Security Tips?

The world has been witnessing the popularity of the WordPress for the last fifteen years due to its numerous characteristics. However, as we know every technology comes with its leaps and bounds so the WordPress too.

Despite having numerous features like search engine friendly, simple hosting, affordable experts, open source CMS, number of plugins and themes, several risks are involved in running a WordPress website.

A few risks that are involved in WordPress sites are described below:

How do WordPress websites get compromised?

Before applying any security approaches, initially, you need to know how your site gets hacked. By doing this, you come to know about the weakened areas and where to take preventive measures to protect them. According to the recent studies, the main ways of hacking attempts are rationalized below:

  • 29% through vulnerable WordPress themes
  • 41% came via a vulnerability in the hosting platform
  • 8% of hacking was done through a pathetic login information
  • 22% were threatened via the security issues of the WordPress plugins

A few WordPress security tips to keep your site secure

The basic security measures help to protect your website for a long way from most attacks. The most common are as follows:

#1. KEEP YOUR COMPUTER SAFE

You can use the following security guidelines to make your computer secure:

  • Install high-quality virus and malware scanner on your computer for regular scans.
  • Set up a quality firewall on the computer as well as on your WordPress website to safeguard from online threats like malware, viruses, hacker attacks, etc.
  • WordPress improves with every new release, so always update your WordPress with its new updates and security plugins, as it performs blacklist monitoring, file scanning, security hardening, active security monitoring, malware scanning, post-hack actions and many more activities to secure your website.
  • Never use public wifi, as your credentials could be tracked.
  • Always use FTP (File Transfer Protocol Secure) when accessing your web server, because the unsecured FTP causes your link being monitored.

#2. STRENGTHEN YOUR LOGIN INFORMATION

Using secure login information keeps you away from online threats. Hackers have advanced technology to crack difficult passwords and they try over a hundred times with diverse username/password combinations to hack an account. So follow the below steps:

  • Don’t use the admin username: Most of the admin is used default username for the administrator which could be hacked easily. So do not use it.
  • Have a separate publishing account: It is advised to use separate accounts for administration and content publishing as the username usually shows up in the author archive URL if the articles is published through admin account.
  • Choose a strong password: the stronger your password is, there are fewer chances to be hacked. So use numeric, special characters and a combination of capital and lower letters make your password stronger.

#3. USE SSL CERTIFICATE

SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) is used to protect visitor’s information of your websites. The SSL creates an encrypted link between a web server and a browser which guarantees that all information transferred between both ends (server and user) remain private and integral.

If you want to establish a secure connection between your website and your client, you need to install an SSL Certificate on your web server. However, the selection of right SSL type is a must for the high level of security. SSL has many types as follows:

  • Single SSL: Single SSL certificate is installed to confirm the identity of the domain name, for example, www.mydomain.com that is operating the web site, encrypts all data between the server and the visitors, also guarantees the integrity of the transmitted data.
  • Multi-Domain SSL Certificate: A Multi-Domain SSL Certificate is used to secure multiple domain names with a single certificate. For instance, you got a multi-domain SSL certificate for mydomain.com, and then the same certificate protects mydomain.net, mydomain.org, and even yourdomain.com.
  • Wildcard SSL: A Wildcard SSL Certificate is installed to secure multiple sub-domains with just a single certificate. If you have only one website then wildcard certificate is considered more logical than a Multi-Domain SSL Certificate, as it allows for indefinite sub-domains and you do not require describing during purchase. For example, This certificate can be used for the domain name mydomain.com, my.mydomain.com, my1.mydomain.com and any other sub-domain and no reissue required.

#4. IMPLEMENT TWO-FACTOR AUTHENTICATION

In two-factor authentication, usually extra steps are taken to log into your site like entering the extra code that is delivered to the user’s phone, it prevents from automatic attacks. OpenID, Duo Two-Factor Authentication or WP Security Question plugins might be used to implement this Authentication.

#5. PROTECT IMPORTANT FILES FROM ACCESS

The wp-config.php file is one of the most vulnerable files on your site that host crucial data and information about the entire WordPress installation. When it is miss used, you won’t be able to use your website.

<FilesMatch "^.*(error_log|wp-config\.php|php.ini|\.[hH][tT][aApP].*)$">

Order deny,allow

Deny from all

#6. BACKUP YOUR SITE REGULARLY

All the above basic precautions must keep, despite these security measures miss happening can occur at any time, so always ensure to have a fresh backup at hand for extra insurance. All hosting providers don’t provide auto backup. You can take backup of your site with help of plugins and without plugins.

Having a reliable backup is the best thing you can do for your WordPress-based business. Anything can happen at any time, but with backups in place, you will avoid the unwanted hassle. Just hit restore, and you’re back in business.

#7. ENSURE REGULAR BACKUPS

The best security you have against WordPress hack attacks is a good backup. Make sure you’re taking backups of your site on a regular basis. This way, if your website is hacked you have your all site data and can restore things immediately.

Here are some of the best WordPress backup plugins:

  • UpdraftPlus
  • BackUpWordPress
  • VaultPress
  • BackupBuddy

TOP 5 PREMIUM WORDPRESS SLIDER PLUGINS

TOP 5 PREMIUM WORDPRESS SLIDER PLUGINS

You can usually spot a WordPress website from a mile away from it’s wide area slider on the home page. Be different and unique by using one of the SUPER SLEEK slider plugins below for your WordPress site.

1.CCSLIDER WP

CSlider WP makes it easy to embed the CCSlider jQuery slideshow plugin in your WordPress theme.CCSlider is a unique slideshow plugin because of the fact that it supports 3d transitions! There are 10 stunning 3d transitions available, and also 10 stylish 2d transitions.

2.uBILLBOARD WORDPRESS SLIDER

uBillboard is a Premium Slider for WordPress. It is a jQuery based slider with a multitude of transitions and options for you to be able to customize it to your needs while not overwhelming you with options you never wanted or needed. Version 3 is a revolutionary release with most of the codebase rewritten from scratch. This has enabled us to integrate many features that you have been requesting during the first year. Make sure you see this WordPress Slider demo in action!

3.WP Slideshow Gallery

With the WordPress slideshow gallery plugin, you can embed a slideshow gallery into any WordPress post/page with the use of the “sideshow” shortcode. You can hardcode a slideshow gallery into any of the PHP files of your WordPress theme using just a few lines of code. This WordPress Slider plugin has thumbs below the image being presented, text overlay and looks pretty cool – and then it is completely free.

4. SLIDER PRO – WORDPRESS SLIDER PLUGIN

Slider PRO is one of the most powerful slider plugins for WordPress on the market (some buyers have been saying that it’s actually the best). The slider offers you 100+ customizable properties, 100+ possible transition effects, 10+ skins and much more. Also, the slider’s administration area is very powerful and uses the default WordPress design, which WordPress users are already familiar with. This slider plugin is carefully coded, using WordPress development best practices, to avoid conflicts with other themes and plugins that are well coded. Please take a look at the list of features at the feature page.

5. ESTRO – JQUERY WORDPRESS SLIDER

“Estro” meaning “creativity”, “talent” or “inspiration”, in Italian, is a fitting moniker for this beautiful slider. For the design of this slider, we wanted to create a price of work which could form the centerpiece of your next web project. A starting point, who’s design and execution would inspire you and supercharge your own work.

HOW TO REDUCE WORDPRESS CPU USAGE

HOW TO REDUCE WORDPRESS CPU USAGE

WordPress – it’s hard to find someone who hasn’t heard about this increasingly popular content management system. Unfortunately, while it’s (rightfully) praised for its ease of use and beginner-friendliness, it’s also well-known for being resource-hungry. One could say that convenience often comes at the necessary cost. Luckily, there are ways in which you can stabilize its CPU usage – and even speed up your website, improving your visitors’ user-experience. What are the most effective ways of doing that? Here are eight hand-picked ideas!

AVOID FANCY DESIGNS AND UNNECESSARY TECHNICAL GIMMICKS

The first, and, in my opinion, the most obvious way of stabilizing WordPress CPU usage is getting rid of all the unnecessary gimmicks and the fancy options it offers. Believe me, you don’t need all those cool-looking add-ons on your site. Not only do they slow down your web property (and, quite often, tend to be unstable) but can also harm your business. How?

For example, let’s take a look at sliders. Many authorities in the online marketing world agree that you should ditch sliders altogether. The names include Yoast, a company behind one of the most popular SEO plugins and ConversionXL, one of the most respected blogs on conversion optimization in the industry. This is because a slider is proven to harm your conversion rate by distracting your visitors and distorting your UVP (Unique Value Proposition). Instead of trying to make your site fancy, it’s better to make it fast and focused on the right message.

GO OVER THE LIST OF YOUR WEBSITE PLUGINS CAREFULLY

But it’s not just the technical addons that are visible which can harm your website performance and spike CPU usage through the roof when you least expect it. Sometimes what’s most resource-demanding is hidden behind the scenes. That’s why it’s good to review the list of your plugins regularly.

You can also disable them one by one and test your site’s performance and verify CPU usage when they are turned off. If any of the plugins are badly optimized, this test will show you which you need to get rid of or replace.

OPTIMIZE YOUR IMAGES

The third element that commonly harms your WP site performance and leads to usage spikes are images (especially the heavy ones). While they are not directly related to WordPress as a whole, if you don’t optimize them, they will demand their share of resources, leaving less for WordPress to operate properly.

Luckily, it’s very easy to optimize them, reducing their size. Just head over to kraken.io or tinypng.comand upload the images you want to reduce in size. And if you’d prefer to have it all automated inside WordPress, you can use a plugin such as Smush. Just keep in mind that you are adding one more extra plugin to the CPU usage.

GET A CDN

Another way of reducing the CPU power that you need and avoiding spikes is a CDN – Content Delivery Network. By using it, certain static files on your site (such as images or videos) are loaded from external servers, leaving more power for your beloved CMS. Naturally, while a CDN helps speed up WordPress indirectly, it’s a very effective way of preventing usage spikes caused by visitors coming from different parts of the world.

This is because its servers are usually spread around the world, much closer to the location of some of your visitors than your main server what reduces the usage of both its bandwidth and hardware resources and prevents load spikes.

CLEAN YOUR DATABASES REGULARLY

The next element of your WP site that can severely impact its performance and make it unstable are databases. And it’s not just the WP database that you should take care of. Many plugins, especially those that collect data about your visitors grow over time and require regular cleanups.

The downside is, to take the full advantage of this step you need to access phpMyAdmin and know how to execute simple SQL queries (or at least be savvy enough to follow instructions available on the Internet). Luckily for those who don’t want to touch any of that, there are WordPress plugins that can do the job for them. Just remember to disable them once you’re done so they don’t impact your site speed.

USE A CACHING PLUGIN

Taking care of your database is not the only way in which you can use plugins to boost your website performance and stabilize CPU usage. One extra thing which you can do is get a caching plugin. That way, instead of generating content dynamically each time a particular visitor enters your website, the plugin will create a static version of every webpage that they visited.

Thanks for that, the next time they come to your website, they will see the cached version (unless they come from a different browser or clear their browsing history) and your WP site will require a lot less power to handle their visit. The most popular caching plugins (some of them allow you to clear your site’s database too) include W3 Total Cache, WP Fastest Cache, WP Rocket, WP Super Cache, and Autoptimize. And what if you want to update your site and ensure that your visitors don’t miss the changes? Most of the time, you can delete the cache in one click.

MAKE SURE YOUR HOSTING IS OPTIMIZED PROPERLY

One big and often underestimated fact that can have a huge impact on your WP site’s stability is the hosting that you use. This is true especially for the low-end shared hosting packages, which often work so badly that it’s hard to even use the WordPress dashboard. What can you do to prevent that?

The good news is, while you should stay away from the cheapest shared hosting packages, you don’t have to pay hundreds of dollars for a good package either. Instead, you can get an affordable hosting that has its configuration optimized for WordPress like Hostinger. Because, as said earlier, WP is popular but not perfectly optimized, making sure that your server includes things such as GZIP compression or NGINX Caching can help you provide people who come to your website with a quality experience during their visit.

USE QUALITY THEMES – AND GET THEM FROM THE DEVELOPER ONLY!

The last, but definitely not the least important way to ensure that your website is functioning properly and does not experience any random, hard-to-trace usage spikes is using high-quality themes and plugins. Even though there are many free themes you could use, it’s best to invest in a premium one which is usually much better optimized than anything you will find for free.

Naturally, make sure that you purchase it from a reliable source – preferably, straight from the person or company who developed it and can provide you with the necessary support. Never, no matter how safe it seems, download premium themes from third-party websites.

You never know what’s inside the code, and such “hidden surprises” could be used to take over your website or your customers’ data. And this would cost you a lot more than the little money you need to spend to get a theme or plugin from the developer.

JUST GET STARTED

While the above list can sound complicated, neither (maybe with the exception of #5) of the ideas requires any technical knowledge. What matters is to get started – you don’t have to hurry up. Take your time and implement the ideas one by one by one.

Of course, these are not the only ways which you can use to “tame” WordPress power usage spikes. But, if you implement them all, you will be able to speed up your site, stabilize the CPU usage and, most importantly, provide your website visitors with a great user experience.

Should You Be Running Your Website On WordPress?

Many people think of WordPress as just a simple platform to run a blog on but over the years WordPress has evolved in one of the most popular Content Management Systems (CMS) available to users today. Currently, 26% of websites around the world are run on WordPress.

It’s not just small websites that are run on WordPress now. Companies of all sizes use WordPress to create their online presence. Major news outlets, large businesses, and small businesses alike use the WordPress platform and can be seen in the WordPress showcase.

What exactly is WordPress?

In essence, WordPress is an online software that allows you to easily create, customize and manage fully functional websites from within an internet browser like Safari. Since it began back in 2003, WordPress has and continues to be an open source project. This means that hundreds, sometimes thousands, of volunteers every day are working on the WordPress code to improve it as well as building powerful tools, plugins, and themes to run on the platform.

WordPress’ web-based editor allows users to design and format their websites without the complexity of HTML or other programming code. However, more tech-savvy users can go into the code and make more adjustments should they choose. WordPress has something for everyone, to ensure that every user gets the website that they want.

Why is WordPress good for small businesses?

Remember how we said that WordPress is open source? This also helps the service itself stay 100% free. There’s no need to lock into any contract or worry about hidden fees with WordPress. WordPress removes the cost of web-designers or services by allowing you to easily build your website yourself using available themes and templates. Users will never have to contact a webmaster or IT professional to make changes to their website, as anybody can make website changes or updates within the user-friendly WordPress’ interface.

WordPress also gives users the ability to extend the capabilities of their sites with thousands of plugins, themes and widgets. Themes allow users to customize the look of their site, widgets are small pieces of software that perform specific functions, usually in a sidebar, and plugins are used to extend the functions of any site. These extensions can come free of charge or at a cost, depending on the developer.

Should anybody need help with their WordPress website, it is easy to find support. With so many users, support can be found almost anywhere, and in different forms like; tutorial videos, forums, or FAQ pages.

What are the drawbacks to WordPress for a small business?

While the nature of WordPress’s open source software makes it easy to use and a great choice for any business, it also makes WordPress websites a target for hackers. Outdated pieces of code from plugins, themes and widgets give hackers easy access into WordPress websites.On average 30,000 new websites are hacked every day.

Most small businesses think that their website isn’t large enough for a hacker to attack, but in reality, this is the opposite of the truth. Hackers use automated bots to scan the world wide web for any websites with vulnerabilities. Once they’ve located a vulnerability the hacker will then proceed to infect that website and use it to distribute more malicious code. Small business websites are some of the most commonly attacked places on the Internet.

Make sure all of your code is kept up to date and click the following link for more free tips to keep your website secure.

What’s the difference between WordPress.org and WordPress.com?

If you’re just starting out and you don’t need a website for anything more than a marketing tool than WordPress.com is where you’ll want to start. From here you can create a website where all of the technical aspects are taken care of. There’s no need to worry about updates or maintenance, but there are restrictions. There’s a more limited choice of themes, plugins, and widgets available and you’ll have to use a WordPress.com hosted domain (ie. yoursite.wordpress.com).

WordPress.org is for more experienced users or users that have a greater need for customization and functionality. With WordPress.org, updates and site maintenance are performed by the user, but users also have the ability to use the thousands of plugins, widgets, and themes that are available on the Internet to customize and extend the features of their website. Also, with WordPress.org, you can use your own domain name (ie. yoursite.com) and host the site with a webhost like HostPapa.

What is Managed WordPress?

With WordPress being as popular as it is, many webhosting companies are making specialized services, called Managed WordPress Hosting, to take care of running your WordPress website for you. With this service, a host will take care of WordPress updates, security, backups, up-time, speed, and customizations.

This service creates a hassle-free experience so that users can worry about running their business and not about what they need to do on their website. These services do come at a higher cost than regular hosting plans, because of the amount of service that is put into them, but it can be the perfect solution for someone that needs a great website and has no web building experience.

SIMPLE WORDPRESS SECURITY TIPS WITHOUT USING PLUGINS

There are some great plugins out there that can really make your WordPress website super safe but in some case, they cost money and can slow down your site’s performance.  We spent some time researching a few easy things you can do to keep things safe and not sacrifice speed or space.  Below are 3 Simple WordPress Security Tips Without Using Plugins.

Securing wp-includes

The second layer of protection can be added where scripts are generally not intended to be accessed by any user. One way to do that is to block those scripts using mod_rewrite in the .htaccess file. Note: to ensure the code below is not overwritten by WordPress, place it outside the # BEGIN WordPress and # END WordPress tags in the .htaccess file. WordPress can overwrite anything between these tags.

# Block the include-only files.

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^wp-admin/includes/ - [F,L]
RewriteRule !^wp-includes/ - [S=3]
RewriteRule ^wp-includes/[^/]+\.php$ - [F,L]
RewriteRule ^wp-includes/js/tinymce/langs/.+\.php - [F,L]
RewriteRule ^wp-includes/theme-compat/ - [F,L]

# BEGIN WordPress

Note that this won’t work well on Multisite, as RewriteRule ^wp-includes/[^/]+\.php$ - [F,L]would prevent the ms-files.php file from generating images. Omitting that line will allow the code to work, but offers less security. You can move the wp-config.php file to the directory above your WordPress install. This means for a site installed in the root of your webspace, you can store wp-config.php outside the web-root folder.

Note: Some people assert that moving wp-config.php has minimal security benefits and, if not done carefully, may actually introduce serious vulnerabilities. Others disagree.

Note that wp-config.php can be stored ONE directory level above the WordPress (where wp-includes resides) installation. Also, make sure that only you (and the web server) can read this file (it generally means a 400 or 440 permission).

If you use a server with .htaccess, you can put this in that file (at the very top) to deny access to anyone surfing for it:

order allow,deny
deny from all

Disable File Editing

The WordPress Dashboard by default allows administrators to edit PHP files, such as plugin and theme files. This is often the first tool an attacker will use if able to login, since it allows code execution. WordPress has a constant to disable editing from Dashboard. Placing this line in wp-config.php is equivalent to removing the ‘edit_themes’, ‘edit_plugins’ and ‘edit_files’ capabilities of all users:

define('DISALLOW_FILE_EDIT', true);

This will not prevent an attacker from uploading malicious files to your site, but might stop some attacks.


Would love to here any other non-plugin tricks you might have to secure your WordPress website? link=”https://wpfix.shop/product/wordpress-speed-up-service/”

5 Best Free Blogging WordPress Themes of 2024

Blogging is for everyone. This message is the reason why WordPress was created in the first place. No matter if you want to blog for personal purposes or for your professional reasons, having a blog can be very effective at helping you achieve your goals. When it comes to blogging, though, to really make it work, you need some quality and preferably free blogging WordPress themes.

This is where this list comes into play. I hope that it will help you pick the theme that fits your needs perfectly. Here are the best free blogging WordPress themes on the market:

Cenote

Features:

  • fully responsive design,
  • one-click demo import option,
  • boxed or wide layout,
  • two demos (main standard blog & fashion blog),
  • 5 widget areas & custom widgets,
  • post layout options,
  • translation ready.

Price: $0

Clean and minimal with a fresh design, Cenote is a WordPress theme for blogging enthusiasts; both newbies and professionals. Created with simplicity and beauty in mind, the theme promises a premium experience of making a blog on WordPress. Highly optimized for SEO, speed and performance, it’s a theme with which you can easily start a blog and quickly grow as a pro blogger.

Zillah

Features:

  • responsive design,
  • optimized for speed and SEO,
  • live customizer,
  • widgetized footer,
  • translation ready,
  • featured slider,
  • social menu.

Price: $0

Oblique is one of those free blogging WordPress themes that look a bit differently. It offers a simple grid layout, a dark background, and an oblique parallax header. The posts have oblique shapes as well. Overall, a minimalist design that puts your stories in the spotlight.

Vertex

Features:

  • responsive design,
  • responsive slider,
  • full-featured blog,
  • bold typography,
  • clean layout,
  • hover effects,
  • custom background color.

Price: $0

Vertex is a free responsive blogging WordPress themes that is perfect for a blog, portfolio website, business website or any other website you have in mind. It allows you to regularly publish different formats of content, like articles, images, videos, etc. Download this theme and use it as many times as you need.

Adler

Features:

  • responsive design,
  • unique typography,
  • full-screen layout,
  • photo-friendly design,
  • translation ready,
  • flexible design.

Price: $0

Adler is a great theme for creative purposes – especially if you want to put additional flare on your blog content. The theme has the look of an actual notebook, using handwritten fonts, marks, and underlines. Adler is photo-friendly and provides full-screen featured images. Overall, a clean and elegant design for creative writers.

Oblique

Features:

  • responsive design,
  • parallax scrolling,
  • custom slide-out menu,
  • color options,
  • translation ready,
  • widget ready,
  • custom backgrounds.

Price: $0

Oblique is one of those free blogging WordPress themes that look a bit differently. It offers a simple grid layout, a dark background, and an oblique parallax header. The posts have oblique shapes as well. Overall, a minimalist design that puts your stories in the spotlight.

5 Best Freelance Websites for Beginners and Professionals in 2024

5 Best Freelance Websites for Beginners and Professionals in 2018

Freelance platforms have changed the way professionals do their job and how companies operate. Through these applications, businesses can easily source workers for projects that do not require permanent employment, and independent professionals can search for work without the pressure of aiming for tenure.

In this guide, we take a look at the 5 best platforms for businesses looking to tap the potential of freelance talents.  We looked at their usability, flexibility, and affordability. A quick overview has also been provided for each, so that you may familiarize yourself with each platform’s pricing, key features, and other aspects.

1. Fiverr

Website Design and Development - Webflow developer

Fiverr is a freelance service marketplace designed with entrepreneurs in mind. It is a tool that helps employers find individuals brimming with talent to complete a wide variety of short-term projects.

Whether you are looking for graphic artists, writers, digital marketers, programmers, or other freelancers, employers will surely find affordable and skillful talents using this platform. Moreover, joining Fiverr is free. You can easily sign up for Fiverr here.

If you wish to get access to premium tools, you may opt for their single enterprise pricing plan that starts at only $5 per job.

What is unique about Fiverr?

      1. Seller Level System. Fiverr prides itself on providing customer satisfaction, on-time delivery, and unparalleled service. This scheme allows them to evaluate the performance of sellers, track their progress, and give them goals to reach before they can take on more freelance responsibilities. Of course, it also allows sellers to enjoy benefits such as getting priority customer support, eligibility to be featured at promotional listings, and the like. In turn, this system helps buyers in picking freelancers with the right set of skills and a rate that falls within their budget.

    1. Secure/Private Communication Channels. Fiverr values the privacy of the sellers and employers utilizing their application. Thus, they make use of state-of-the-art anti-fraud and data security measures. Other than protecting personal information, these measures also let users communicate and exchange files through a secure messaging system within the platform.
    2. Freelancer Transparency. The transparency of Fiverr’s system provides buyers with all the information they need to choose a seller for a project. It allows employers to see the seller’s portfolio as well as feedback from previous employers. This makes it easier to decide which sellers to hire and ensures the quality of work that the company is paying for.
    3. Protected Buyer Payments. Keeping your financial data safe is easy with this platform. The application supports financial transactions coming from varying payment methods.

2. Upwork

Upwork

Upwork is a cloud-based freelance platform known for having the largest pool of employers and job finders. Perfect for the business of all sizes and freelancers with different skill levels, this application allows users to easily sift through available listings per their needs. It also has features that detect potentially fake employers or employees to protect the integrity of legitimate users. Moreover, Upwork offers affordable pricing plans that include tools for hiring assistance, pre-funding, consolidated invoicing, customized reporting, and more. Should you be interested, they also offer free sign-ups so you may test if the platform works for your operations.

What is unique about Upwork?

  1. Hassle-Free Screening Features. When it comes to freelancing, assessing applicants can be difficult because there is no personal interaction between the employer and the job finder. Upwork offers a resolution for this through their chat scheduling and profile browsing features. They also help buyers get to know candidates first-hand by allowing them to facilitate interviews online.
  2. In-App Communication Channels. Coordinating work among workers–be it part-time or full-time- is important to ensure the productivity of your operations. Communicate with your talents on-the-go using the in-app messaging tool of Upwork. Through this feature, you can provide feedback via text or video as well as share files with your freelancers.
  3. Simplified Billing Process. Tracking the billable time of freelancers is no easy feat, especially because they don’t need to come into the office to do their job. This is why Upwork provides tools that allow you to verify the work hours of their workers. It also allows you to set up pre-fund accounts of services rendered and helps you schedule billings every hour.
  4. Top-of-the-Line Freelancer Search Engine. Upwork offers a search engine backed by reliable data science and algorithms to let businesses narrow down the long list of potential employees and allow freelancers to efficiently filter jobs that suit their skill level.

3. Freelancer.com

Website Design and Development - Webflow developerFreelancer.com is a freelance service marketplace and crowdsourcing platform connecting millions of sellers and buyers in over 247 countries. Offering custom plans that let you utilize basic and advanced tools depending on what your operations require, this application is trusted by employers and job finders in different technical, professional, and creative fields. Whether you want to bid on projects related to software development, data entry, or engineering or wish to post jobs that deal with writing, accounting, or marketing, you can count on Freelancer.com to have options for you. For your convenience, they offer monthly and annual subscriptions at different price points.

What is unique about Freelancer.com?

  1. Fuss-Free Recruitment Solutions. Using Freelancer.com, you can browse through the registered talents according to their skill set and proficiency level as well as check out their portfolio to determine who to hire. Alternatively, freelancers using the application can reach out to sellers to bid for the projects that they want to work on.
  2. Safe and Secure Payments. This platform uses a milestone payment system that offers protection for all users of the site. It guarantees freelancers that the payment for their work is available and ready for release while employers are assured that the payment will only be released if they are satisfied with the outputs submitted to them.
  3. Easy Progress Monitoring. Freelancer.com wants its users to know what is going on with your project at any given time. This is why their desktop app allows users to monitor the hours spent on a job, get in touch with buyers and sellers, share information, as well as check on the progress of the project.

4. PeoplePerHour

PeoplePerHour

PeoplePerHour is a freelance service marketplace aimed at empowering professionals across the globe to take on work that they love doing. Other than optimizing the way sellers and employers connect, they also offer numerous tools to manage all the tasks related to freelancing. The platform is equipped with a smorgasbord of features such as invoicing, account management, proposal reviewing, and in-app messaging. PeoplePerHour offers different kinds of pricing plans depending on your preference. You can opt for monthly payments, one-time-payments, or quote-based payments.

What is unique about PeoplePerHour?

  1. Account Management. With PeoplePerHour’s WorkStreamTM, managing freelancers and overseeing active projects has never been easier. The dashboard lets users see all the information they need and get access to the necessary account management tools all in one interface.
  2. Escrow Protection. Buyers using the platform are required to give down payments for a freelancer to start a project. To ensure that the service provider meets the job requirements of the business, PeoplePerHour offers an escrow protection feature.
  3. No-Cost Job Posting. Finding freelancers to work on your project does not have to be expensive. By choosing PeoplePerHour, you can post your projects for free, and start receiving bids from sellers within minutes.

5.Service scapeservicescape

ServiceScape.com is a global marketplace that has been connecting individuals and organizations to top-rated freelancers who specialize in content editing, writing, translation, and graphic design services since June 2000. The company hosts and promotes the services of freelancers who work remotely using a wide variety of marketing initiatives, while giving them access to their existing client base which has been growing for over 18 years.  Each freelancer’s profile shows his or her validated credentials, area(s) of expertise, portfolio, pricing, client ratings, and feedback from services provided to other clients. Clients can browse professionals’ profiles and choose the right person for their project. There is no complicated bidding on projects or crowdsourcing contests. Instead, through a streamlined process, professionals determine their own prices and most aspects of project creation have been predefined and integrated into the freelancer’s profile. The site has an easy-to-use interface, so professionals and clients can efficiently manage their projects and messages through their online account. Clients and professionals can communicate with each other through the website’s messaging system or through the convenient teleconference option. With a broad range of subject-matter and document type experts—ranging from personal and business communication to college admissions to peer-reviewed academic journals—ServiceScape.com is an invaluable resource for students, professionals, business owners, and ESL learners looking to make their content the best version it can be.

5 Awesome Free Parallax WordPress Themes in 2018

5 Awesome Free Parallax WordPress Themes in 2018

Looking for a theme to make your website look modern and interactive? Then, you should definitely include a parallax theme and make your WordPress site feel much more alive and vivid.

Below in this article, you can find a list of the best 10 free parallax WordPress themes which will help you add a completely new dimension to your site:

Moesia

Moesia WP Theme

Your theme doesn’t have to be boring and dull, even though your business is serious. Now you can go beyond the common corporate style. Moesia offers 11 pre-defined blocks for building a homepage and allows you to choose the one that best fits your needs. Each of these blocks has the option to include a parallax background image and modify colors. Plus, there are two layout options and you can add a custom header, social icons, widgets, etc.

Alizee

Alizee WP Theme

This awesome theme doesn’t only display a parallax header, but also features custom widgets, toggle menus, and various layout options. It’s grid-based and offers a Masonry layout which is inspired by Pinterest, so it’s truly up-to-date. Furthermore, it enables you to make customizations such as adding a logo or favicon, swapping out colors, using Font Awesome Icons, and adjust custom strolling.

Hemingway

Hemingway WP Theme

Being pretty simple and functional, this theme is the ideal one for bloggers. It has a two-column design which makes your posts stand out from the rest. You can also upload a full-width header with parallax scrolling, add a logo or a widget, choose from many page templates, or swap out colors. What’s more, it’s ready for translation and retina-ready.

One Engine

One Engine WP Theme

Being so versatile, the OneEngine theme is suitable for everything and everyone. It comes together with a parallax background, smart carouse, over 600 Google Fonts, 60+ animations, and has a Contact Form 7 built in. So, how not be creative? Plus, it is a single-page theme that is easily manageable and features an intuitive layout builder that enables you to drag-and-drop your pages.

Radiate

Radiate WP Theme

This theme is the perfect choice for anyone who’s looking for complete functionality and simplicity. It includes a parallax header image and is retina-ready, translation-ready and fully responsive. In other words, regardless of the device your site is accessed to, it will still look great. It also has a custom background and various color options