Is WordPress worth it?

  • I have a general question for the old timers working with wordpress.
    Is using wordpress as a blog platform working for you?

    I must admit that wordpress as a first website, blog, hobby, something to do when the kids are out of the house, it is a superb platform with numerous options, bells and whistles and truly out-performs other weblogs on the market, especially for the price.
    BUT, does it work for SEO (search engine optimization) and functionality.
    Is there anyone besides wordpress itself that has a popular, optimized for the search engines website that spiders love.
    Are you running a website that is receiving hundreds or thousands of hits a day from the engines for competitive terms?(and not for your “Aunt bessies yorkshire pudding recipe”)
    Why I am asking is because I am working on my first two wordpress (not my first web sites) but first wordpress sites and I am finding numerous hurdles that the search engines may have to jump across.

    In that question, I mean:

    1) Is your site loading in acceptable time?

    I am on DSL high speed home and work and I have to wait up to 30 or 40 seconds before it loads sometimes.(30% of the time I get a “the page cannot be displayed” and I must hit refresh). To login to my wordpress and make a post, It takes me about 20 minutes to an hour to make a post (that’s already written, simple cut and paste function) because 19 out of 20 times I get “the page cannot be displayed” and must start over. A simple 1 word edit could take up to 30 minutes and is pretty frustrating.
    I understand that I am hosting the sites on a standard server with other sites but is it really necessary to go with a very costly dedicated server for it to function acceptably?

    2)Is wordpress search engine friendly?

    I have noticed the layout of the hyperlinks and keyword placements are way outta wack (according to the popular SEO forums I have been reading for the last couple of years.)
    Have you figured out a way to be search engine friendly? I would love to hear a success story with a site that’s maybe selling something, offering something popular or anything really.

    I write this as I am in the decision phase whether I should just scrap the wp sites I have been working on and go with straight html or stick with it and see how it goes.

    A few success stories would be great to hear.

    Any comments would be appreciated..

Viewing 9 replies - 1 through 9 (of 9 total)

  • 1. Your load time is absurd. Your host is crap, your internet is crap, or you’ve got a crap plugin. WordPress is normally blazing fast.

    2. Most of the SEO stuff is fairly crap. There have been numerous threads here, and it’s generally agreed that WP is plenty good for SEO.

    20-30 minutes to publish one post?
    That’s not a typical WP behaviour…

    resiny and moshu are right on all counts. That is painfully slo, something is very wrong somewhere – any complaints of slowness for WP usually entail 10 or 20 seconds, not double-digit minutes! As for SEO, any advice besides making sure your site is standards compliant and that you produce quality content is about as reliable as buying some magic beans. Any honest SEO provider would really just help someone get their site up to par and help them focus the content. Just my 3 cents!

    Cheers,
    Michael.

    Something’s wrong with your network connection or your host.

    Dunno if you’d explored the Documentation much yet or not. Figured I’d toss a couple of links out:

    https://codex.www.ads-software.com/Search_Engine_Optimization_for_Wordpress
    https://codex.www.ads-software.com/Permalinks

    Dang it, there’s a codex page listing some of the truly big installs of WP and I can’t find it. But yeah, it can scale. Some recent threads here in the forums related to large volumes and options as well.

    Yep….host/connection/network sound screwed up. I had issues with one of my WP installs taking 30 seconds or more to load the page. Turned out that with all the plugins I was using in the sidebar and within the loop, I was having 150 or more database calls, and that 30+ load time. Dropped a bunch of the added in code from the plugings, tweaked the code that stayed in, and dropped the load time to 3 to 5 seconds, and 90 or less calls…made a HUGE difference.

    But, your problem definitely is NOT WP related. WP is might flexible, but you DON’T have to use all the bells and whistles…

    YMMV

    Rich

    I actually just received a stats report that placed my WordPress driven site in the top percentile for load time, so I’m with the others on this—you’ve got a problem with your connection or your server.

    Ditto on the above comments. I find WP load time to be quick minimal. It varies depending on your server, and your plugins etc.. but still as a general rule WP is pretty good.

    I defy someone to find an equal to WP that loads faster with all the features it packs.

    On SEO, my site has always had unbelievable ratings. I’ve always thought that WP must somehow be cheating google, it’s been that good. I don’t write much on my blog anymore, but during it’s heyday I’d be in the top 10 for pretty common phrases or words.

    Take for example, just searched then and it ranks #3 for ‘nick jones’ in google. (#1 in google australia). I’m pretty happy with that.

    Thread Starter ken102

    (@ken102)

    Well, thanks to you all for the helping hand, I was thinking there might be something wrong with my hosting so I found a site that did a reverse IP and I realized my sites are hosted on A server with well over 1,000 other sites on it (A little excessive I think). My guess is that’s the problem because I am using only 2 or 3 plugins for each so this is obviously not the issue.
    Thanks for pointing that out.
    Thanks for the links HandySolo, I will definately check those out and thanks to you all for your help.

    PS: Resiny, may I offer you a valium,
    just kidding..lol
    It was only a question..

    mylagoon, I am very happy to hear that, I feel much better now, really. congrats…

    You ask if wordpress is good enough for proffesional purposes. You’ve already determined that there’s something wrong with your server or another cause that’s been causing your slow downloading time. But what about SEO? I don’t think it’s a problem.

    Have you heard of problogger.net? The author of that site recommends wordpress. You know the famous blogger “The Manolo” – he recommends wordpress. Both of these people claim to make six figure incomes from their blogging activities (spread over more than one blog).

    Plenty of people are using this blogging platform successfully for large scale ventures.

Viewing 9 replies - 1 through 9 (of 9 total)
  • The topic ‘Is WordPress worth it?’ is closed to new replies.