Author: Daya
Are you looking to build a multilingual WordPress website?
WordPress is the dominating content management system (CMS) that powers more than one-third of the total websites on internet. The main reasons behind the popularity of WordPress is its ease-of-use, being open source, no need of coding, great for blogging, etc.
So, if you have an existing website or looking to create a new WordPress website or blog, and want to make it multilingual, then this article is for you. Before going into how to build a multilingual WordPress website, let’s first clear what exactly it is.
Suggested reading: WordPress security guide: 8 best tips to secure WordPress website
What is multilingual website on WordPress?
A website that can provide your content to the visitors in more than one language is called a multilingual website. For example, if you are from India, then you would want to serve your content in Hindi and English both. In order to do this, you have to make your WordPress website multilingual.
After making your site or blog available in multiple languages, your visitors will be able to choose the language of their choice or their regions.
How to create a multilingual website on WordPress?
So, now that you know what a multilingual website exactly is, the next step comes how to create multilingual website on WordPress.
There are three best ways to do it. With each way, you can allow the users to convert your webpages, blog posts, tags, categories, etc. into more than one language.
The first way is to hire a content writer who can write the content in multiple languages or who can convert your English content into regional languages or the ones of your choice. This is by far the best way to do it, because you can try to make your converted content SEO-friendly. Also, nothing beats the manually and dedicatedly written content.
The second way is to use language translation tools like Google Translate on your website which will convert the content into the language selected by the visitor. However, these translation services are not that accurate and reliable. The meaning of your content might get different once it is automatically translated. Moreover, most of such services are not available for free.
Lastly, the third way to do is to use WordPress multilingual plugins.
Here, we will talk about two ways only— hiring a content writer or translator for your website, and using a WordPress plugin. Here we go.
Suggested reading: 4 best ways to find dead or broken links in WordPress
Hire a content writer for your website
The professional content writers are great at writing user-friendly and SEO-optimized content for your site. The content writers can provide you high-quality content so that your visitors can get engaged and consider a purchase.
If you are not sure where to hire a freelance content writer, then we have got the best solutions for you. We have a team of top content writers who can write content for webpages, blog posts, social media, newsletters, press releases, etc. The content written by our writers is ranking on the first page of Google and other search engines, bringing a high traffic to our clients’ websites.
Use a WordPress plugin
Another great way is to use reliable WordPress plugins. Following are the best WordPress plugins for a multilingual website:
- WPML
- TranslatePress
- PolyLang
You can install any of these plugins to serve your content in multiple languages. There are reasons behind calling these plugins the best ones. First, these plugins help you to translate all your content, whether it is on a webpage, blog post, product description, categories, etc. Second, they are also SEO-friendly to some extent.
Must read: 5 game-changing image optimization methods for WordPress sites
Having said that, let’s move on to how to set up your WordPress site to make it multilingual. We are sharing steps to use and configure the WPML plugin here.
- Open your WordPress dashboard.
- Visit Plugins section and click on Add New.
- From here, search the WPML plugin and install it. Once installed, you have to activate it on your site.
- Once activated, a notification will appear in your WordPress dashboard to configure this plugin on your site. Click on the ‘Configure WPML‘ button in this notification to begin the configuration.
- The WPML setup wizard will open. In this wizard, there are four sections. The first section is to identify the default language on your site, which is generally English. It will be identified automatically by the plugin. In case, the plugin identifies a wrong language, you can change it manually. Once selected, click on the Next button there.
- The next section is ‘Translation languages‘. From this section, you have to select the languages that you want to make available to users. Once you have selected all the languages of your choice, click on the Next button.
- The next section is Language switcher. The purpose of this section is to set three primary languages for your site, which will be available as drop-down or collection of country flags. Users will simply have to click on their preferred language or flag to translate the content. You can set primary languages by easily dragging and dropping. The language switcher buttons can be added to widget areas, footer, or navigation menu. It’s all up to you.
- Now, let’s move to the final step, which is Registration. For successful registration, you will have to enter your site key in the required field. Once done, click on Register button.
If you have followed all the steps as mentioned above, the WPML plugin setup process is done successfully.
This is great plugin for every WordPress site, because you can choose where to apply the translation buttons. You can enable it on specific blog posts, pages, tags, categories, and themes.
Handing over to you:
We hope this guide on how to build a multilingual WordPress site helps you to serve your site to the visitors in multiple languages. All the steps and recommendations mentioned in this article are of great use. If you have any queries, feel free to reach out using the comments below.
Read next: 6 easiest ways to monetize your WordPress blog for free
Are you looking for the best WordPress themes for your new blog?
If you have decided to start a new blog or have already started one with WordPress, then choosing the best WordPress theme is another challenging task for you.
This task is challenging for several reasons. First, if you are a beginner, you might not want to invest your money on purchasing a WordPress theme, so you are looking for free WordPress themes.
Second, not all the themes are good for your blog. Many of them don’t come with the functionalities and features you want on your site. While, there are numerous free WordPress themes that are not secure and can make your blog vulnerable to hacking.
So, to help you find the best free WordPress themes for your blog, we have curated a list of top themes, which are not only highly secure and reliable, but also come with all the essential features and functionalities.
Must read: WordPress security guide: 8 best tips to secure WordPress website
Free WordPress themes for bloggers
Below is a list of top and free WordPress themes for bloggers, whether you are starting a new blog or looking to bring a new look to your existing one. These themes are already being used by hundreds of other bloggers like you. Here we go.
1. Cenote
Cenote is one of the finest themes for WordPress bloggers. A lightweight theme for your blog, the Cenote gives a neat and clean look with new generation layout. The theme is known for its simplicity and white space to enable a user-friendly website or blog.
Cenote theme can be used for various niches, such as technology, fashion, and lifestyle. It is also an SEO-friendly option that helps you rank easily on search engines.
2. Astra
Astra is a leading name in the WordPress themes arena. It is being used by thousands of users to power their personal blogs, business sites, portfolios, as well as ecommerce stores. It supports most of the well-known page builders for you to easily build your site.
The Astra WP theme also supports WooCommerce plugin, so that you can start your online store or ecommerce site. Furthermore, it also enables support for multiple languages with translation capability, allowing your visitors and customers to access your site in language of their choice.
The theme loads your site faster because it is a lightweight option. You can customize the colors and fonts on your site.
3. OceanWP
You might have already heard about the OceanWP theme, as it is one of the most popular WordPress themes for bloggers. Along with several free features, it also has some premium features which make the blog a powerful one.
Since it is a big name in the WP themes arena, it has got some exclusive companion plugins. When you activate the theme, it will suggest you to install a page builder to easily kickstart your blog designing. The bloggers of any niche can use this theme, along with business sites and online stores.
For the blog, OceanWP theme has got multiple options for layout, a couple of navigation menus at the top, upload your own logo, fullwidth pages, a number of sidebars, galleries, along with options to customize things.
Suggested reading: 4 best ways to find dead or broken links in WordPress
4. Ribosome
Another great theme for blogging in 2020 is Ribosome. It is great for magazines and personal blogs, as it allows you to customize the background, colors, header, etc.
You can add social media icons on the top of the website homepage and other pages. This theme provides you a single option for navigation menu. There is a sidebar on the right side of pages with a layout having two columns.
With Ribosome theme, you get six distinct Google Fonts, thumbnails in the round and square shapes, a couple of widgets to be added at the start and end of blog posts to show ads or suggested posts.
5. Hemingway
If you are looking for a clean and simple WordPress blog theme, then Hemingway is a great choice. It features a layout with two columns along with a full-width header image. The best thing about this theme is that it comes with a parallax effect.
Hemingway theme is customizable, allowing you to choose the colors, page templates, and ability to add your own logo, add widgets, etc. It is completely user-friendly and easy to set up.
6. Bento
For users who want a multi-purpose theme for a blog, Bento is a good option. It comes with numerous useful features for WordPress bloggers. Bento works seamlessly with most of the plugins and page builders. When you install the theme, it will suggest you to install the right page builders for blog setup.
Even the free version of Bento allows you to customize the look and feel of your blog. You can do so easily from the WordPress theme customizer.
Related read: 5 game-changing image optimization methods for WordPress sites
7. Maxwell
Looking for a theme with minimalistic and elegant design? Then Maxwell is the one for you. It is one of the top WordPress themes available for free with a clean magazine styled layout. We simply love the beautiful typography of the Maxwell theme. The key features of this theme include multiple layouts for blog posts and beautiful slideshow for posts.
8. Writee
Writee is another well-known free theme for WordPress bloggers. It is an ideal option for personal blogs, travel blogs, as well as adventure blogs. The theme allows you to add a slider of featured images and blog posts on the top.
You can add multiple widgets of your choice and several templates for a great blog.
9. Fascinate
Fascinate is a simple yet elegant WordPress theme for bloggers who are looking to build personal portfolios, blogs related to fashion and lifestyle niches, as well as content creators.
It is a beautiful and eye-catchy theme that engages the visitors. You can choose from the color schemes and typography. The featured slider is another great thing about this theme that adds an x-factor to your blog.
10. Lovecraft
Lovecraft is one of the best WordPress themes for bloggers today. It is a neat and clean theme known for the simplicity and white space. With this theme, you get a left sidebar, navigation menu on top, full-width header that can be customized, and much more. The headlines for your blog posts remain in bold with strong typography to drive user attention and clicks.
Must read: 6 easiest ways to monetize your WordPress blog for free
Handing over to you:
If you are looking for free WordPress themes for blog, then your search has ended here. You can choose any of the above-mentioned themes for your WordPress blog, depending on your choice and blog niche. These themes are user-friendly and good for SEO as well.
If you are already using a theme or know of more great themes, let us know via the comments below. Also, share with us about your choice from the above themes.
WordPress is completely dominating the world of content management systems (CMS), being used by more than one-third of the websites today. Because of its ease of use, simplicity, and features, it is become the preferred choice of bloggers and businesses.
However, one thing that keeps on scaring the website owners is the security of their website or blog. Since WordPress is the most popular CMS, hackers are targeting it with advanced tricks to exploit the websites. If you have a WordPress website and are not implementing any security practices, then your site remains at the risk of being attacked. Moreover, Google blacklists thousands of websites every week which are not secure or are vulnerable to cyberattacks.
Along with taking care of your business, content writing, marketing, and sales, you also need to take care of your website, because it is one of the most valuable assets of your business.
Also read: 4 best ways to find dead or broken links in WordPress
WordPress security tips to secure your site or blog
If you are serious about your website, then we have curated a few of the best WordPress security tips to avoid all forms of cyberattacks from your site.
1. Choose reliable web hosting provider
Web hosting providers play a crucial role in the quality of hosting services you use. If you use cheap web hosting and poor service provider, then don’t expect to have great security features. There is a reason behind the low cost of poor hosting providers. They don’t provide strong security features.
Hence, you should always power your website with a reliable web hosting, whether it is shared hosting, WordPress hosting, or cloud hosting. In case your websites face any security issues, the good service providers offer support to help you combat such issues. Cheap service providers don’t really provide support or aren’t available 24/7.
2. Avoid nulled website themes
Website development with WordPress is super easy because it comes with free and premium themes that can be used with no technical knowledge. All it takes is finding an appealing theme, live preview, install and activate it. There is no need of coding or programming.
While there are hundreds of themes available out there, you should never use nulled and poor themes. Always choose trustworthy and best WordPress themes for your site. Nulled themes can leave your website vulnerable to attacks, impact your performance and SEO.
Not all theme providers are reliable. Some provide free themes and then hack the websites that use those themes. It would be great to go for a premium theme because they are well-designed and are secure. Also, if you are choosing free themes, then make sure that it is reliable.
3. Use WordPress security plugins
Another great thing about WordPress is that there are plugins available for every purpose. You can find plugins for SEO, social media, email marketing, etc. It will be great to use some WordPress security plugin that can scan your website or blog for viruses, find malware, blacklist suspicious IP addresses, and limit the login attempts.
There are several good plugins available out there, which you can use and strengthen the security of your site on an automated basis. We recommend you use a plugin like Sucuri, Wordfence, Bulletproof, or iThemes security. All these plugins are available as both free and premium models. Some features are free, and some features come at a cost. If you have a new website, then even free features will work well. For established websites, we suggest opting for premium features.
4. Set strong password
Whether it is a social media account or your website, you should always use strong password. Use of weak and common passwords leave you at the risk of being hacked.
Many website owners use passwords like ‘qwerty12345′, abc123’, which are guessable and crack-able. If you are using such weak passwords, then instantly change it to a strong one. Here are a few tips to set strong passwords—your password should be more than 8 letters; it should contain both small and capital letters; it should have numeric characters and symbols. For example, ‘dFhjYu@4t0U’. Nobody can guess or remember such passwords.
Suggested reading: 5 game-changing image optimization methods for WordPress sites
5. Use SSL Certificate
SSL certificate has become an essential thing for websites today, because it improves security, helps you gain trust of visitors, and enhances your SEO.
Use of an SSL certificate moves your website from ‘not secure’ to ‘secure’, which means all the transactions and communications between the web browsers of users and your web server will be encrypted. This is a must-have security feature. Without it, the users will see a ‘not secure’ warning in the URL of your site, which will impact their trust. They wouldn’t consider a purchase on your site. Hence, install an SSL certificate today. It will also optimize your site for SEO.
Related read: How to install an SSL Certificate on WordPress site?
6. Use custom URL for WP-login
Most of the WordPress websites’ login URL is yourdomain.com/wp-admin. This means that everyone including the hackers know where they have to go to insert the login credentials or target a brute force attack.
What you can do is change it and use some custom login URL that only you know about. This will save your site from a lot of brute force attacks. You should also enable two-factor authentication on login page to further beef up your WordPress website security.
7. Keep everything up to date
One thing that many WordPress websites lack is that they don’t use the updated version of WordPress, and the themes and plugins. WordPress keeps on releasing new updates and bug fixes to improve the performance of the platform, add new features, and fix the security issues.
When you don’t update the WP to the latest version, you are at risk of attacks because hackers know about the vulnerability. Same goes for the themes and plugins. Hence, it is a great practice to keep everything updated for better security.
8. Regular backups
What if your website gets hacked and you lose all the data?
Despite using the best security practices for WordPress, sometimes there remains some loopholes or human error, which can result in your website getting hacked. Cybercriminals are very advanced today and stay a step ahead of us. If they hack the site and locks or deletes all your data, what will you do?
You can simply do nothing and loss your business. That’s why you should always have a backup of all your data, so that it can be recovered in cases of cyberattacks and disasters. You should create regular backups of your site, using a plugin or manually.
Read next: 6 easiest ways to monetize your WordPress blog for free
Handing over to you:
With the rise in cyberattacks against websites today, no website owner or blogger can afford to leave the site vulnerable to attacks. There should be the implementation of the best WordPress security tips.
Using the tips mentioned above, you can easily boost the security of your site and save it from many hacking attempts. If you have any questions, let us know via the comments below.
The web hosting market around the world will grow at a CAGR of 15.9% to reach a market value of $76.2 billion by 2023, as per a report by Market Research Future (MRFR).
Web hosting is one of the biggest business sectors in the IT industry, including numerous services for individuals, bloggers, and businesses of all sizes. These services include domain names, shared hosting, WordPress hosting, cloud hosting, SSL certificate, CDN, and many more.
Over the last few years, the competition among web hosting providers has increased. This is because of the rise in the number of online businesses looking for solutions to build their websites. Now, the web hosts are continuously improving the things on their end, lowering the prices, offering add-ons, and better support to beat the competition.
However, they are still stuck with several challenges related to the billing. As more and more customers sign up and buy web hosting services, the complexity increases at the billing end. Furthermore, the market is now filled with a broader set of services, rather than just shared hosting and domain names.
Related read: Give your web hosting ResellerClub SuperSite 2 storefront professional look with Prohost v2
Billing challenges for web hosting businesses
To beat the competition and make things easier for business, the web hosts have to overcome their billing challenges. In this article, we have curated the top billing challenges for web hosting providers.
1. Lack of integration between systems
Web hosters today are lacking the right tools or solutions that can help them integrate the multiple processes of their business. These processes include link between shopping cart and payment gateway, connection between payment gateway and billing system, and so on.
Without the proper integration between these processes and systems, it becomes difficult for the different teams to manage things and provide reliable support to customers. The right web hosting business tools can help in establishing the proper integration, right from the time of customer onboarding, shopping cart, billing system, and to provisioning of services.
Related read: Where to find custom WHMCS themes for your web hosting website?
2. Delays in payment
One of the biggest challenges for web hosting providers today is the delays in payment by customers. Whether it is an SMB or a large enterprise, delayed payments always impact the operations and cash flow in a negative manner. This is all the more challenging for the new businesses who are dependent on the regular cash flow by customers.
They need a solution which can help them to overcome this challenge right from onboarding the customer to delivering invoices, mailing reminders, to simplifying the overall payment process. Web hosts can use billing tools like WHMCS, Hostbill, or UberSmith to address this challenge and get the things going in a simpler manner.
3. Offering add-ons
To gain a competitive edge in the market, the web hosting providers have to be unique and provide additional products, offers and other such things to upsell the services. For example, if a customer is using shared hosting from a particular hosting provider, then it will be a great idea if that hosting provider offers SSL certificate on discount if the customer buys shared hosting for multiple years instead of one year.
Handling of invoices for such customizations and offering of add-on services are difficult to handle for billing teams. They have to check things and take care of everything on their own, unless they use the right billing tools that can manage custom orders.
4. Identification of fraud orders/transactions
Security issues and fraud are the new norms in today’s era of digital transformation. Almost every online business is facing this challenge and things are the same for web hosts. Fraud orders and transactions can’t be identified or detected unless the billing teams work on such transactions.
They need to find such orders even before their occurrence or simply avoid having to accept fraud transactions. Implementation of billing tools that can help in avoiding or detecting fraudulent orders will prove to be a boon for billing teams.
5. Handling tax and VAT
Regardless of the country of operation, you have to manage and handle the charging of accurate tax and VAT for the customers. It’s a tough task for the billing and finance teams to accurately handle all the transactions with tax on the basis of country of operation.
Use of a software like WHMCS and using the right WHMCS themes for web hosting providers can solve this challenge.
Suggested reading: Enabling Automated Backups in WHMCS (Importance and methods)
6. Scalability
The requirements of web hosting services keep on changing for the customers. A customer who has chosen shared hosting plan might switch to dedicated hosting or cloud server in the next months. In such cases, they will change their service plan and package, which means you have to upgrade the billing process.
If the billing process is not seamless and convenient, the customers may leave and go to other service providers. Having a seamless billing is yet another big challenge for the web hosts. Automation of such upgrades and customizations can help in addressing this challenge.
7. Accepting local payments
Good businesses are those who provide their customers the payment options of their preference. It is not a good practice to accept payments only using the options of your choice. Not all customers prefer to pay via debit or credit cards. Not all of them might be comfortable with PayPal. You have to take care of their preference and provide them local payment options as well, such as PayTm in India.
But challenge here is that you need to have support for all the payment options. For this, you should use tools that support most of the top and preferred payment gateways and merchant processors. Don’t let a customer go because he/she can’t find a payment option of their choice or preference.
8. Supporting multiple currencies
While USD is the most common currency used by businesses today, but if a customer from different country whose local currency is no dollar is looking to buy services from you, how will he do that? That’s why it is essential to support multiple currencies, which are used mostly or on the basis of the countries where you operate.
However, the management and invoicing of orders with multiple currencies is one of the biggest challenges for web hosting providers. They need to use some automation software or tool for that.
If you are looking to use a billing software for your web hosting business, then always look for this feature so that you can provide support for multiple currencies and accept local payments easily.
Read next: 4 best ways to find dead or broken links in WordPress
Handing over to you:
These are a few of the biggest challenges for web hosting providers today. By using an automated billing solution, best web hosting themes, and other essentials, the service providers can address these challenges.
If you have any query, let us know via the comments below.
If you have a WordPress website or blog, then you may have come across pages or posts showing 404 error or other such errors. This happens because the link of that page or post has got broken. And the broken links are really bad for the SEO of your site and provides a poor user experience to the visitors as they see nothing there but an error.
In case you don’t fix the broken links on time, it can impact your website ranking on Google and other search engines. Before learning how to fix a broken link in WordPress, let’s first clear exactly what is a broken link.
What are broken links in WordPress?
As the name suggests, the links that have got broken or dead are known as broken links. These links don’t work and show error when visited.
The links can get broken in several cases, such as if you have made changes to the URL and not redirected the old URL to new one, or if you have deleted a page or post, etc. In these cases, your server will show a 404 error to the visitors.
Broken links can also occur if there are any typos in the links that you don’t notice until analyzing the site for such errors. This is the reason you have to monitor your WordPress website for broken links and other such things on a regular basis. Because if you don’t do, your SEO will be impacted significantly.
Suggested reading: 5 game-changing image optimization methods for WordPress sites
Finding broken links in WordPress
1. Use SEMRush
SEMRush is one of the most reliable digital marketing and SEO tools that you can use to find broken links and analyze other things on the website. It comes with a website audit tool to monitor your site and detect if there are any errors like broken links.
To use this tool, you need to register for an account which is a premium service. But if you don’t want any paid service, then don’t worry as you get free trial also. With free trial, you can check 100 pages on your site.
Once registered, visit the Side Audit option in SEMRush and then click on New Site Audit button. Paste or write your domain name and choose the number of pages you want the tool to monitor. Start crawling.
Wait for a couple of minutes while SEMRush does its job and shows you the report. From here, find the Broken link section and export the report.
2. Install Broken Link Checker plugin
The best way to find broken links is to install the Broken Link Checker plugin on your website. It will analyze your site and look for the links that are broken.
Along with broken links, it will also look for missing images and redirects and notify you by mail or dashboard. Moreover, you can configure it to disable broken links from being crawled by Google so that your rankings don’t get affected.
What you need to do is search and install it from the plugins section. Once installed, activate it and configure. Open the Broken Link Checker plugin, hover to Settings and click on Link Checker.
It will start crawling the broken links on your site and may take a few minutes depending on the number of posts and pages. If any such links are detected, it will show these up in a new tab. You will also receive a notification for the same in the dashboard.
To avoid future broken links from ruining your SEO, you can configure the plugin to notify you whenever any broken link is detected.
3. Use ahrefs
Another efficient way to check broken links is the ahrefs tool. It is a well-known tool in the digital marketing arena and also helps in finding broken links.
Open ahrefs broken link checker tool in your browser, enter your domain name or URL in the search bar, and click on Check Broken Links button. It will start the process and take some time to detect all the broken links on your site.
Along with showing broken links on your site, it will also show the broken links to your site.
Must read: 6 easiest ways to monetize your WordPress blog for free
4. Chrome Extension: Broken Link Checker
If you are a Google Chrome user, then it will be great to install the Broken Link Checker chrome extension. Whether you want to check broken links on a page that you are on or the entire site, this extension will work efficiently.
It is a great alternative if you don’t want to use a lot of plugins on your site and don’t aim to browse other tools. Since it is an installed extension, the things become seamless for you. If you are on a page, all you would need to do is a couple of clicks to check dead links on that page.
Fixing broken links:
Now that you have used the above methods to find the broken links, it is time to fix them. The best thing you can do is redirect the wrong URLs to right ones so that the visitors will be automatically redirected to the new URLs. If a link has been removed permanently, then redirect such links to your main homepage or the blog homepage.
For setting up redirections, you can use a plugin like 301 redirects.
Handing over to you:
While there are several tools and methods to detect broken or dead links on your site, we have curated the best ways for you in this article. These are very reliable options and will definitely help you to meet your purpose. If you have any queries, feel free to reach out to us via the comments section below.
Read Next: Top 9 simple tips to secure your WordPress site in today’s era of cyberthreats