The Ultimate WordPress Guide/Checklist: What to Do Before and After Setting Up Your Website
Ugochukwu Sullivan
WordPress Theme & Plugin Developer | Streamlining and Documenting Setup Processes for Beginners
Every WordPress developer/designer should have a go-to list of required pre and post-setup practices. I keep mine in a somewhat messy Notion table. But hey, it's there.
Whether you're building for a client or personal use, having a checklist is how you give yourself the feeling of being “experienced” so you don't repeat mistakes.
Today, I’ll walk you through:
(1) WordPress Pre-Setup Checklist
Evaluate Competitors
I view this as a way to learn from those who came before, evaluating competitors provides valuable insights into industry standards and best practices. By doing this, you can:
This information helps you understand what works well in your industry and what areas you can improve or innovate on.
Don't Build Off the Top of Your Head
Having a prototype is incredibly valuable as it serves as a roadmap for your development process, giving you clear direction and promoting a smooth workflow. Additionally, it allows you to spot any potential issues in the early stages.
WordPress(.org) or WordPress(.com)
With the typical WordPress approach, you'll be responsible for managing everything on your own. This includes handling files, databases, security, backups, and more. However, when it comes to WordPress.com, limitations are often a concern, regardless of the plan.
There may be some issues with plugin compatibility, limitations on certain themes, and restrictions on third-party integrations. However, there's something I really enjoy about building client websites on WordPress.com - it brings me a sense of peace and tranquility. With their Business plan, I feel confident and at ease knowing that they provide:
These features, among others, make WordPress.com a reliable choice despite its limitations.
Researching the Right Hosting Provider
This decision is crucial, as the success of your website often partially depends on their services. It's ideal to choose a provider that:
These features ensure your site runs smoothly, remains secure, and is well-prepared for any potential issues.
Choose Your Theme and Page Builder:
When it comes to choosing a theme, it's important to find one that suits your requirements and has all the necessary features. Take a moment to think about the font capabilities of the theme, particularly if you're not utilizing Google or prebuilt fonts. Make sure to consider the size of the theme, the available customization options, and whether it is compatible with your chosen page builder.
(2) WordPress Development Checklist
Set Up a Local Development Environment
Constantly making changes to your live website files can be risky, but I must confess that I've done it quite a bit with staging sites (judge me). Creating new features, testing, and potentially breaking your site in a local environment feels forgivable. My first attempt with WordPress CI/CD and Git resulted in accidentally erasing website files and merging them—it wasn't a laughing matter.
Unlike those early days, I now begin every development journey with a Local by WP Engine environment, and it has revolutionized my workflow.
Create an Online Staging Environment & Setup CI/CD
Working with a local environment can be quite enjoyable, but it can become a bit of a hassle on a low-end PC where clearing cache after every change is necessary. It also limits tasks like setting up SMTP, payments, or anything requiring SSL.
That's where an online staging environment becomes important—it's a version of your live site that you can mess with. It allows you to set up and preview everything before pushing changes live, simply by clicking a single button, which is super cool.
Connecting your local and staging environments is pretty straightforward. There are a couple of options available to you for syncing your staging files with local files. One option is to build a pipeline yourself, while another option is to use a third-party service.
If you're interested in a more detailed guide on connecting these environments, check out my article [here].
Set Up Backup & Disaster Recovery Plans
Whenever I'm not using Jetpack, I trust UpdraftPlus to handle scheduled backups of my site, ensuring that they are stored safely in Google Drive. If there is an unfortunate incident where my site breaks and I am unable to access the admin dashboard for a quick restore, I will take the necessary steps to troubleshoot the issue, identify the problem, and retrieve the backed-up file from UpdraftPlus. I can quickly replace the corrupted files and restore functionality.
Regularly having your hosting provider back up your site is incredibly beneficial, providing an additional layer of security and peace of mind.
(3) WordPress Maintenance Checklist
I won't lecture you about the importance of regularly updating your theme or plugins, but I do recommend setting up site audits with Ahrefs.
This has completely transformed my experience. With Ahrefs, I can easily keep track of my website's overall health and identify any potential issues that could negatively impact my SEO performance. This includes monitoring domain rating (DR), broken links, duplicate pages, broken images, and more.
Optionally, you should set up Google Analytics and configure Search Console. If you're big on privacy, you can also consider Phantom Analytics.
(4) WordPress Security Checklist
Implement Security Measures
Sucuri and Wordfence are top players in WordPress security. Which is better, you ask? I've used both, and they serve their purpose well. Wordfence's free plugin offers some extra features, like two-factor authentication (2FA) and other enhancements that add an extra layer of security.
Both offer a Web Application Firewall (WAF) though.
Monitor for Downtime and Heartbeat
As part of disaster recovery, being alerted if your website ever goes down is essential. I use BetterStack to monitor site status and heartbeat, ensuring I'm immediately aware of any issues.
(5) WordPress Post-Setup Checklist
Optimize for Speed
Having a beautiful but slow website is like... (I’m not in the mood for quotes right now). Here's the point: when you have a fast website, everyone likes you—Google, your users, yourself, and even me. Yes, me.
I don't rely solely on caching and speed plugins. I start with optimizing my theme, CSS size, the bundler I use, and my images. I use what I call the RCCR method to optimize my images:
This ensures my page sizes are very lightweight and load quickly.
Final Words
Here you have it—compulsory steps I take with all my sites. There's more, and I'll keep adding as I find better processes to set up the foundations of my websites.
Use this WordPress Developer checklist as a starting point, but make it your own. Build on it by documenting each step you take as you progress. This way, you'll know what works best for you and can constantly tweak and improve your process.