Last updated on May 29th, 2023
It’s almost the end of 2022 and it’s time to improve your website or blog to grab more opportunities to do new and exciting things.
If you have a website or blog, this is the perfect time to think about your goals for 2023. What are you already doing? What do you need to do more of (or less of) to be successful? Where do you want to be a year from now?
Don’t panic!😒
Here are 9 things you can think about today that will help you to make your blog better in 2023.
Are you thrilled? Let’s drive in…
Jump ahead to:
9 Ways to Improve Your Website in 2023
1. Get a Professional Blog Design
A blog design matters a lot for your brand. Because your blog design is the very first thing your audience will notice before reading blog content.
But design costs you a bit of money…I’m not giving you false hope that you can create a good looking blog free of cost…
If you’re a WordPress user it would be great to make your blog amazing. Only you need to pick a decent WordPress theme.
Believe it or not, you don’t have to use the default theme that came installed on your blog! When I see a WordPress blog using the plain Twenty Eleven theme, I just die inside. There’s a better way!
There are TONS of themes line Neve, Avada, etc available online that come at a reasonable price. Even they’re simple to install and customize on your own.
Still, if you are not sure or you fear theme customization, you can hire WordPress developers from freelance websites like Fiverr.
For those on free wordpress.com blogs, your choices are unfortunately limited.
The fact is, no matter what blogging niche you’re in or how you present your blog content, the way your site looks is important.
Don’t fool yourself – a logo made in Canva and slapped on a free blog theme does not look professional and it never will be.
Instead of fretting about the cost, think about the benefits of solid branding, a polished experience for visitors, and the increased potential for your blog in 2023.
2. Make Sure Your Site is Technically Sound
Is something displaying incorrectly on your blog or homepage? Are your blog website buggy and full of errors? Or got outdated themes and plugins?
The new year 2023 is a great time to improve your website. Basically, when you look at your blog all the time, it’s easy to block out things like broken images/links, javascript errors, or other issues.
But for the first time, visitors aren’t going to ignore those issues, and neither are search engine bots as they attempt to crawl or index your site.
Be aware of that and take time to review your site for anything that doesn’t work the way it should. If you find issues then fix them instantly! Or if you don’t know, ask for help or hire developers.
3. Make Sure Your Site is Secure
On average, 30,000 websites are hacked every day. Every 39 seconds, a new cyber attack happens somewhere on the web.
While nearly 43% of websites are using WordPress on the web. And you never heard of any news article, tweets, or blog posts, about hacked WordPress sites.
If you talk to many other bloggers or business owners, I’m sure you know someone who has been hacked, stolen, and/or injected with malware.
Don’t let it happen to you!
Below are just a few ways to improve your website security in 2023:
- Login page
- Admin user
- Database prefix
- Malware scans
Whether or not you realize it, your WordPress website is attacked by Brute Force, Malware injection, or many more.
If you want to protect yourself….
Firstly, Limit Login Attempts plugin. This plugin provides a simple way to protect your site by blocking (IP) and/or username from making further login attempts.
It also makes a brute-force attack difficult or impossible. If the bots can’t keep trying, they’re less likely to find a way in.
Secondly, I use & highly recommend the iTheme security plugin. It includes an endpoint firewall and malware scanner that was built from the ground up to protect WordPress.
Also, they include Brute Force protection, 2FA, and a suite of additional features, which makes iTheme security the most comprehensive WordPress security solution.
Even iThemes Security setup and onboarding experience are designed to allow anyone to secure their WordPress website in under 10 minutes, without becoming a tech guru.
After-all website security is the most crucial part to make your blog safe and secure.
4. Make Your Site Backups
BACK. UP. YOUR. SITES. This one is a no-brainer, right? Surely you’re already doing this! There is no way I can emphasize this enough.
Never assume that your host, server admin, tech support, or web designer makes regular backups of your site.
Do not trust that your site will always be “fine” and that you’ll never need a backup.
Do not assume that a database backup is enough to restore your site. Also do not store backups inside your hosting account.
Because they won’t do you a bit of good if your server crashes or your hosting account is compromised.
Do yourself a favor and get BackupBuddy. Yes, it’s a little expensive, but it’s easy to configure, syncs with Dropbox and Amazon A3, and a number of other storage services.
With this ninja, you can create full backups of your entire site that you can restore by running a simple script.
Even over half a million site owners are using it which makes Backupbuddy the most reliable backup solution.
Be aware that you will never regret having a reliable, well-supported backup solution that actually works.
5. Get a Better Blog Host
End of the day if your site does not load properly or within 3 seconds, your website visitors will run away.
Now, Raise your hand if your sites are hosted with traditional shared hosting. I’m not saying shared hosting is bad, for beginners or new websites shared hosting is good enough.
But before choosing shared hosting make sure It’s worth it. For new websites, Shared hosting providers like Bluehost, and Inmotion Hosting is worth your money.
Now if you already have been with them and your site is starting to grow I suggest that you scale your hosting plan from shared to managed hosting or VPS hosting.
Now raise your other hand if you want fast website load, uptime, and site performance that do not get you from shared hosting.
The good news is, that you aren’t stuck with a host that doesn’t meet your needs. Even if you prepaid for 2 or 3 years in advance.
Back in 2021 I was with shared hosting (Godaddy) and my site load was extremely bad and uptime sucks.
Then I decided to move to a better host like (Bluehost which I’m currently using) which literally makes my site performance better than ever.
It has never gone offline since I moved to Bluehost and I pass Google core vitals as well. If you want to grow and rank on Google, excellent web hosting matters a lot.
I won’t even recommend a particular host which I didn’t use, lest I come across as biased Bluehost (for Small sites) and Cloudways are worth it and you’ll be just fine.
Just avoid cheap hosting and get a better host because at the end of the day, it is said you get what you pay for.
Good Hosting is such a blogging tool that you firmly need to improve your website speed in 2023.
6. Audit Your WordPress Plugins
While you shouldn’t be afraid of WordPress plugins, there’s also such a thing as overindulgence.
Go through your website’s plugins to see what you need and what you don’t. Get rid of any inactive ones.
Replace any that haven’t been updated in the last year. Lose the ones that aren’t working the way you thought they would and take a few minutes to find something better.
Having tons of plugins dragging down your site most technically is heavy on your site. Back in 2021, my blog (Passive Blogger) had 33 plugins that were literally heavy on my site.
Then I figured out and uninstalled some of them. Now I have only 19 plugins on Passive Blogger which literally speed up my blog.
If your site takes forever to load and you aren’t sure why to check your plugin list and get rid of them and/or replace them.
Replacing or uninstalling plugins gives my site extra space to load fast. I’m aware that I’m telling you to install a plugin that you actually needed. Trust me on this.
7. Write Better Blog Content
How was your traffic in 2022? How about engagement and social shares for your blog posts? If these aspects were lacking, maybe it’s time to review your content strategy for 2023.
Wait, what’s that? You don’t have a content strategy and you’re just kind of winging it?
Writing random blog posts that pop into your head? Posting blog posts that don’t inform, entertain, OR educate? Perhaps that’s why you aren’t happy with your traffic and/or engagement.
Technically, You aren’t writing content that makes people want to come back and then look at your content strategy.
No matter what else you do with your blog, the content you write brings people back or makes them run away.
If your blogs are boring, full of grammar and spelling errors, or irrelevant to your audience, you’re going to have a very hard time building your successful blogging business.
Being able to create awesome content goes back to knowing your audience and your blog’s purpose.
If you know what you’re writing and who you’re writing for, it should be fairly simple to figure out what to write.
No one can hit it out of the park every single time, but you should try for a well-written, interesting, and error-free blog post.
It could be hard at the beginning but daily practice makes you a good blog writer. Of course, you could use, grammar checker tools & blog writing tools to write better.
But somehow and someway you need to focus on improving blog writing, at the end that will improve your blog readership and grow blog profit.
8. Make It Easy for People to Find You
There are a lot of opinions out there about what, where, and how to share online.
Some people, tell or recommend removing or minimizing your “follow me” icons to focus on building your email list.
Some will tell you to limit your social accounts to the few you like most, while others (like Pat Flynn) think you should “be everywhere.”
I don’t really care how you choose to engage with your audience. It makes no difference to me. But make sure whatever methods you use are obvious and easy for people to find.
If you want me to use your contact form, put up a contact page with a link in your menu. If you want me to email you, put your email address on your site!
Also, If you want me to follow you on Twitter (I’m @fdshakil by the way – I love Twitter!), put an icon or link or button somewhere.
By the way, social media would be a great choice for everyone. Because social media is a bigger part of our lives than ever, and that isn’t going away in a few decades.
Even if you aren’t willing to jump on Facebook or Twitter just yet, it’s important to communicate with other people who share your online interests.
From reading other blogs/sites in your niche to joining online groups (Passive Blogger), there are many ways to get to know other people who are both interesting to you and interested in what you have to say.
It’s also essential that your website provides an easy way for visitors to share your content with their social networks.
There’s a reason why every website you visit has icons at the end of each post– they’re encouraging readers to say, “Hey, friends on [insert social platform]! I read this article and enjoyed it, and I think you will, too!”
Word of mouth is the best way to promote and grow anything on the internet, and you don’t want to miss out on those opportunities by excluding social media from your repertoire
Want to get in touch with me? facebook- @shakilfd and Twitter- @fdshakil. I’d love to connect with you.
9. Set Blog Goals
What is your blogging purpose? What do you want to do in 2023 that you haven’t done in 2022?
Do you dream of opening your own online business? Getting more affiliate sales? Writing for a major website or publisher? Now is the time to make the right decisions that will get you closer to those goals!
Set up a blog marketing plan, writing plan, and more that you can achieve in 2023.
Whatever you do, don’t tell yourself you can’t. I just finished my third year of running a semi-successful blogging business.
And I have gone through many adverse situations and I never could have done it if I wasted time on “can’t.”
Instead, start focusing on what you CAN do, right here at the beginning of 2023, to reach whatever goals you may set for yourself, whether they’re business goals, personal goals, or both.
Make sure to track your daily activities and play 80/20 rules, believe me, it will not only improve your blog but the overall growth of your blogging business.
Putting it All Together
At the beginning of this post, I mentioned the unrealistic goals we tend to form; the ones that give all the control to external factors.
However, it would be dumb to assume that people don’t want higher traffic or larger stats – how else do we measure our progress?
By determining your blog purpose, writing great content, making your site visually and technically appealing, and harnessing social media, you are ensuring the continued growth of your blogging business.
I have never known a blogger or website owner who did those things and didn’t experience growth.
While you can’t focus solely on the numbers, you can rest assured that making these improvements to your site WILL result in greater things to come in 2023.
What are your future goals for your website in 2023? How do you plan to reach them? Or do you still have some planning left to do?
