The Weekly Bulletin | March 19, 2024

Hi SODP community,

Let’s recap on what’s been happening, the new content, industry updates, tips, and more.

TIP OF THE WEEK

By Aslam Multani, CTO & Co-founder, Multidots

Last month, we hosted WP Publisher Success Week. Day 3 featured a workshop on workflow and website performance. This tip of the week is a summary of the advice Aslam Multani shared with the attendees on optimizing the performance of WordPress-based websites.

Whether you already have your digital publication on WordPress, or you are planning to migrate to the WordPress CMS, there are multiple things you can do to improve performance.

During WP Publisher Success Week, Aslam Multani, CTO and Co-founder of Multidots, identified 5 main aspects:

1️⃣ Choose compatible themes and page builders

Your choice of theme can have a huge impact on your website performance and CWV metrics. If you are migrating to WordPress, pick a theme that is compatible with the page builder you plan to use for the site.

2️⃣ Use fewer plugins

While plugins are great for customizing your website and adding new features, they can also severely compromise performance.

3️⃣ Stick with native architecture

When it comes to content architecture, the best option from a performance perspective is to go with the native architecture. Whether it is articles or any other type of content elements, use WordPress native custom box types or taxonomies for better performance and future extendibility.

4️⃣ Use optimized hosting platform

Using a managed WordPress hosting instead of standard hosting can have a big impact on performance. With managed hosting, you don’t have to worry about managing servers and keeping track of security updates.

5️⃣ Continuous monitoring

Performance optimization is not a one-time task. Even if you have optimized everything before launch, a lot can change over time, including changes to critical pages, new content, algorithms, security parameters, and plugins.

SODP POSTS

Ebook: WP Publisher Success Week – Key Learnings from WordPress Experts

WordPress dominates Google’s search engine results pages because it significantly simplifies the optimization process for its users.

However, with competition for the audience’s attention and engagement at an all-point high, publishers have to go the extra mile and apply best practices in managing and optimizing the performance of their WordPress sites.

That’s why last month, in partnership with Multidots, we hosted WP Publisher Success Week – to help publishers learn best practices from leading experts in the field.

This ebook is a summary of learnings from the event, highlighting WordPress best practices that every digital publisher that uses or plans to use this CMS must know.

The ebook gives you access to:

• A summary of learnings

• Video recordings of all sessions

• Presentation slides

JOB BOARD

➡️ The Economist is seeking an editor to work on social media, newsletters and other digital platforms (NYC, NY, US). SEE MORE

➡️ The Seattle Times is hiring an Assistant Metro Editor to lead its government team (Seattle, WA, US). SEE MORE

COMMUNITY BUZZ

Industry News

➡️ Google is rolling out a change to the perspectives filter, renaming it from perspectives to forums. A Google spokesperson told Search Engine Land the word “forums” is a more intuitive name when seeking out that content. Google also told that searchers can use this filter to hone in on results from hundreds of forums from across the web. READ MORE

➡️ The Associated Press is launching an e-commerce site called AP Buyline, powered by Taboola. It's part of a broader effort by the AP to diversify its business by adding more consumer revenue. READ MORE

Social Media Discussions

➡️ Jecelyn Yeen on LinkedIn:

Web Perf tip! Use the big row settings in the Network panel to observe resources and fetch priority changes. #ChromeDevTools

READ THE FULL POST

These are the highlights for the last week.

Until next!

Vahe Arabian and the editorial team at SODP